The plum you’re going to eat next summer
The plum you’re going to eat next summer
doesn’t exist yet; its potential
lives inside a tree you’ll never see
in an orchard you’ll never see, will be touched
by a certain number of water droplets
before it reaches you, by certain angles
of light, by a finite amount of bugs
and dust motes and hands
you’ll never know. The plum you are
going to eat next summer will gather
sugar, gather mass, will harden
at its center so it can soften toward
your mouth. The plum
you’re going to eat next
summer doesn’t know
you exist. The plum you are
going to eat next summer
is growing just for you.
Notes
Where W. S. Merwin left us tasting the dark memory of cherries already plucked, Gayle Brandeis flips the horizon toward an orchard in the making, tracing the quiet, unearned trajectory of a fruit gathering mass for a mouth it has never known. This anticipation of the uneaten plum operates as a pure spectacle of radical contingency, where the object of consumption is structured around a productive lack—a teleological illusion where non-existence gathers sweetness specifically to satisfy an appetite that hasn't arrived yet. It grounds August’s theme of Feast in the mystery of future abundance, reminding us that every harvest is an act of quiet faith in a world already preparing its sweetness for us. #poetry #feast #gaylebrandeis #august #plum