The Fish

I caught a tremendous fish and held him beside the boat half out of water, with my hook fast in a corner of his mouth. He didn’t fight. He hadn’t fought at all. He hung a grunting weight, battered and venerable and homely.

Here and there his brown skin hung in strips like ancient wallpaper, and its pattern of darker brown was like a tree bark, and that was like a monster’s eye.

The fishermen have been careful of doing anything wrong; can I now, in this moment, do something that they never did?

I looked into his eyes and saw his hunger. I saw a sentiment and a resignation in his insight.

I love to let him go. I liked his eyes, so full of conciliation. When I let him go, I got in the water—I went into the water. I thanked the fish for reminding me.

I let him go, I did it, just as you always should— and he swam away, a little too heavy, for his style, maybe—in space. I let him go—the fish and I. We shared an articulation. I saw acceptance in the world, an attunement I hardly know.

• Elizabeth Bishop