The Pear Tree

there you were in that ragged denim jacket, frayed at the cuffs, and your jeans hung loose on your bony hips in the hot wind.

I stood at the kitchen window, watching you reach up into my husband’s pear tree, plucking those fat golden pears one by one. slow. deliberate.

you turned and caught me staring, and flashed that boyish grin, teeth white against the sunburn, eyes squinched up. and something inside me just caved in—a deep ache low down. and more than that, something darker: me pinning you down, me owning you, wanting to master that soft wandering soul because you’re all drift, all yes and no spine.

the way you handled those pears.

you stretched up, shirt riding high, ribs showing against the rough bark. long and thin in the green cool foliage. a hungry serpent in the branches, twisting them off the stem so they dropped heavy into your palm, the skin taut and sun warm. I knew they’d be wet inside, dripping down your skinny fingers—those fingers that later slid under my skirt on the sofa like a cold snake finding a warm hole.

I was already gone, already yours, or you mine, no way left to tell, only the ache and the pears and the summer day burning us both up slow.

pear juice on her chin,
husband’s tree, my skinny thief,
summer sins drip slow.