Beside inside, I sat down and gave a heavy sigh. I didn’t know what to say so I didn’t say nothing. I just sat there and looked at my clean shoes all bright against the dusty slab of cement that made the dugout floor. I looked at my laces and thought one might be a little loose so I reached down and grabbed each loop and gave a tug. Next to inside, I was all the time wondering what inside was feeling, but I didn’t dare ask. Inside was on deck.

In the ball game of life, a lot of waiting ensues. I don’t mind on account of all the big hits at the right time that come up just once in a blue moon just in time. Those are all the moments we wait and sit next to.

Confusing parable about fish - I’ve had a couple and this is the second. I’ve been dreaming of fish. Every night on account of my vitamin B. Those damn fish suffocating my subconscious, riddling my every move, fish. Damn fish shouldn’t riddle my every move.

I nudge inside after the inning and ask if it thinks I’m doing all right with fish. That damn inside all blase indifferent replies, “Just what do you think you are doing all right with now?”

I play it all kewl and stuff and tell inside that I’m talking about making ceramic fish. That’s what. You know what inside gone and done? Inside hiccuped in the middle of a laugh. I didn’t take it to heart. I just poured another whiskey.




I’m just an ordinary man wondering what to do. I sometimes implore inside to give me an answer and you know what inside says, well inside says,

”You already know.”


What the hell is that supposed to mean?

Fish.

My lover says I’m obsessed with fish, but she doesn’t understand that I make fish for her. Every fish, any fish and only fish. For her. Damn fish and their swimming around. Ever hear about a salmon that returns from sea to it’s spawning ground over dykes and damns jumping all the way upriver? Well, that’s how I am about making fish.

To the clay fish I give one thing. Myself. Even if there isn’t room up on the hill, I still give it in the valley. I scream up to peaks if I can’t get there and echo in canyons where the water done dried up like a thunder of spirit. I’m like that with the fish.

And all that is now, and all that is gone and all..