The Salmon Cannoneer

Without courtesy of a call that's cold Or even one where your neighbor's been approved The Salmon Cannoneer arrives, In overlapping rubber, yellow scales, Dripping wet, imposing in his uniform. With seaweed for his epaulets And a handlebar mustache Where gills should be, And big, black boots, mud fauceted off From banks his bridges join. He plywoods up two facets of a wall And pumps a hollow out to build its pylons in. Surrounds it all with a chain link fence So children's armies must out flank The danger cratered building site. Stars arrive. Hegemony of childhood matters less Than salmon inklings manifest: That thought itself is flight above Strange deserted waterfalls. 2/12/22