Because Any Pip or Pit Is a Solar Seed
I gather and store
three seeds from that little sun
called Orange, digging them
out of tart-sweet pulp on a day
when the Mother Sun’s circuit
will dip even farther north,
her late afternoon route
almost touching the ground.
Belly-heavy sun. Ripe.
With the best of my kitchen towels—
linen spun and woven by hand—
I dry them. Then set the seeds
aside in a green bowl
on a blue windowsill.
Set them there to cure.
When summer suddenly chills
into a fit of blue-black clouds,
I gather handfuls of hail,
make a bowl of cold to snug
the three seeds close. No way for them
to ever grow into proper star-selves
unless they bear the teeth marks of ice.
I dry them again and set them
on that windowsill so sky-struck blue.
Leave them there for a winter’s wait,
for a long season-sleep,
a swoon into dormancy.
I’ve made time and space
for some shrivel, tuck,
and pucker of their skin.
Only this hard freeze and long thaw
can ready these seeds to bear
more upon more small
sugar-blazoned suns.
Paulann Petersen, Oregon Poet Laureate Emerita, has eight full-length books of poetry, most recently My Kindred from Salmon Poetry of Ireland. Read more.