Lucie Monroe

Pomegranate

There are 100 ways to eat a pomegranate.

1. The prudent soul covers the kitchen table
With old newspaper pages,
Slices through the fruit with a fully charged
Electric knife, and separates
The seeds from the pith with tweezers.

2. The angry teen chooses her fist
To hammer the outside of the shell
Dislodging clusters of seeds
With speed and much less accuracy.

3. The loving mom spoons the contents
Into her professional juicer
Discards the unpleasant pulp
And mixes the punchy, scarlet nectar
With seltzer and sugar.

9. The impetuous lover
Bites the flesh with fiery teeth
Sprinkling fruit blood on their
Partner's body and feeding them
A mouthful from reddened, drippy lips.

17. The old bedridden invalid
Who has long forgotten he ever
Had a taste for food is spoon fed
Pomegranate jelly. The orderly
holds back a disgusted grunt
When pink drool runs down his chin.

42. The seagulls delight and alight
In the shade of a pomegranate tree.
Their beaks staccato down the open
Bellies of burst open fruits, competing
For a bill full of seeds and survival.

99. And there is you, my sweet child,
Dipping your gingerly fingers
To retrieve the shiny tokens one by one,
Fearing for your white dress, freshly laundered.
Your fingers morph into makeup
As you smear the juice across your lips
A rosy pout, too good to kiss.

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