Heaven dried up here, though whitecaps & Wind anoint. The flight of the floozy handicaps This fat gnarly thistle of a guy, a pudgy Old runt, really; but life for him has the power Of a nightingale ode tranced into the language Of disappearing cod. Codspeak never again. They'll Never overcome the surfeit of fishermen, wednesday Draggers on the Grand Banks. The slaughter complete. Humans define these ancient inhabitants, not long Ago moving in schools forty miles wide. Our schools Now speak of losing role models, as if the sea were The inner city; the young cod followed once Behind the great ones, to their feeding grounds Now fished out. They knew the way. These not. They swim into little bays, where no cod has ever Gone before, clean-bottom bays, no food here, No codmating joy. Byby baccalà. So long merry flings.
