The Hidden Hand of the Marketplace

The Hidden Hand of the Marketplace

Fishermen in the beginning of time

Sacrificed a symbol of themselves to The Great Spirit

Praying for the welfare of the fish

Who sustained them and gave their life meaning

Within The Great Web of Life.

Fishermen at the end of time

Sacrifice all the fish to the great god of Moolah

Praying to get paid back enough bucks

To keep afloat and survive another month

Without being washed up on the beach with the fish–

Yet another victim of the Hidden Hand of the Marketplace.

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This photomontage consists of three photographs, two of which I took this summer: The first is of a blue fisherman glove that washed up on the beach at Fort Foster in Kittery. The second is a wild ocean shot I took on Cape Cod. I got permission to use the third photo, the image of the fish skeleton, from Dreamstime.com.

I’m sorry about the gender bias.  It just didn’t fit the cadence to say fisher people or people who fish or people who live from the sea. And alternating fisherman and fisherwoman would have changed the meaning.