A Fish

Underwater liver, hider behind
rotted sog logs
mover that moves
in a quiver from dark water
to darker, I lure you
with plastic pollywog from water.

Avid hand distorts in reach
to retrieve you, refracted numbed else thing
underwater, touches slick shiver
never knew before. You bring so much

(not to mind, for mind cannot reach
back so deep and be sane-safe) but to touch
you recall the raw raunch,
numb rut before grunt on beach
before even raw couplers, tail to tail,
where seminal moil seems steam

in water over mere fecundity.
You bring so much to touch,
slip witch, gaped with gasping,
muscling out of hand slick with you.

I needed $15. A friend commissioned a poem entitled “A Fish.” This was long, long, long ago.