I think he saw it coming: Simon Peter did.

I think the groaning nets, the slapping water,
the skittering fish, the creaking hull,
awoke his dazed awareness of the future,
of the streams of time.

No wonder he so quickly knelt and sought
to have You go away. To heal a mother-in-law:
that’s well and good. A lingering prophet, though,
demands a change of course.

Of course he saw it coming, Simon Peter did.

As fish strained hopelessly for their last watery breath,
he held his own as hopelessly he waited.
You knew, he knew, and Andrew, James, and John:
You’d caught the fisherman.

A poem/prayer based on Luke 5:1-11, the Revised Common Lectionary Gospel reading for Year C, 5th Sunday after the Epiphany.

Photo by Eric Anderson.