Wrote this poem years ago, but really liked how it came out live, with musical accompaniment. Features Bridget Cross on Guitar and George Kuhar on Keys and Samples. Second one came out of a poem I wrote in several segments, experimenting with narrative perspective while sitting in a very quiet room in a noisy, fragrant city.
Once a bud
a flower
framed by fourteen
delicate furry leaves
turning away from the fruit
a lover’s cold shoulder
now a heart-shaped jewel
pockmarked with so many
seeds like freckles
pale green on the side grown in shade
darker, nearing brown on
the side kissed by sun
a sun loved creature
solid and hard on the outside
held in the palm of your hand
look beyond the surface
in the concealed places
between fruit and foliage
find un-pollinated stamen
wonder, could this berry
have been even bigger?
press your nose
to its goose bumped flesh
realize how the barely visible
blackheads on the side of your
nose are not unlike
the seeds of this berry
now break
it open
give into the desire
which filled
you the moment
you caught
first scent of the opened
flesh
somewhere in the room
notice the juice
how it stains
your pale fingertips
like the juice
which is cool
and sticky
on your warm flesh
how hollow inside
how like the emptied
belly of a salmon
memory of
wild tangled strawberry greens
discovered on a sandy beach
near a town once called
strawberry point
how your toes caught
on the furry vines
and tripped you up
landing face down
in warm beach grass
how can a strawberry
even have a taste
having evoked so much more?
you are of the same
soil as this
broken open and
bleeding berry
tear with
your teeth
and taste
if you can
what is remembered
Portland Morning Poems>Word Temple
Jonas Lamb 