a magazine for anglers
by Henry Hughes
Fishing for stripers off Long Island
Double hauling
your best ten-weight
downwind
put me right on those bass
driving bunker insane against black musseled rocks.
Stripping fast
through tern whirl and splash—
the oily chop moving off,
leaving my big white deceiver
swinging to the boat.
You put it in gear
to get me closer. A friend
even after
miles of arguments
and that Bridgeport backcast
that hooked your wife—
my two a.m. confession,
drinking whisky at Danfords.
This daybreak tide
so painfully clear
we don’t need GPS
to find our spot. Can you get me closer?
Rolling a lead-eyed hackle
to the riot’s edge. Mouth and tail again. Come on, take it!
Damn. A little closer.
Another cast, but they’re cooling off.
Cut the engine.
Oh, man. Too close. Back off.
Something in your eyes, your hand
on the throttle. The fish gone.
We got too close, I drop my rod.
Too fucking close.
Henry Hughes grew up on Long Island, New York and he now lives on the Luckiamute River in Oregon. His first collection of poems, Men Holding Eggs, received the 2004 Oregon Book Award. His second book, Moist Meridian, was chosen by Robert Pinsky as a finalist for the 2011 Oregon Book Award. He is the editor of the anthology, The Art of Angling: Poems about Fishing (Knopf, 2011) and his commentary on new poetry appears regularly in Harvard Review.
