LIFE LINE. by Chani Zwibel

My father took

my sister and I fishing

and never complained of getting daughters

instead of sons,

unless

we must find a tree

somewhere on the riverbank.

(We are not boys

and cannot just stand up

to go pee outside.)

We always stopped

at the bait shop run

by two nice old people

who always gave us suckers,

the tart kind with the bubblegum inside.

Dad gets the meal worms

in a Styrofoam cup full of dirt.

 He jokes “YUM”,  

as we question the container’s contents.

On the bank of the Youghiogheny,

Dad shows us how to know a fish is on the line

when the bright bobber sinks.

We catch the little fish.

They swirl around in the last sloshes

of river water in a bucket.

He says they are too small;

He unhooks them gently and releases them

back to the green brown depths

to wait for next time

While we wait for bigger fish to bite,

we play dinosaurs.

I like to imagine the plastic Brontosaurus

placed on a flat rock,

up to his neck in shallow water,

staring out on a primordial scene.

Dad never seemed to mind in the inconvenience

of me or my sister or our toys.

Girls can learn a fisherman’s philosophy just the same.

 Dreams are down there,

last small puddles in the fish bucket.

Small fish are free,

even though the dreams are not free,

any more than the bobber is free from the line.  

Chani Zwibel is a graduate of Agnes Scott College, was born and raised in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, but now dwells in Marietta, Georgia, with her husband and their dog. She is an associate editor with Madness Muse Press. She enjoys writing poetry after nature walks and daydreaming.