My
grandmother used to take us fishing.
Years later I had a dream of that shore:
Feet
dangling from the pier,
she’d
bait our hooks and
take
the fish off.
Most
too small to keep,
she’d
throw them back.
Sometimes,
we’d get one we could take home.
Once
in a while we’d catch a crab.
They
were tenacious and hard to shake off,
despite
our best work,
and
Grandma was often tasked there too.
Years later I had a dream of that shore:
I’d
waded in, hands in the water,
trying to catch a great big fish.
The
fish was beautiful,
all
the colors of the rainbow and more:
it
seemed to shine with gold and silver;
it had a preternatural light.
it had a preternatural light.
No
matter how hard I tried,
I
could not grab that fish.
Long
after I awoke, the dream stayed with me.
I
couldn’t catch it,
and
I couldn’t let it go.
© Julianne
Carlile