Ecosystem

Such a glut of rudd in Enagh lough back then:
a swung blob of dough, seconds under, would dip the float,
mouthed by a flash of bronze sheering from the shoal.

Red-finned with scales like finger nails,
the rudd bait-balled in opaque depths,
thickening shelves and shallows, bulging and glimmering,
ever-ready for hooking till our heaving keep-net
bent to the bloated sag of their out-of-water weight.

Days of rudd and rippling rings in endless evenings,
the whisper of first stars on flat calms  
through the fading light of home-comings.

But some random winter gave rise to change:
small fry at first, incremental slashings,
till the fat Pike of Time gorged away our plenty.

Now Enagh is empty depths where monsters lurk,
devouring each other in a fury of moments.
I cast my line into shifting shoals of ghosts.