Born among the smooth stones in civics class,

they swim away to school in deep, salty seas

and there to fill their sacs with wordy gas,

a volatile blend of bombastic claptrap speak.

Gracefully they swim, turning now to right

then to the left with an easy synchronicity

that astonishes and bewilders at its sight,

until mature, before the call to congregate.

That time has come to seek from where

they came, Bob and Pat, Steve and Lamar.

Time to heed beckon call like stud and mare,

call to the basic instinct to swim upstream

against the currents flowing from the land.

The swifter the current all the harder will

they swim to fulfill their instinct’s demand,

to become the hook-jawed gene pool of us all.

Too late they find futility in their exertion,

another floats above the sandy bed and nests,

a fish of different breed, a whole new version,

who swam the whole way without inhaling.