For the Lazy - The Bad Poem

OK. For those of you too lazy to move your finger and settle your cursor over the link and push down, here's the poem. It's really bad, so please don't send me your complaints about stomach pain, nausea, cramps, or that woozy feeling. I warned you; now you're on your own. I will publish my acceptance speech tomorrow.

The Fish I Didn’t Catch

Walleye eludes me.

Slimy catfish, full of industrial toxins, jump at my lures.

Sucker carp, all bulging doleful eyes and slate brick scales, raise their fins to beg,

 “Catch me! Catch me!”

A bluegill also volunteers itself. Surrenders to my will.

But my heart is not satisfied.

 

Walleye eludes me.

 

Why, oh why did I pay ten dollars

to register for the Freeland Walleye Festival Fishing Tournament?

Why, oh why did it rain all day that Friday?

Why, oh why did my nightcrawlers overheat in the car window,

            congealing into a mass of gray flesh,

            taunting me with their lifeless forms,

            laughing from their Purgatory of worms?

 

Walleye eludes me.

 

My wife says, “Curse the walleye and die!”

But I’ve spent too much already.

            The license

            The rod and reel

            The tackle and the box to hold it

            The really, really big boat

I must fight on. I must endure. I must be victorious. I must.

 

Others pass by on the right and on the left.

They hoist their larder high, rubbing it in my face.

“They’re biting tonight!” they shout.

“You can catch ‘em in your hands!” they scream.

“My two-year-old caught a ten pounder!” one large round specimen brags.

I fantasize about big hooks and big poles.

Big stinky fishermen being landed with big nets,

De-scaled, gutted, coated with corn meal and fried delicately.

 

Walleye eludes me.