From a manuscript in progress.

Or the one drunken half-quarter grand uncle recalling
The sound speckled apples on his fabled real daddy’s
Coastal orchard made falling multidimensionally
To the vaguely salty combination of plantation dirt
And marshland bearing the roots of this strange
Distant cousin to the plum, the Cherokee palm tree,
And West African pear, color of a bloody, dusky ruby,
Husky & almost as bulky as the lamenting lamb’s head
His daddy lopped off once & kicked at him laughing,
The uncle informed me wistfully at a reunion of family
Fleecers, fabricators, fairy tellers & makeup artists
With his cast-off awful alcohol stench burning my nostrils
As he gripped the back of my head & gazed deeply
At the speckled invisible apple or head in his hand.