I Bought Some Pear Nectar Today

Below is my offering for the January writing prompt at Poets Online.

Perhaps you might also care to try your hand at writing a poem about... fruit.

That's the prompt. Really. Write about fruit.

I BOUGHT SOME PEAR NECTAR TODAY

God, how I love this store
It is too pricey, I know, but still it whispers to me
of provincial European bakeries
and of bloody butcher blocks
and of vineyards dancing with a world of bees
Things I’ve never seen
but have lived for a lifetime

I remember when your sister
said she loved the smell of our pantry
“Like a health food store,” she had opined

But I call the pungent smell of fresh herbs
and whole grains
and dried fruit
mingled heaven

Today I walked the forbidden aisles
like halls in a memory
and lusted
not for things I wanted to buy
but for a memory just out of reach
yet powerful
and nearly lost

The walls come down
just a little
when I think of him
and of the she that was me
that day

(How does it feel to be called “him”?)

Dancing around the discomfort
of feeling naked, fully clothed
I remembered
the feel in my mouth
(thick and full and sensuous)
and the taste on my lips
(sweet and voluptuous and urgent)
and I heard his words – your words – in my ears

And so, silliness of silliness,
I bought some pear nectar today

And thus she finds him in the halls of memory
and lets him in, with dim eyes
and hunger
and hope

© 2010 Laurie Sitterding