Nightcatch
- Nightcatch
When the green-tail shrimpthicken in Bogue Sound in October,
let your skiff drift along the edgeof the channel at four or five feet.
Make it a still night with a moon,or maybe Orion bright overhead,
smooth black water at your feet.Now sling that lead-weighted web.
Watch it spread wide and ploosh,dozens of shrimp flash in all directions
like a starburst, except those that thumpand flicker inside of your net coming up.
Release the choke, let them snapand bounce on the deck, their bodies
translucent. Throw back the smalls,jumbos in the cooler. Hold one up.
Wonder at the black-bead eyes on stalks,a green moon on each tail blade.
Take your time. Let the quiet magnify.When you lift the hem of your net,
ready for the next toss, allow yourselfto leave the moment for a second— [End Page 104]
a few more nights like this, you’ll havehundreds headed and veined, bagged
in the freezer, enough to take youall the way to next summer. [End Page 105]
Peter Makuck’s poetry, fiction, and nonfiction have appeared in the Hudson Review, Poetry, North American Review, and the Sewanee Review. His third collection of stories, Allegiance and Betrayal, was recently published by Syracuse University Press. He lives on Bogue Banks, one of North Carolina’s barrier islands.
