Iliamna Lake Monster

Twenty to thirty feet long

and seldom seen but from

low-flying private planes.

No way in or out but by float plane

or private boat when the river

is high. But what a lake!

More of an inland sea, really,

at 77 miles long, 22 miles wide

at its widest point. As deep as 988 feet.

Pilots report a blunt head—for ramming

boats to dislodge tasty passengers?—

and a dull aluminum-coloured, tapered body.

The beast has a vertical tail

and never surfaces for air, so it can’t

be a serpent, reptile, or whale.

Ergo, a fish. A freakish big fish

capable of towing a Cessna by heavy gauge

wire fishing line attached to a pontoon.

Towed it around the lake, leaving one pilot

stunned as he fell into the moiling water.

Fish towed the plane for miles before the line broke.

Some scientists have suggested the fish

might be a white sturgeon. It’s big enough,

and, being a bottom feeder, is seldom seen.

But it’s got a crocodilian lumpy, bumpy hide

and isn’t a dull aluminum. So what then?

A cryptid species we know nothing about?

Aluminum torpedo fish? Folks claim

it’s scarfed more than a few fishermen.

Was regarded as a piscine god or other

before the white man arrived, hoping for

a big fish fry. Now who’s got the blunt

swollen heads? Who’s pushing water over

the gunwales of their leaky mental boats?

Who’s the monster? Cryptid or scientist?

Whose sharp fin is slicing through the water now?