Filleting a Lingcod
by Evan Bauer
Fish keep their eyes open after death;
there’s a certain intimacy
in this prolonged eye-contact,
a reminder of the sacrilege
of missing any turquoise gemstone flesh
as I slice the leopard-print skin
along his curved spine.
At once they appear so menacing,
rising from the deep green murk maw-first,
jaw unhinged and flared like a viper,
then flailing in the nets threaded embrace.
But now he lies still on the cutting board,
lips pressed in smooth silence
broken only by a scar
where the gleaming treble hook
buried itself.
My left hand is gloved, but without need;
his frill of dorsal spines has collapsed
in submission like a felled tree line.
There’s something very human about killing--
a sacredness in the ceremony
of dexterous fingers dancing the blade
along ribbed skeleton, stripping his volition
in two long fillets, breaded and pan-fried
in sizzling coconut oil.
there’s a certain intimacy
in this prolonged eye-contact,
a reminder of the sacrilege
of missing any turquoise gemstone flesh
as I slice the leopard-print skin
along his curved spine.
At once they appear so menacing,
rising from the deep green murk maw-first,
jaw unhinged and flared like a viper,
then flailing in the nets threaded embrace.
But now he lies still on the cutting board,
lips pressed in smooth silence
broken only by a scar
where the gleaming treble hook
buried itself.
My left hand is gloved, but without need;
his frill of dorsal spines has collapsed
in submission like a felled tree line.
There’s something very human about killing--
a sacredness in the ceremony
of dexterous fingers dancing the blade
along ribbed skeleton, stripping his volition
in two long fillets, breaded and pan-fried
in sizzling coconut oil.
Evan Bauer, originally from Santa Cruz, CA, is currently studying English, Creative Writing, and Japanese as an undergraduate student at UC Berkeley. He also works as an editor for the university’s undergraduate-run literary journal, the Berkeley Fiction Review.
A 2017 Pushcart Prize nominee, Evan's poem can be found in Issue 12 of Glassworks.
