Apples

perhaps prosaically I see only apples tumble-positioned in cane baskets light-patched, colour-streaked stalks angled from a cleft a stick stuck in a deep dimple sometimes one leaf dried a sign of the apple tree I see no eve no snake whispering in a shell-pink ear no adam being so-called tempted his blood-song inherited answering a call to arms too young to resist the naïve young-womanly charms his master asleep or more busy inventing new worlds new galaxies aeons of light years away but adam and eve are long gone centuries ago they went on some fool’s word that eating an apple meant leaving paradise for a desert or a wilderness more or maybe less than a sinful sexual symbolism redder apples would more remind me of snow white and her small white even teeth piercing the polished red skin crunching into the white fruit-flesh delicious and juicy but a maggot of poison the jealousy of the queen so perhaps prosaically I carefully check my apples before I eat cutting them into pieces halves halved and again halved or even childishly slicing them into rounds marvelling at the wheeled flower of the seeds and the seed cases admiring the thin curled red ribbon strip