Many apples ago, I climbed a crabapple tree, scrambled to pick

the round, bitter fruit. Bitter but beautiful, that hard lesson I taught

myself to keep my desire from consuming itself, like those overripe

drops that fall in the orchard, thick with bruise and blight, spreading

like split hems beneath the trees. From the harvest of what remains—

ginger golds, ambers, russets, crimsons—see how they make

a welcome mat of their dying. Then stand at the door to find out

if you will be let in or locked out, if this is to be your last supper

or splendor’s summit, your squander, your reprieve, or the pulp

of sorrow. Pick yourself up from wherever you have fallen

to the ground, look around for a branch to land on, an unlatched

screen door that might open. And what will you do then with all

the light you’ve consumed, spellbound with mouthfuls of wonder,

when love tumbles its frantic windfall into your arms?