C. The speaker compares the broken fishing lines to “medals” to show that the fish’s survival is a triumph.
When you analyze a poem, there are many things into which you will want to take into consideration—tone, imagery, word choice, etc. When looking at word choice, you’ll want to take be aware of a word’s denotation as well as connotation. The denotation is what the word literally means. The connotation is what the word draws out of the reader by manner of symbolism. When we think of a “medals,” we think of awards at the end of a contest (think gold, silver, and bronze medals from the Olympics). Thus, “medals” here means a victory that the fish has earned as it has triumphed over the fisherman.
