I had to keep at it. Had to get things done. And everything, it seemed, needed doing at once.
—Karen Chamberlain, “Desert of the Heart”
In the dappled light, in the heavy air
before the noontime summer storm,
peaches hang beneath leafy boughs
and a woman walks alone among them,
moving from one bright globe to another.
They are ripe, the Glohavens, swollen
and soft, and in the woman a fierce joy rises
and surges and takes her by surprise. She
has come here with a goal in mind—
to pick quickly two boxes for freezing and jam.
Her list of to do today is long—she is
moving from one home to another.
Says Basho, The journey itself is home,
but she is not traveling light. Six hundred
pounds of peaches to sell. A large garden
harvest to be processed and stored.
Books, of course, her bread baskets, clay ovens,
canning pots, jars, tea. Two children.
Files. Boxes of toys. She’s been
rushing all morning in an effort
to beat the storm. And so it is that
she finds herself here in the rows
where the Glohavens flash and glance
through the green, and for a few moments
the work disappears and she sheds every
part of herself that is not hand nor tongue nor nose.
Peaches, she eats them as if she’s an animal,
tears with her teeth to get through the skin.
She crams her mouth with sweet sticky flesh,
and fills it and fills it again. She feeds a rare
hunger that can truly be fed, and in a few minutes
she’s satisfied. She stands in the shade, hums, smiles,
licks her juice-glazed hands. Fuzz irritates
her chin. What is she doing here? She forgets.
Oh yes. Fill the boxes for freezing and jam
in the dappled light in the heavy air
before the noontime summer storm.
Like this:
Like Loading...
Read Full Post »
