Setting the Circumstance

The river is low
runs once red turn ashen
boney residue
swollen mud and cattle footprints
Old West prints for sale
But we took the boat out anyway

An old new skiff with wooden oars
light skimming across the open flats
watch the fat fish backs
in arcs, simple muscle tailing loops of spray

Water tension release
and we’re gone
past the fair weather boaters
their umbrellas red and green and blue and yellow
turning round in a supple merry-go-round
a half-assed circle snagging trout
a hundred and fifty click

The river is low
I remark needlessly
watching the banks encroaching ever so slightly

in

in this riffle
this patch of green or light or gold
I’ll spot a fish

Today a trout hunter
today a casting lesson and its on
downstream
down the rising tide
the lofty expectations of fried chicken licking Mississippians
Montana sucks
(a little more obscenely)
I’m done

But then we’re out and down
the wooden oars golden in the afternoon
honey
I’d thought to lick it off
watching the currents mesh, entwine, then separate on their common journey
our common journey

I felt the tired breeze
on the back of my burning neck
and thought of this dropping river bed
this stone cold tomb and womb
birthing place of rhyme and half-wild trout
some a little more wily than others

Tattered hats and loose shirts
wrinkled from the day before
always the day before and another client
another frustration
airing like the sweated rental gear
its all neoprene and size ten boots here anyway

I’d rather talk it quiet and think aloud
I’d rather not mention
the oar creaks
the turning rhythm of moving
the river whispers some
but it garbles the words and I’m lost
lost when I close my eyes
this or that play of light
the yellow russet hews
words beneath the rocks?
I cannot understand them
though I listen
listen now and then

We passed the known named places
a shelf, a run, The Swirl
some empty
some occupied
shouting greetings
Hey
I feel like a coke
looking back, at a shelf, a drop
the upstream is raised
it raises the sun

We pulled into the slow water behind an old car body
The Steering Wheel
slowing to watch for heads
turning to see
startled
a bloated rainbow
pale
face down dead
age
nature
carelessness
hold your breath then breathe
hold your breath in this heat then wait
feel the burn
then realize
it’s all the same
we rowed on

In the hazy heat sitting eyes closed on the water
it feels like you’re sitting on the water
glide
I felt the graphite quiver
the run
the retrieve
but most of all the shiver
that one instant and now
for a moment
twenty
at least it’s there
that fleeting connection
millions alone
baptism
venture into this water and wait
baptism
seeking a connection
a slow persistent tug
in that haze
I feel and felt
a thousand shadows
a thousand spirits
each a little different
rising and pull
running and the throb deep
he’ll shake you off that way

Pirates in the shallows
VPs in the deep
circling like sharks the distant aquifer

Shadows become shadows
transparent solids become mirages cloaked in sunlight
the heartless burning sun
engenders life
life and trout working a seam, a shelf
spinning this toiling sun
heartless
a lidless eye

Turning I see him stalking
the soft brush of wings
turning I see him casting
soft, delicate
the tireless stroke easy
soulless
soulful
it twists and unfolds in perfect loops
always a perfect circle descending
a constant rhythm unbroken by me
the evening
the loose spin undone

I’m open now
for suggestions

Standing wet in the deep trough between rocks
naked without neoprene
not quite
another fly
another arc
tracing the rod tip back and forth across the sky
waiting
it’s all about the lighting this lighting’s perfect
their heads appear bigger
distorted by refraction and projected just a little further upstream
I’m thinking this doesn’t matter
he lands six inches off
two inches on
we were there
I see it in my mind
slightly before the cast is done
I see it
cussing himself if his vision is blurry
cursing the snotty fish
ignoring the stupid ones
he’s on to them
two or three
still they rise

And then it moved back
its head a bullet
its mouth white in the golden heartless sun
moving
he dropped it
small twist of thread and feather
down and down on top of him
until
the inexplicable timing of things
the long wait
then he pulls the line and water and fish in a thin spray
he’s there

I watched and watch a fish
a brown trout
a toad
(twenty something)
shake its head and shake the fly
or break the knot

We moved on to old commitments
there’s always a commitment
but it’s all in the timing
in the initial set of situation and circumstance

The river is low
drained of evening light
swollen with summer
but we take the boat out anyway
a skiff
wooden oars
golden honey of sun
and the trout illuminate
watching the fly go down