For these few hours our captain is John,
or some such name—drowsy—I forget…
None of us know him. Below us—riding
the waves so far down the whitecaps
are lost, like the haze of the milky way
near city lights—they trawl for cod,
little crews of men who know each other,
share a town on Newfoundland
or Cape Cod, or Prince Edward Island,
the southern coast of Maine. They share
a livelihood, give each other nicknames,
and they pull up the grey fat fish
from their giant nets, pull them in
with outsized greasy winches that strain
against the weight of ocean. For days
they do this, trusting each other, listening
to the weather report, as the fish rise to the stern
with their great eyes bulging in terror,
as if there were a sudden turbulence afoot,
that audibly shook our trays of airline
seafood, some whitefish the stewardess
said, as she now smooths her blue skirt
to look in control, and the voice of John
reassures us, it is only a small bumpy patch—
we will be in London twenty minutes early,
well fed, well rested, safe for the time being…
Published in Cider Press Review, Volume 27, Issue 1.
Michael J. Galko is a scientist and poet who lives and works in Houston, TX. He was a 2019 Pushcart Award nominee, a finalist in the 2020 Naugatuck River Review narrative poetry contest, and a finalist in the 2022 Bellevue Literary Review poetry contest. In the past year, he has had poems published or accepted at Stillwater Review, Cagibi, Eclectica, Clackamas Literary Journal, Cordite Poetry Review (Australia), and Tar River Poetry, among other journals.
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