THE PEAR

THE PEAR
by Randall Nicholas

I had taken a bite
yesterday
but it was too hard and dry
without much taste
so I bound it tight
in Glad Wrap,
stuffed it in a Zip-Loc bag,
and set it on the counter
for later
where today
I remembered it,
unwrapped it,
and saw its sorry wound
browning its interior
and sorreling its broken skin.
Over the sink
I bit into it again,
already mushy,
drawn inside itself,
none of that luscious
sweet juice
springing into one’s mouth
like a fountain from earth,
and finished it
down to its stringy core
and my gullet’s verge of reflux,
spitting out
the few soft seeds
as though I were savoring it
to its last spontaneous drops,
kind of in commemoration
of what I’d hoped for yesterday
and in punishment
for what I’d done
unwittingly
to spoil that today,
and, in between,
in homage to the pear itself
and the injury it had sustained
each side
of its peak of perfection
vanished, non-experienced
that which could have been so good
but instead was
irrevocably abused.