Fish Eyes
George Bishop
They don’t seem much different
dead or alive—a little coloring
maybe, the only eyes on earth
that have never uttered a word.
A difference, of course,
is the flounder—one eye seducing
the other into sharing a single world,
doomed to a sole performance of the sea.
As for the rest of the fish
I imagine separate scenes passing
as they school or drift off to search
the poisons of a colorful reef.
And when they die I think of them
dying twice—perhaps gasping
from some unattended gill net
showered with relatives
and alone staring up
at the needle of a scale.