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Fisherman
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Wrapped in marine air, he
unfurls his net.
Exhaling, the sea seeks
the nylon snare, and the blue
belly fish skim
each other’s fins, scarcely struggling
to fight the inevitable
hunter’s claw.
Suffocating, the sapphire sun
pierces their fishy flesh like a violent dagger.
Their instinctual hearts
not knowing why
they were lifted into the atmosphere
of such poisonous pressure, lungs
collapse under the gravity, die,
hysterical, terrorized.
A smile reflects
on the brilliant crystal waves.
He, with his human eyes
untouched by such foreign agony
counts
each pretty corpse
and sails on,
like God’s shadow
through the caldron
of the inescapable Earth.
.Copyright © 1991 by Allison Grayhurst
amazon.com/author/allisongrayhurst
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First published in “Beneath the Surface, McMaster Creative Writing” Winter 1990/1991, under the pseudonym “Jocelyn Kain” aka “Allison Grayhurst”
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You can listen to the poem by clicking below:
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“Grayhurst’s rapturous outpouring of imagery makes her poems easily enjoyable … Like a sear the poet seeks to fathom sensual and spiritual experience through the images of a dream.” Canadian Literature
“Allison Grayhurst’s Common Dream is a massive book by a talented and enthusiastic young writer, with a feel for descriptive, meaningful verse. Philosophical and very deep,” Paul Rance, editor of Eastern Rainbow, U.K., spring 1993.
“Her poems read like the journal entries of a mystic – perhaps that what they are. They are abstract and vivid, like a dreamy manifestation of soul. This is the best way, in prose, one can describe the music which is … the poetry of Allison Grayhurst,” Blaise Wigglesworth Oh! Magazine
“Rich images and complex, shifting metaphors drive Allison Grayhurst’s poems. She focuses on sexual love and interior landscapes, widening to include the heart, eternity and all.” Next Exit
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