Eels

. . . in the pail, looped like bowels in their salt
broth, still alive, giving off peristaltic shudders,
close odors. One slimy writher butters
its brine with a slick spit. I find no fault

with it, though other kids flinch and go eeew eeew
when I tell them I have eels for dinner. Daddy hooks
them, hauls them out of the choppy Sound. Such looks
he gives me! They dangle in his hand and slurp-spew.

Home, at the sink, he denudes them of their skin.
A few slits, a long yank: it’s a cinch to strip off.
Then mother chops them in eights, dredging the soft
chunks in a dune of cracker meal. What a din

as she slides them into the frying pan! The cat
goes wild, hoisting a tail to the feast in that hot fat.