1984, the years you stole. (cross post with edits)
stopped in the store, glaring white light
she cries “Mommy! Cherries!” and a moment, a
skip and
I find myself swallowing bile and vomit and 20 some years of
squeamish denial.
One hand in, one round fruit out.
A perfect stem
stretches towards me.
“This one is perfect!” she blurts.
I turn my head so the clenching goes unnoticed.
Inside, in the distance, an unfurling, unravelling.
I place the fruit singly in the bag, each contact
weighted down, a jolt, electric.
That day, any days that summer, somewhere
around 1984 when I had that red bathing suit with the
racer back and yellow straps, and sun shone a
chemical burn between those rotten apple trees.
Those days, pocketed in my hand the smell of him, the
taste of him his wetness and his burden on my face his fruit
passed between us.
Unravel.
They ask for them, the one fruit denied the
roundness I
couldn’t bear to look at, to listen about “Wow-look at these cherries” the
hurried wives and businesswomen would say “so lovely” under the 2.99/lb signs
while I
did my level best not to collapse and teeter around them,
my mouth turned to stem holding onto the sheer
green of the buggy.
Home, my thumbs bore inside as
the kitchen light
shines off their edges, as the light of my daughters lies
stark
across them and I’m covered in it, the stain of them
bloody across my hands and fingertips
those same damned
fingertips which opened that door and opened that drawer
filled to flowing with those bloody lush fruits.
Filled to flowing with that one particular torment.
Filled to flowing with
his tongue down my mouth and cherries floating past,
excuses.
Unraveled…
my door holds the remnants
holds the last story, moldering inside clear.
They will not be eaten.