In the dreams, I dreamed

In the dreams, I dreamed, two fish grew legs –
these two fish he’d caught. Well, he’d caught one
and the one caught the other,
before he’d caught them together, two in one
flopping from his fishing line. Whose line?
I didn’t know him, but he handed me them –
these two fish he’d caught as one, and I pulled the one
out from the mouth of the other. I knew
it was too big to be just one. What kind of fish?
I can’t say. They were two ordinary fish, of the kind
you’d ordinarily see hanging from a fishing line.
They were a silvery white, and their scales
caught the blue of the early morning light
when you turned them. Then I held them
and I didn’t know what to do with them. I thought
I’d release them, but he’d brought them
from a long way off, and no water was nearby.
There was no water here, except for two puddles.
Two puddles formed where two tires gouged
the ground. The water was a chocolate milk brown,
and it shimmered. I put the two fish in this water
and they squirmed to soak it in. Happy,
I thought, or as happy as fish can be
out of proper water. Then around the corner –
the red brick corner of the house that’s here, for it was
here at my childhood home he’d brought them to me –
I saw more puddles, bigger puddles. The fish
and I skipped from one to the other, each of the fish
also getting bigger, until we reached the horizon’s
line. That’s when the two fish grew legs
and walked over the edge, into the ravine
and out of the dreams, I dreamed.