In August, but this year in July, Gravensteins:
golden fleshed, generous, kind to cook,
ciderer and ring-dryer. She tries everything,
but mostly butter: a large crockpotful
of peeled rings, quartered, lightly cloved,
cinnamoned and nutmegged will make
six pints and one short jelly jar. After
that, the old Egremont Russet, Cortland,
Honeycrisp and Jonagold come all together;
what can she do but slice them all in quarters,
toss them into her dedicated shredder,
pour pomace into a burlap bag
and hang that, with her father's pulley
and old hemp rope, to a maple branch?
Juice will run for hours, collecting
in a tub beneath; at evening she dips gold,
The apple grows so bright and high,
And ends its days in apple pie.
An old Jew munches an apple,
With conquering immersion
All the thwarted longings of his life
Urge on his determined teeth.
His face is hard and pear-shaped;
His eyes are muddy capitulations;
But his mouth is incongruous.
Softly, slightly distended,
Like that of a whistling girl,
It is ingenuously haunting
And makes the rest of him a soiled, grey background.
Hopes that lie within their grave
Of submissive sternness,
Have spilled their troubled ghosts upon this mouth,
And a tortured belief
Has dwindled into tenderness upon it....
Now’s the time when children’s noses
All become as red as roses
And the colour of their faces
Makes me think of orchard places
Where the juicy apples grow
And tomatoes in a row.
And to-day the hardened sinner
Never could be late for dinner,
But will jump up to the table
Just as soon as he is able,
Ask for three times hot roast mutton--
Oh! the shocking little glutton.
Come then, find your ball and racket,
Pop into your winter jacket,
With the lovely bear-skin lining.
While the sun is brightly shining,
I spoiled the day;
Hotly, in haste,
All the calm hours
I gashed and defaced.
Let me forget,
Let me embark
--Sleep for my boat--
And sail through the dark.
Till a new day
Heaven shall send,
Whole as an apple,
Kind as a friend.
The wild duck fly over
From river to river
And so the young lover
Goes roving for ever.
They fly together,
He walks alone :
No maiden can tether
Him with her moan.
At the bursting of blossom
On her breast his head ;
He has left her bosom
Ere the apples are red.
Across the valley,
Singing he goes.
In highway and alley
He seeks a new rose.
If it were only still!--
With far away the shrill
Crying of a cock;
Or the shaken bell
From a cow's throat
Moving through the bushes;
Or the soft shock
Of wizened apples falling
From an old tree
In a forgotten orchard
Upon the hilly rock!
Oh, grey hill,
Where the grazing herd
Licks the purple blossom,
Crops the spiky weed!
Oh, stony pasture,
Not in that wasted garden
Where bodies are drawn into grass
That feeds no flocks, and into evergreens
That bear no fruit—
There where along the shaded walks
Vain sighs are heard,
And vainer dreams are dreamed
Of close communion with departed souls—
But here under the apple tree
I loved and watched and pruned
With gnarled hands
In the long, long years;
Here under the roots of this northern-spy
To move in the chemic change and circle of life,
Into the soil and into the flesh of the tree,
And into the living epitaphs
This much the gods vouchsafe today:
That we two lie in the clover,
Watching the heavens dip and sway,
With galleons sailing over.
This much is granted for an hour:
That we are young and tender,
That I am bee and you are flower,
Honey-mouthed and swaying slender.
This sweet of sweets is ours now:
To wander through the land,
Plucking an apple from its bough
To toss from hand to hand.
No thing is certain, joy nor sorrow,
Except the hour we know it;
Oh, wear my heart today; tomorrow
Who knows where the winds will blow it?
Speak, sir, and be wise.
Speak choosing your words, sir,
like an old woman over a bushel
of apples.
Strong rocks hold up the riksdag bridge . . . always
strong river waters shoving their shoulders against
them . . .
In the riksdag to-night three hundred men are talking
to each other about more potatoes and bread for
the Swedish people to eat this winter.
In a boat among calm waters next to the running
waters a fisherman sits in the dark and I, leaning
at a parapet, see him lift a net and let it down
... he waits ... the waters run ... the
riksdag talks ... he lifts the net and lets it
down . . .
Stars lost in the sky ten days of drizzle spread over
the sky saying yes-yes.
Every afternoon at four o'clock fifteen apple women
who have sold their apples in Christiania meet
Little hot apples of fire.
Burst out of the flaming stem
Of my heart,
I do not understand how you quickened and grew.
And you amaze me
While I gather you.
I lay you, one by one.
Upon a table.
And now you seem beautiful and strange to me.
And I stand before you.
Wondering.