Taken near the Tlingit community of Kake, Alaska. During the salmon run as the salmon prepare for spawning the jaws of the male fish develop a pronounced curve, along with changes to their body shape.
After spawning, they die. I liked how the grouping led to a sense of community even when they were dead. While I was there several live fish made it upstream, often working their way through groups of dead fish, which was interesting to watch. I had one image that captured that process but thought this was a more interesting composition.
Something about the raindrops falling on this scene intrigued me. I'm not sure I've figured out what or why yet...
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The absence of day-end seagulls was acute. The railings and bulkheads that they joyfully decorated were now underwater, being swished clean by the bay's unfailing agitator. A triumphant double flag could still be spotted protruding from a cupola, signalling the existence of the now invisible boathouse below. The broken weathervane atop the flagpole resisted the winds. It pointed straight to Hell.
Following the most recent storm, pinwheels of dead fish could be seen swirling belly-up, their damaged bodies catching on submerged tin ledges near the marina. The downpour had slowed to intermittent pitters of rain, and although there was no sun visible to set, an eerie rose-gold hue fought to emerge from behind gunmetal clouds. Its shimmer jaundiced the silver fish scales, but did not warm the surrounding water.
The ruined fish were but a smelly synecdoche of the scene. Listing skiffs, clamboats, and chubby little tugboats alternated with catamarans, runabouts and sloops in starburst patterns, their sterns or bows leaning in to drunkenly kiss. The movement was radial, maintaining formation, choreographed by insistent underwater eddies. Every once in a while, a zombie boat would smack into a submerged section of dock, creating a winceful, screeching wallop. The one grace was that there was no one left to hear.
Somehow this reminds me of "still life" paintings that include dead rabbits on the table along with other objects. This gracefully escapes from the eye-candy approach to art. I would hang this in a commercial art gallery and put a high price on it, perhaps with a different title.
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