Through the IceRichard JordanI wanted to imagine fish asleep below thick ice, with black eyes lidded, fins slowly twitching in dreams where they slip away from predators, propelled by current. I didn’t want to drop a leaded minnow, pierced only millimeters from the spine, through the jagged hole. But as it tumbled out of sight, I couldn’t look away. I wanted to believe my father when he explained that fish-especially bass-can’t feel a swallowed hook. He told me this because I was seven, and the heavy largemouth I didn’t want to hold was spilling blood and flopping on the snow. My father clubbed it with the blunt end of a hatchet, had me kneel beside it for a photo. And I smiled.
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Richard Jordan