Trout
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I had to explain to her that she was as beautiful
as a trout. Not a bluegill but a trout
with brown spots finely dusted over her arms
and back. I had to explain to her that a trout was the best of fish.
Not the fish caught green over the side of a bridge
with its gasping gills, wide underslung mouth, and stomach
spewing out worm muck.
I swam with her, and I said she looked like a trout
drawn long and sleek out of a cold gravel stream. Too fine-lined
to be cut open, her own stomach, back, arms, thighs
tightly packed. Her long hair, neck, and chest
leaving the water with white skin showing off her spots
small and otherwise unseen
like on the belly of a trout,
brown against the underside of the fish, jerking
against the green grass of the bank.