Sad Oranges

The poet ruminates about how apparent is not the real. Painted oranges in a fruit bowl may appear perfect but the sad truth is that they are in the grip of a devouring pestilence. A life and a world that appears perfect, has its own hidden flaws.

They are dying

without even knowing it.

Squinting in the Florida sun,

they destruct from the inside out,

devoured by a pestilence

of this year’s hungry bacteria.

The ripe orbs drop to the ground,

stunted and green, calling for help

in a muted chorus, thudding softly

like old tennis balls. They used to be

bright, juicy, ready for squeezing

in morning kitchens all over America.

This winter, orchards weep

chartreuse tears, one plague of many,

joining forest fires, mudslides, tornadoes,

and a high-rise apartment slithering into the sea.

Oranges prefer to nest, shoulder to shoulder,

with bananas, in an art nouveau

fruit bowl made of edible sunlight.

But theirs is the zest of bygone sugar,

the hidden pulp of despair

in the citrus rind of death.