Skip to main content

The Pear Tree -




we drove through my hometown late one afternoon,
a mid-July breeze kisses my cheeks and
whispers over my shoulders
through the open window
(I always have the windows open)
 and the golden light of a yawning sun
bounces off the sweaty hoods of a small town summer rush hour.
and as we idled there,
held by the precious sonance of contentment
my love told me a story from his childhood:

“when I was a boy back in the UK I had a paper route.
along my route, on one of the corners,
there was a pear tree
ripe with perfectly firm green fruit
rouging, softening, by the day.
I knew,
if I kept myself disciplined,
this one tree held just enough fruit for me
to have one pear
each time I did my route
for the season.
I was so proud,
it was my very own little secret slice
of heaven.

“on the way home from school one day
I took my friends to show them my pear tree.
I wanted them to witness the magic of
the tree
I had spoken so highly of,
to share with them a bit of its wonder.
we approached the tree,
the boys and I,
and for a moment
I felt such pride introducing them.
they looked at her for a moment,
- a split second of peace -
and then just as quickly
they charged the tree,
and stripped every last bit of fruit from her branches
before my eyes.
they laughed, and then they left.
that was that.

 “the moral of the story,”
he said,
“is to never let it be known when you love something,
for the moment you let it be known, it will be taken from you.”

I looked over at him
more naked beside me than I had ever seen;

"I think it's about finding the ones who won't strip your pear tree."

                                            - how we come to fear love


Written by Taylor Neal

Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Going to Hell - Alex Kudera

The years raced by until I found myself standing on a street corner in China. I was in Xi’an, and I was in my wife’s old neighborhood. We lived in her tiny studio—a few narrow rooms, linoleum floors, hot pot and range, no oven or fridge. A plastic seat on the toilet so frangible, I broke it twice by sitting down. Twenty-first century living in yesterday’s mainland. An authentic experience in the world.                But I was out for a stroll. This is what I loved to do—walk and look around. It was hot, but the neighborhood was out and about. A crowd stood alone or congregated on every corner. Laolao and Yeye claimed every spot on rusty metal benches shaded by trees. Many more people walked in the sun. They had umbrellas; I did not.                In ten minutes, I strode around the corner and up the block. The sun’s bright rays seared my retinas. The heat beat against the pavement and splashed up against my cheeks and ears. You could fry an egg on the sidewalk. Throw it on fried ri
Post a Comment
Read more

The Cement Mixer - Jon Doughboy

 It’s 2002 and 2008 and 2012 and 2023 and the Millennials collectively, the entire generation,  have rented a cement mixer the size of a global recession from Jean Twenge’s cousin who works  in the building trade making a buttload of dough renovating subprime mold-farm homes and  turning them into hot commodities with some fresh sheetrock and gentrification gray paint and a  sheet or two of brightly-colored metal siding for “curb appeal.” On one side of the mixer is emblazoned the word “Time” in Vantablack spray paint. On the other, smeared in feces and blood, is the word “Culture.” The Millennials excitedly crowd around this two-named mixer like it’s churning out unviable yet  charming third-party candidates. And this is no ordinary mixer. It’s state-of-the-art and the art  consists of taking in hopes, fads, fears, archetypes, myths, and generation-defining themes and  mixing them all up into something sturdy for future generations to crawl then walk then sprint  then wobble then coll
Post a Comment
Read more

The Rage of Impotence: a review of Mark SaFranko’s One False Step – Zsolt Alapi

The British author, Graham Greene, dubbed author Patricia Highsmith “the poet of apprehension” in his introduction to her Selected Stories . Highsmith is a one of Mark SaFranko’s favorite authors, and there are haunting echoes of her sensibility in his latest novel One False Step , appearing for the first time in English (previously published in French translation). SaFranko manages to create a world that is cruel and almost claustrophobic, drawing the reader into an unsettling feeling of dread as the protagonist’s life slowly devolves and spirals toward its inevitable conclusion. One False Step is the story of Clay Bowers, a philanderer, whose wandering eye lands him into trouble when, in an instance of darkly humorous irony, he falls off a roof while ogling the lady of the house, rendering him a paraplegic. As he is recovering in the hospital, he realizes that “The thought that he might not be able to do anything (sic)…that he might only be able to lie there and think for the rest o
Post a Comment
Read more