Parts and Labor
by Rob Rice
Days when the conversation among loved ones isn’t even that good
Or hovers on the awkward edge of bad
But still we’re relaxed
Splitting cherries slowly so they look like
Georgia O’Keefe’s corpus callosum
Pondering what is the common ancestor of all fruits
What huge fleshy compromise
Pteridophyte hidden intermediate
With swollen knots and melon’s bulbous soft-sitting
In the umbrella’d ferncradle it’s antioxidant tinged
Among rotting other ones
Vomiting ambitious seed volumes
Every one a small uprising
Evidence of plans to take over the forest