fishing boats on liangzi lake

Fishing Boats on Liangzi Lake

October 30, 2007

At 7:30 am the seascape is littered.

Funny crooked silhouettes are

wooden fishing boats and their

fishermen – two in each and sometimes

a motor. Like this one humming up from behind.

Maybe he had to have that last coffee,

or maybe these early winter mornings

are difficult for him, too, to

rise out of warm cotton quilts, inner

dampness burned away in the night.

How is it that these boats set out together -

like geese, on a southern course, pulled by

instinct more than weather? Who decided

the time and does it change with the summer light

growing, receding into fall, into winter?

Do they call out to each other, make the

rough jokes of rough men, their

tongues as calloused as the old hands

pulling on the wooden oars? Or do they sing?

on mornings less damp, when the steel water shines?

How is it they all turn at once, as a fleet,

sharing fishing waters, who decides

when and where? I wonder. And when I

wonder aloud to the old woman beside me,

on the porch after breakfast, she says,

"They’re fishing.

They go out in the morning to fish,

and bring the fish back here to sell,”

points to the dock to explain, to show

the simple-minded American.