You don’t think apples
Just Grow on trees, do you?²
When an apple has ripened and falls, why does it
Fall? Because of its Attraction to the earth, because
Its stalk Withers, because it is Dried by the sun, because
It grows Heavier, because the wind Shakes it, or because
The boy standing beneath it wants to Eat it?³
Much Pleasure we have lost while we
Abstained from this delightful Fruit …⁴
Strawberries! The smell of youthful
Illusions, and feverish transient Joy …⁵
He shows them a stick of dry wood, and speaks a
Word to it, and Lo! It Blossoms—and he speaks
Another word, and Lo! It bears red Apples!⁶
Melon in morning dew—Mud-Fresh—⁷
God created the desert so that
We can appreciate the Date Trees.⁸
When the plum Blooms—a Freeze in hell!⁹
Better than any argument is to rise at dawn
And pick dew-wet red Berries in a cup.¹⁰
¹ Matthew 12:33 (English Standard)
² Rae Armantrout, Care
³ Leo Tolstoy tr. Louise and Aylmer Maude, War and Peace
⁴ John Milton, Paradise Lost
⁵ Iris Murdoch, The Black Prince
⁶ Ursula K. Le Guin, The Tombs of Atuan
⁷ Basho tr. Stryk & Takashi Ikemoto, Melon
⁸ Paulo Coelho tr. Alan R. Clarke, The Alchemist
⁹ Issa tr. Stryk & Ikemoto, When Plum
¹⁰ Wendell Berry, A Standing Ground