Wednesday, August 24, 2011

Wild Pears




She appears when the sky's glass
is half-filled with twilight and swallows stir
its fermenting gray. Long neck and hair slid
behind alert ears, lend her the grace
of a blond deer listening for intruders
and smelling the scent of hidden fruit.

It's too early for insects pirouetting fire
between pine branches or poets
who relinquish the porch steps for a lamp lit chair.
The day pauses, darkness set on a distant table,
while silence reveals sweet oddities

like pears blooming on a tangled hillside
and this woman who comes to collect
their ripe bodies. She will take them home,
place them in a china bowl and wait.
Either the artist will paint jade torsos
sun-bathing in white porcelain or
the housewife will peel off their skin,
add sugar and boil them down
for jelly. There are enough glass jars
and sealer wax in the closet. Her brushes
,however, are worn, their bristles bent
and lacking the soft agility
she remembers, once possessed.

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