Ripe Red Tomato - Aug 7 2022

 

Ripe Red Tomato

Aug 7 2022

The tomatoes are small, green, hard.

They look too heavy for the slender stem,

suspended like dense billiard balls

beneath tight leafy crowns.

Already early August, and I can't wait for them to ripen,

have my doubts

enough time remains.

But we are impatient creatures

striding briskly through the world;

men of agency and action

animals of flight.

While plants appear passive,

rooted, unmoving

changing too slowly to see.

Like part of the scenery,

permanent as rock.

Ignoring, of course, that they reach out toward light

find their way to water

regenerate lost limbs;

continue to grow

throughout their lives.

Even defend themselves

with chemical warfare

clever pheromones.

I'm simply living too quickly to see

the molecular machinery

busily at work,

converting light into matter

drawing water from soil

turning leaves toward the sun.

And if it could see

I would be a blur

of madcap motion

racing nowhere fast.

So we may live side-by-side,

but we each inhabit

a separate magisterium

of space and time.

Might as well be

on different planets.

A ripe red tomato,

sun-warmed

redolent

plump.

It has a taut smooth skin

on which drops of water glisten.

Its pulp is soft, but firm,

as I let my teeth

sink greedily in.

Its juice is sweet, but also savoury,

and too complex and subtle

to describe as anything but

tomato-y;

a rich translucent yellow

sticking to my fingers

dribbling down my chin.

So after a long anxious wait

and for a brief delectable moment

our two worlds intersect.

Summer, coming to its end,

and a taste

well worth the wait.