FISSURE
Last week, I was sipping
lemongrass tea
from an eggshell-white
ceramic coffee mug
when my college roommate
called to tell me he had
pancreatic cancer.
It had been years since we last spoke.
I stepped into my backyard,
the grass cool from morning shade,
and we talked for over an hour.
At one point,
we laughed about the time,
on a frigid January night,
he ran naked
through knee-high snow
from Barclay Hall
to the duck pond.
Back inside,
I found a puddle
on the countertop.
The tea seeped through
a hairline fissure in the ceramic.
I want them back—
every one of those mornings
that I did not appreciate this vessel,
that I took for granted
a mug that did not leak tea.
NECTARINES
This morning, light pink petals,
delicate as memories,
unfolded from green buds on branches
of the dwarf nectarine tree growing
in the corner of my backyard,
the first blooms of the season
signifying future pulp and juice.
Last spring, to protect the fruit from
squirrels and house finches, I wrapped
the tree in a black polyethylene net.
Checking on my fruit
one warm Saturday afternoon,
I found a hummingbird,
red-faced and silver-bodied,
entangled in the mesh.
Except for an occasional
flicker of its cobalt eyes,
the snared bird hung lifeless.
With tweezers and scissors,
I pulled and snipped it free,
laid its body, tiny and still,
on a shaded table,
and, beneath its bill,
nestled a spoonful of
sugar water.
At first, nothing,
then, an impossibly small tongue
from the tip of the bill
touched the sweet syrup—
a ripple,
a twitch of its head,
a quiver of feathers,
a flap,
a jostle.
The hummingbird rose off the table,
hovered, faced me,
and darted out of view.
Today, a new season
brings new awareness.
This tree knows only to make nectarines,
to selflessly offer sweet succulence to all,
to give its flesh,
to be left naked each cold and grey winter,
to do it again, and again, and again,
always you,
always yours,
never me,
never, ever
mine.
Brad Borsari graduated from Haverford College with a BA in English and a minor in creative writing. His poetry has been published in JAMA and Annals of Internal Medicine. He practices Internal Medicine in Fullerton, CA.