Windfall

by Bena Ruth King

Existence is not questioned,
Only its purposiveness.
Pink-appled, pocked and diseased,
Lying there—God-created—
Not assembled on a line
Of factory time. Too many
Fail to see the fruit of life
Or the yields of losing it.
To label it, however,
As insignificant
Does not negate the fact of
Being wanted. Portraits can
Not store colossal skies of
Aspiration, or the aged
Wine of life well-pressed, nor
Its full taste of memories.
To pick it up and hold on
Outstretched palm, lacking knowledge
Of its gender topples me.
On my knees I rake aside
Recoil, brace against the winds
Of loss (blame on blame). In a
Grave beneath the Ginger Gold
Apple tree it lies, drenched by
Inundating rains of June.

In another era, Bena Ruth King might have been a Victorian poet, clipping baskets of roses while musing on metonyms and meter; instead, she was born in 1983 and whispers poetic inclinations to the corn.

Photography by Kenneth Godoy