poetry thursday prompt

Poetry Thursday's inspirational prompt this week is ''food'' - now, it always happens that I do most of my browsing around lunchtime and so food is invariably never far from my thoughts. Previously I had written about my lunchbox orange - 'twas nothing more than a scribble really.

this time, what with the bad news in the east and the heatwave bringing home the reality of climate change and, if we ignore this, the possible suffering it will bring to the affluent world - on a par to the current crises in many parts of the third world - and how their fragile economies and eco-structures are totally dependant on trade with us, the affluent world, yet still they starve while we get obese - this crazy travelling fruitcase of a world in which we live...

so, from my box this lunchtime I want to compose something about my rosy apple. (as per usual, it's a work in progress but one that I'll probably never revise.)


My African Apple

What can I tell you about my apple?
Its satisfying shape and glossy hue
Firm to touch, crisp, the expectation of bite
A little label that says South Africa!
Seven thousand miles, this fruit travels further
Than I do. Across plains and mountains
Rivers and valleys, villages and towns
And I wonder, as I crunch, whether
It crossed the dry lands of Somalia
Or Sudan and whether a woman there,
I’d seen on an aid poster, looking up,
Seeing my apple’s flight, wondered too
As I do, as she walks to fetch fresh water.
Some evenings we’ll walk the mile to the pub
Leaving the car because I’d like a drink
She walks fifteen miles because she wants to live
And apples fly seven thousand miles because
We can’t wait for fruit to be in season.