Hey,
the year after your breakup
Do you remember the box of peaches in the mail
that came for your landlord on vacation?
She'd be gone for days
so we thought we could eat them so solacing
Sweet pink fur in beautiful foam soft we asked her
could we have them so bright
But she'd rather let them spoil.
Still, we secretly shared the roundest with my dad, ran to
the grocer, bought a cheap peach to fill the half-moon gap
felt so sneaky
sticky felt so sweet
your hair was still so long it caught sugar on your lip
how i loved replacing. Still do.
we left the cedar box in the kitchen and the secret peach never spoiled
brought in ants under the dirty glass door
from the lily patch through the back eager for hot yellow sugar
thought they were pillagers but really only there to replace the peaches
they were so careful and quiet, so polite.
We hoped she wouldn't notice and she never did
but it makes me wonder should i get us peaches sometime?
Replace the ones we ate
or didn't eat,
replace the ones the garden creatures had
replace them again when we eat them again?
string of sunset skins and crisp bites
beautiful brown house of apricots and nectarines,
sweet lily ants circling the kitchen, thousands
well i know you don't see it;
bruised like a beating, baked in ugly bugs,
too soft and sweet for someone as smart as you,
a subpar replacement.
I'll get them for me then,
take one to the grass and split it with you, just one grocer's peach
nobody's baby, nobody's pride
but still a sweet thing. Then,
i'll bury the pit under the green
and come home with a thousand fragrant fruit.
I'll watch the ants all pace around me.
I'll
put the peaches in the pantry