Rich

Scattering across the grass, May raindrops 
pelt me as the puppy Keegan retrieves 
downed apples from under the tree.
The yellow globes are striped: each one 
corrected by a red pencil. 
Across the lawn, fallen fruit, 
gold, or plum-dark and rotting --
rich variety of a dreamt creation.

Eve might have mused in such a garden,
amid fruit drowning in its own juice. 
Because he had not smiled today, 
she might have tossed a round thing -- 
not yet named Apple. Rain rustled the grass
and the animal played. What worm could lurk 
in one small bite?

Our apples juice the eye with hue,
bright orbs on black soil, contents 
of a farmer's basket spilling waves of scent.
Keegan munches the rottenest 
apples with his new incisors, 
savoring an occasional spicy ant,
knowing Apple for the first time.

Rich in apples, we stretch out
and let wind play our hair like harpstrings. 
Happy as the players in the cautionary tale, 
we hardly feel the slither of knowledge, 
wet and green wounds of mortality,
red-lining us from paradise.

© Rachel Dacus

from Earth Lessons, Bellowing Ark Press, 1998