Joy to the fishes
in the deep blue sea,
joy to you and me

—from “Joy to the World,” Three Dog Night, 1970

•••

And so we sit on the pier,
over a deep blue sea of fishes,
eating some of their brethren,

tasty joy for us, if not the fishes,
for which we are grateful, along
with some of their yummy

invertebrate sister shrimp,
and cousins from farther away,
like ono from Hawaii or

the Gulf of Mexico and halibut
from Alaska along with
the closer-to-home swordfish

of our west coast—we two
happy humans imbibing in
sea and sun and fishes,

joy to you and me.

•••

(for Dick Schmidt—with thanks and love for the sweet
SoCal getaway to warm ocean)