Wallowing in this bloody1 sty，
I cast for fish that pleased my eye
（Truly Jehovah's bow suspends
No pots of gold to weight its ends）；
only the blood-mouthed rainbow trout2
Rose to my bait. They flopped3 about
My canvas creel until the moth4
Corrupted5 its unstable6 cloth.
A calendar to tell the day；
A handkerchief to wave away
The gnats7； a couch unstuffed with storm
Pouching8 a bottle in one arm；
A whiskey bottle full of worms；
And bedroom slacks： are these fit terms
To mete9 the worm whose molten rage
Boils in the belly10 of old age？
once fishing was a rabbit's foot
O wind blow cold， O wind blow hot，
Let suns stay in or suns step out：
Life danced a jig11 on the sperm-whale's spout
The fisher's fluent and obscene
Catches kept his conscience clean.
Children， the raging memory drools
Over the glory of past pools.
Now the hot river， ebbing12， hauls
Its bloody waters into holes；
A grain of sand inside my shoe
Mimics13 the moon that might undo14
Man and Creation too； remorse15，
Stinking16， has puddled up its source；
Here tantrums thrash to a whale's rage.
This is the pot-hole of old age.
Is there no way to cast my hook
Out of this dynamited17 brook18？
The Fisher's sons must cast about
When shallow waters peter out.
I will catch Christ with a greased worm，
And when the Prince of Darkness stalks
My bloodstream to its Stygian term . . .
On water the Man-Fisher walks.
