Well, I am a fisherman and find the comparison of fishing and writing shares that unique combination of anticipation and patience. |
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Fishing TripWriting, like fishing, is mostly anticipationAn anxiousness that builds for weeks over the lure of words, the perfect feathered phrase, dropped lightly Waking mornings, ready and more ready each day and looking forward now packing tackle boxes testing lines of thought Selection, always weighing the strength of rod against the hunted fish Too much metaphor perhaps, but the pull is always there Lazy times between these trips and busy with the busyness of other things And then I’ve been away too long from remembered ponds and long slow casts among the water lilies Anticipation as the sun gets low a catching of breath in slow retrieves I know it’s time to fish again laying a fly lightly, gently natural as my skills allow, then watching the drift, fingering line Every sense awake and focused for a time in this illusion of natural life And if I’ve patience and any skill at all to do it lovingly enough, ripples rise, tailing before the strike and the moment stretches far beyond these waters |
 This poem is included in Jim Freeman's poetry collection THE SMELL OF TWEED AND TOBACCO available here in print or as an e-Book in your favorite formats. |
