The Old Men on the Bank

The Old Men on the Bank

The quest is not in the catch.
They come to stand among trees
like firs in the old forest
footed by soft pine needles.
They come to hear the river
croon at the bright cresting moon.
They come to cast corkies; small
colored floats with barbed hooks
that imitate red salmon roe.
They come to fill the empty
spaces for dead fishing friends
feel the analgesic river
like morphine flowing through  veins.
Mostly they come because of
habit. A habit triggered
by the Springer’s spring cycle.

Before first light, pickup trucks
towing drift boats invade the
Rogue Elk Cafe, as fishers
refuel their coffee mugs’ and
grizzled veterans reunite.
Bankers, as they are branded
exchange their gifts of tall tales,
share prize fish-smoking recipes
renew the ritual of spring.
Some boast of former catches,
others silent, content to glimpse
at slivers of the dawn’s rays
and ponder the missing, like
fingers tracing names in the
morning’s obituary column.
The Springer season begins.

The bankers stake out prime spots
Along the river’s edges
Like gold miners hoarding veins,
protecting precious ore.
New faces fill the empty
spaces of the missing men.
Soon “fish on!” reverberates
from excited voices whose
taut lines tug at tired arms
As large fish shake, flip, and flop-
An old dance, deeply ingrained
Ancestral remnants; leftovers,
Orts of evolution that urge
return again and again
to the holy water where
the fish we seek come to die
like the old men on the bank.