The Apple Tree
When Lydia and I
resolved to climb that apple tree together
it was over -
not all at once, I still had a child’s love
for shiny distractions
but when her long bare legs
arched over my eyes to gain the highest branch
it was over,
it was over next Spring, next girl next door,
or next school term, next crush.
The following year Lydia and I climbed over a fence
one we had hitherto not climbed -
it was then that I knew this is never over,
not this year nor the next, not for a lifetime,
not until a poets shaky hand writes about
apple trees and climbed fences.
Maybe there was hay in the corn field, maybe the sun
smelled of new mown hay?
Maybe the flaxen scent of young love is the very seed
of all that comes next.
I like to think of those sweet stalks, imagine
a stem of straw between my teeth
something to savor still on a sunny porch
while on the down slide of this ride,
I hope you also can find that naiveté again,
that your first apple tree has not died,
I hope you climb it once more in your mind’s eye
like I can, both Lydia and I.
Copyright © Eric Ashford | Year Posted 2020
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