Holding in my left hand an apple;
they told me it was naturally grown.
No sprays. Or if sprayed,
the spray’s not as deadly as some;
the skin, red as a Vermont 
sunset in late summer,
when something, insects, pollution,
thickens the lower layers of air
and the light shifts to deep red,
slanting up from the rim of the world
that slopes downhill from us and then
the entire mountain and valley
are bathed in it.
As if the sun is a giant ruby –
a jewel like Betelgeuse.
All this while, I am eating the apple;
its insides are glowing
like the summer sun that rises
at the edge of morning.
A crisp yellow-white,
full of miracles;
eating its moderately poisoned fruit,
in this careless moment,
in this careless moment of light.