A fisherman stands bow-legged in shallow surf, water to his ankles.
Beside him stands his miniature–right down to the blue cap.
                                                                                                   The sun flares
yellow above trees already dark with night. House lights flicker on one by one.
The fishermen are silent.
                                          Even the surf seems to have quieted its steady breath.
Seagulls ride drafts overhead without a caw and a school of fluke separates
around the wiggling bait in the shape of two hands praying.
Father and son gaze at the water rippling with orange sky, neither willing
to let the day end.
                              On the shore, their basket shows a meager haul: a flounder,
two Blackfish just past the legal limit–none of the Blues, the father’d described
in bedtime stories once leaping out of the Sound almost jumping into his boat.
But this moment–close enough to hear each other breathing with the surf
and the breeze, their lines holding the pink of the clouds, imagined Blues
circling out beyond their casts–is enough.
                                                                    Even the boy knows
not to speak, just feel the surf and watch the sky turn purple then black.

Published in San Pedro River Review