Psalm by Paisley Rekdal

View this email on a browser Forward to a friend November 3, 2016   Psalm   Paisley Rekdal

Too soon, perhaps, for fruit. And the broad branches, ice-sheathed early, may bear none. But still the woman waits, with her ladder and sack, for something to break. A gold, a lengthening of light. For the greens to burst into something not unlike flame: the pale fruit blushing over weeks through the furred cleft creases: a freckling of blood. Then the hot, sweet scent of August rot, drawing wasps and birds and children through the month. So much abundance, and the only cost waiting. Looking at the tree, I almost expect the sound of bells, a stone church, sheep in flocks. But no sound of bells, no clarion call. The church is far down in the valley. This tree should be a revered thing, placed at the ancient heart of a temple. Instead, it is on a common lot, beside a road, apartment buildings, a dog sleeping in its yard.  The woman has come here neither as master nor supplicant. She simply plans to fill a plastic sack with whatever she can take: the sweet meat giving under the press of a thumb, covering what is its true fruit: the little pit, hard and almond-brown that I've scooped out, palmed and planted, but to no avail. A better gardener could make demands of such a seed, could train a tree for what desire anticipates. But here the tree grows only for itself. And if it bears no fruit for the killing frost, or if it flowers late because of a too-warm winter, what debt am I owed? At whose feet should I lay disappointment? Delight no more comforting nor wounding than hunger. The tree traffics in a singular astonishment, its gold tongues lolling out a song so rich and sweet, the notes are left to rot upon the pavement. Is this the only religion left to us? Not one only of mortification or desire, not one of suffering, succor, not even of pleasure. The juice of summer coils in the cells. It is a faith that may not come to more than waiting. To insist on pleasure alone is a mark of childishness. To believe only in denial the fool's prerogative. You hunger because you hunger. And the tree calls to this. But the fruit is real. I have eaten it. Have plucked and washed and cut the weight, and stewed it with sugar and lemon peel until the gold ran rich and thick into jars. I have spooned it over bread and meat. I have sucked it from my husband's fingers. I have watched it sour in its pots until a mist of green bubbled up for a crust. I have gathered and failed it, as the tree for me both ripens and fallows. But now, it is perhaps too soon for fruit. The winter this year was hard, the air full of smokes, and do I know if spring reached the valley in time? Who planted this tree? How long has it stood here? How many more years can such a thing remain? The woman reaches a hand up into the branches, palm cupped, weighing the leaf knots. She is looking to see what instincts, what weathers still grow here. She snakes her hand through the greening branches. Up from the valley, come the golden tongues of bells.            Copyright © 2016 Paisley Rekdal. Used with permission of the author. About This Poem   "While I've never been a conventionally religious or spiritual person, increasingly I've had to admit that the greatest joys I experience—whether writing poetry or loving someone—are at heart utterly unbidden, uncontrollable and mysterious. My life is built on living with and cultivating a kind of faith I can hardly articulate; this poem is the closest I have come to it." —Paisley Rekdal   Paisley Rekdal is the author of Imaginary Vessels (Copper Canyon Press, 2016). She teaches at the University of Utah and lives in Salt Lake City. Poetry by Rekdal   Imaginary Vessels (Copper Canyon Press, 2016)  "Nearing Dawn" by Jorie Graham "The Weavers" by Linda Gregerson "Friend," by Jean Valentine Poem-a-Day   Launched during National Poetry Month in 2006, Poem-a-Day features new and previously unpublished poems by contemporary poets on weekdays and classic poems on weekends. Thanks for being a part of the Academy of American Poets community. To learn about other programs, including National Poetry Month, Poem in Your Pocket Day, the annual Poets Forum, and more, visit Poets.org.   You are receiving this e-mail because you elected to subscribe to our mailing list. If you would like to unsubscribe, please click here.   © Academy of American Poets 75 Maiden Lane, Suite 901, New York, NY 10038