On Prodigal Bay

BBroken in half the battered moon hung dejected in the gloom in the gloom of Prodigal Bay the ending of a vital day. The day I found my Father's son the Golden Boy,the only one to ever make my father smile a child of beauty,without guile He rocked a crockeyed rocking chair as if to rock away from there In his hand,a living thing,a fishing pole, could almost sing as he sailed the light line high between the river and the sky He never turned his eyes to mine just rocked and fished his fishing line I told him of our father's plight, I bade him come with me tonight to gaze a final time and share one moment just to say," I care." The line zinged out to kiss the tide across the river's other side the moonlight sparked the flying tears along the line,that spanned the years and we were back there in the past watching brother at the mast smiling as he sailed along singing some old sailor's song laughing as our mother danced on the deck,but then she chanced to catch her ankle in a loop a rope piled there upon the sloop she screamed a scream that echoes yet and now my brother can't forget he blamed himself for her demise and could not bear our father's eyes for he was charged with keeping straight and neat the deck and now self hate had kept him here on Prodigal Bay until our father's dying day I knelt beside his crumpled form I touched his hand so tired and worn He turned and handed me the line "Your turn to make the catch this time." The eddies spiraled without end the way our mother's love had been I watched the bobber rise and fall I tried to comprehend it all and then the snap!,the pop of line the slack was gone,the fish was mine! I yelped and staggered to my feet my brother jumped out of his seat and caught his ankle in the line I couldn't reach for him in time He disappeared beneath the creek my sight grew dim,my legs grew weak I must have swooned there on the dock the deja vu,the pain and shock well anyway my job was done, I found my father's favorite son!