She: cuts a disk of ice from his skull,
lets down the sinker and line, the hook and ladder,
making remarks on the cold. Lighting fires on the ice,
she sends more bait down the fishes' dumbwaiter.
And a tug on some line! A bell rings! Who can find
the right one in time? Lines trembling, profuse as axons.
 
He: makes coffee, several pots, one on each fire,
believes the Groucho Marx version of an executive's desk,
I refuse to speak to a fish,
Put him through to my secretary,
Don't call us, we'll call you.
The fish try to get through, all ring together.
 
And, together, they (the man and the woman) lower
thermoses of coffee and sacks of provisions
hand over hand as jute rope splinters pierce mittens.
A boy at the far end, out of a fakir's basket,
climbs as fast as they extend him more rope.
Sheikhs pursue him. He hollers,
 
Send bedsheets! And they pour him some down.
There are scimitars under the ice! And he emerges,
no stranger. The man melts and becomes a fish.