Benjamin James Lancaster

I grew up in an orchard

 

eating jam

 

on eggs, marmalade-coated

 

steaks, pie for dessert

 

with breakfast

 

 

but not since I saw the apples

 

and the honeymoon melons

 

bowled between our placemats

 

neatly laid for supper

 

does the knowledge inescape me

 

that the fruit we eat lives

 

and any act of our eating

 

barbarous because

 

they’re just juicy, warm

 

budding placenta sacks dripping

 

from fruit trees to

 

nurture their fruit seeds—

 

the more succulent the apple

 

the more well-formed and

 

stronger the suckling appleseed—

 

so they may survive the horrific

 

downward plunge into the world

 

and land safe on roots

 

and grow their own

 

 

or would do so, if we did not first

 

pluck and cut and section out

 

the innards, discard them

 

then cook and eat

 

the empty sack