The Fishing

all my life,
the old folks
have been saying:
“...the fishing isn’t what it was”
but it hasn’t been
since before I was born
so I think they could use
a new thing to mourn
like the fact that all their houses
are too big for two
and too expensive
for the likes of you and I
(waiting on the past to die)
no one knows
they’re hoarding
when it happens
when the nets are full
you pull them in
and celebrate extinction
when you’re a lord of land
it seems divinely destined
you believe that work makes free
for all whom you’ve imprisoned
locked in the stocks
you decimated
from the living that you killed
bragging of the mortgage-free
prison property you built
(as you give the future the bill)
and every day, my friends and I
bait our hooks
with hope because
the fishing isn’t
what it was

~ ~ ~

January 14, 2026
Digby, Nova Scotia

Year 19, Day 6639 of my daily journal.