Christine Ariella Crater
At Fisherman’s Paradise, Coburn, Pa., Deciding Whether or Not to Have the Baby
My husband taught me the art of angling--
I can swing leader line smooth as a lariat
and lay gentle slack to drift. I can balance
on slick rocks through opaque water.
I follow the hatches: caddis, march brown
blue-winged olive, green drake. I understand
that all this is influenced by the moon.
All afternoon, nymphs rise, fish snap.
The water’s surface pulses with gnats
and I think of Cleopatra.
She knew she would bear sons, her body
fertile as the Nile. I am waist deep
in Fisherman’s Paradise, inspecting my catch.
Out of the water, does it just now perceive
its heaviness? I pour the fish back
and even before I release my grasp
the silver flash of it vanishes
in the tumbling green-gold water.
Christine Ariella Crater studied English with an emphasis in Poetry at the Pennsylvania State University. Her work has included writing a series of literary biographies for the Pennsylvania Center for the Book, an affiliate of the Library of Congress. Her poems have appeared in the Meadow, Calyx, and the Utne Reader.
Return to May 2015 Edition
My husband taught me the art of angling--
I can swing leader line smooth as a lariat
and lay gentle slack to drift. I can balance
on slick rocks through opaque water.
I follow the hatches: caddis, march brown
blue-winged olive, green drake. I understand
that all this is influenced by the moon.
All afternoon, nymphs rise, fish snap.
The water’s surface pulses with gnats
and I think of Cleopatra.
She knew she would bear sons, her body
fertile as the Nile. I am waist deep
in Fisherman’s Paradise, inspecting my catch.
Out of the water, does it just now perceive
its heaviness? I pour the fish back
and even before I release my grasp
the silver flash of it vanishes
in the tumbling green-gold water.
Christine Ariella Crater studied English with an emphasis in Poetry at the Pennsylvania State University. Her work has included writing a series of literary biographies for the Pennsylvania Center for the Book, an affiliate of the Library of Congress. Her poems have appeared in the Meadow, Calyx, and the Utne Reader.
Return to May 2015 Edition