FISHING FLEET, SAN DIEGO HARBOR

Fishing boats at night

Whenever I pass at night a street familiar
but unknown because I can’t know
what’s going on in fixed, cheerful-seeming houses
beyond the sidewalk and night green lawns,
it’s easy to imagine a fairy world of light
and goodness where everyone wins.

Boats on a windless night in their glassy moorings
like ducks all in a row are something else.
They come and go in and out of sheltered bays
for respite from the storms of open seas.
I like to think the cheery lights mean surely
the day's catch was good,
God’s in his heaven, all’s right with the world;
but it isn’t necessarily so.