all into one

The skin of a peach is so soft, too soft

softer than mine, softer than the hair that 

grows behind a cat’s ear—

Humanise the flesh of a fruit 

recognise it as something equally as living

as moving as my legs—your arms. 

Its blood runs in every direction when skin 

is broken and it reminds me of an ant hill 

flooded with water, ants running in every 

direction in search of safety which was 

just removed as they drip from my 

chin—dropping from the face of the earth. 

The liminal difference between raw steak 

and the fruit of a tree is all too clear in my 

mind, suddenly I can feel the hardness of 

its rib cage and feel the beat of its heart. 

Flesh, meat, and bone all into one. Yet it’s so 

sweet, it’s so very sweet, and now the 

thought of meat turns sour in my mouth. 

How can two sit so far apart on the tree of 

evolution yet so closely on my tongue? 

Now it’s all too much, now the saliva 

pools and my gums feel rough. 

The pit of the peach is covered 

in pungent red left from the flesh 

ripped by my teeth and it’s as though I am 

staring at the core of the earth, and it 

challenges all my beliefs and

understandings of what life is and what lives 

under the skin. Everything left unseen and 

unrecognised feels completely exposed 

and I need so badly to understand what 

exists beyond the seeming end, the 

seeming bones of my living peach *crack* 

in the core and within its core a seed of poison 

stares me down. (sweet appearances) 

conceal (bitter reality)  (uncomfortable exposures).