Category: orchard

I have eaten
the plums
that were in
the icebox

and which
you were probably
saving
for breakfast

Forgive me
they were delicious
so sweet
and so cold
~William Carlos Williams “This is Just to Say”

(and the actual response from Dr. Williams’ wife Florence published later with his poem posthumously)

Dear Bill: I’ve made a couple of sandwiches for you. In the ice-box you’ll find blue-berries–a cup of grapefruit a glass of cold coffee.

On the stove is the tea-pot with enough tea leaves for you to make tea if you prefer–Just light the gas– boil the water and put it in the tea

Plenty of bread in the bread-box and butter and eggs– I didn’t know just what to make for you. Several people called up about office hours– See you later.

Love. Floss.

Please switch off the telephone.

munching a plum on   
the street a paper bag
of them in her hand
They taste good to her
They taste good   
to her. They taste
good to her

You can see it by
the way she gives herself
to the one half
sucked out in her hand
Comforted
a solace of ripe plums
seeming to fill the air
They taste good to her
~William Carlos Williams “To a Poor Old Woman”

Such richness flowing
through the branches of summer and into

the body, carried inward on the five
rivers! Disorder and astonishment

rattle your thoughts and your heart
cries for rest but don’t

succumb, there’s nothing
so sensible as sensual inundation. Joy

is a taste before
it’s anything else, and the body

can lounge for hours devouring
the important moments. Listen,

the only way
to tempt happiness into your mind is by taking it

into the body first, like small
wild plums.
~Mary Oliver “The Plum Trees” from American Primitive

Who needs an icebox anyway
when the plums
are hanging heavy
in the orchard

dotted with chilled dew
glistening
in the spare pink light
of dawn

so ripe
and so ready
their golden flesh
warming in the sun.
~Emily Gibson “A response to Dr. Williams”

There is a plum tree on our farm that is so plain and unassuming much of the year that I nearly forget that it is there.  It is a bit off by itself away from the other fruit trees; I have to make a point of paying attention to it otherwise it just blends into the background.

Despite not being noticed or having any special care, this tree thrives.  In the spring it is one of the first to bud out into a cloud of white blossoms with a faint sweet scent.  Every summer it is a coin toss whether it will decide to bear fruit or not. Some years–not at all, not a single plum. Other years, like this one, it is positively glowing with plum harvest– each a golden oval with a pink blush. These plums are extraordinarily honey flavored and juicy, a pleasure to eat right off the tree if you don’t mind getting past a bitter skin and an even more bitter pit inside. This is a beauty with a bite — sweet surrounded by bitter.

I think the tree secretly grins when it sees puckering taking place all around it.

This tree is a lot like some people I know: most of the time barely noticeable, hanging on the periphery,  fairly reserved and unobtrusive.  But when roots go deep and the nourishment is substantial, they bear a bounty of fruit, no doing things half-way. The feast is plentiful and abundant, the meal glorious despite the hint of sour. Maybe it is even more glorious because of sweet within bitter.

If “tucker” describes a great down-home meal, then being “plum-tuckered” would be eating our fill of the bitter-sweet. Even when the bitter in this life is plentiful, the sweet will always overwhelm and overcome.