Tuesday, September 15, 2009

In Orchard Country

Years ago on a dirt road in orchard country,
a farmhouse burned to the cellar-stones.
That night I stood with the other fruit-pickers
watching flames roll and thunder down the walls.

The next day we found near the ruin,
still warm, a tree hung with baked apples. And so,
after a night too close to the fire, a poet,
may hold something delicious in a scorched hand.
—Thomas R. Smith

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