Night squalls spit snow into the air.
Wolf moon breaks winter’s smoky choke
as pines along the island flare
beneath hibernal whitewashed cloaks.
A fisher watches night buoys blink,
the waves that yaw as tide goes slack.
He doffs his boots and pours a drink
to push the endless darkness back.
Bright salmon swim through shuttered night
beneath the troller’s bobbing chine.
Not evening stars, but satellites,
they tack the slate-black salty rime.
Kings share not the dull toils of men
who must fish, fish, and fish again.
For those not bound to law or Book
the only fear’s the sharpened hook.
Tina Johnson lives in Star, Idaho, but her writing is heavily influenced by the 39 years she lived in Alaska, both in the Bristol Bay area and in Sitka. She has worked in libraries, at the Daily Sitka Sentinel, Old Harbor Books, and as crew on the Poiken J, her husband’s commercial fishing boat. Nevertheless, she considers writing poetry to be her main gig. Her work has been published in Atlanta Review, Bellingham Review, Inkwell, and Writers in the Attic.
Euphony Journal 