The afternoon before your surgery I sit
in this quiet house, ignoring the laundry basket
and the checkerboard of ingrained dirt on kitchen
tile to slice fruit from the bag I brought home
from the store. What is it about fruit with amulets
for hearts—nectarines, plums, apricots, peaches—
with a pit in the center of their planetary bodies and
the squish as your teeth cut through their flesh?
From Asia Minor, migrating birds helped scatter seeds
of cherry and other trees. In Taoist mythology, even
just the fragrance of a ripe peach of immortality
extended your life by 360 years. You know everyone
could use a little sweetness in their mouths, a legend
about drifting upriver into a village where time has stopped.
Purveyors of fine poetry since 2003.
