#274 A Winter Apple (Don Paterson)

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A WINTER APPLE

Here, I got you one of those you like:
those bewildered late bloomers, tough and small
and sweeter than they’ve any right to be,
as green as Eden, the red an afterthought
as if there’d been an hour left in the season
to paint them all, and where the brush had swept
the snow-white fruit below is stained with pink
as if your teeth had bled from biting it.
It was hard enough to body itself forth
with so few leaves to hide it from the frost
without it burning fuel on working out
where its skin stopped and its flesh began.
All that touched it shook its heart. It was that
or it was nothing. Take it in your pocket
on your long Sunday walk to eat by the loch
with that lone jackdaw only you can talk to.
I make no great claims for this little thing
but I promise only good will come of it.