Pete Spence
Gone Fishing.
Pete Spence was born in 1946. He is a poet, visual poet, and filmmaker, and has worked in various jobs to cover the ongoing deficit. He is currently retired from work but not from any of the above.
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Gone Fishing.
toss me the Albatross
it seems lonely searching
for fish in the lounge room
i'm reading Game Fish of
the East Coast of Australia
game for what! hockey table
tennis chess? a photo on page
64 of a school of small fish
amuses the Albatross
it just looks like a cloud
in the water to me
when a dolphin turns up
in the photo the Albatross
bursts into a panic
i quickly turn the page
to a serene backwater
with a small crab scurrying
across the sand holding
a placard that clearly reads
"turn page before i'm eaten"
a photo of a Plankton
counter's hide is puzzling
until we read on and find
this particular Plankton
counter is a bird-watcher
in their spare time! but
what about Dugong Stone
Fish Beche-de-Mer what
of Jellyfish tirade and
what of Krill darkening
the watery horizon?
what of stunned Mullet!
the next pages are about
sharks those teeth dear
Albatross are pearly white!
the photo on page 88
is of 11 Albatross standing
precariously on a rock
watching a Blue Heron
another photo near the end
of the book is of a fisherman
alone in a very small
row-boat far out at sea
waving a broken oar
a constellation of various
sea-birds are circling
the boat! i've been so
engrossed in my reading
i haven't noticed
the Albatross has gone!
i find a note on the kitchen
table scrawled with a beak
dipped in Vegemite
"gone fishing"
Pete Spence was born in 1946. He is a poet, visual poet, and filmmaker, and has worked in various jobs to cover the ongoing deficit. He is currently retired from work but not from any of the above.