Table Bay

Down at the water—    glancing througha web of fingers—

a mirrored face,    veering blues,a cirrus. And my father

underwater roving    bottom-stonesI’d dreamt of tapping

in one long-held    breath. Kneelingat the dock’s edge,

I watched him scour    silt and lichen,flash of a play-thing,

as I settled on    the sob’s octave.Earlier, by the spider’s

silk on the swim    ladder, I’d seenunder the dock

into the colony of cool    rot, and throughto the warped world

a well will pull in,    to what monstersdwell in bodies

of water. I’d seen    fall thinningthe flocks, a chain

of ripples shuddering    under an osprey’sdripping talons.

And at home,    the stove-fire,the three-story absence.

Kneeling at the dock’s    edge, snagged,I fixed my gaze

on the bay’s boony    depths where my father,feeling along the pitchblack

of centuries-old    soaked larch,followed my taut line

straight to the shimmer    snared in bark.Root-moored,

he picked at each    hook of the lure,a solemn, meticulous

sifting as if he were    parting skinfor a splinter in my palm.

His touch traveled    the line, the rod,into my hand.