Fishin’, my father believed,
did not necessarily mean catchin’,
though catchin’ was nice, too,
especially the tender little trout
he and my mother occasionally
snagged from the West Walker River
high in the Sierra Nevada.

Fishin’ rarely meant catchin’
to my fly fishing husband,
who’d grown up bait fishing
for the family larder on lakes
and ocean. Tempting a hungry
fish with a delicate fly was
more challenging than with
lures or bait,

and he was happiest up to
his wader’d thighs in a stream
casting his line, watching it float
gracefully to the surface
and waiting.

Should there be a catch, he’d
admire the protesting fish,
careful to release it as gently
as possible—not unlike
the way he released me.

Years after his departure,
on the Campbell River outside
the town of the same name
on an island called Vancouver,
I watched two boys each land
a sizeable salmon, all by
themselves, then hold them up
to gawkers and shorewatchers
like me.

The boys turned back to rebait
their hooks and cast into
the summer-swift river,
then wait, as the sport demands,
wearing matching grins,
hoping for another lucky
catch—

their happy definition
of fishin’.