How to Eat a Quince

Note its pregnant

portliness, as if beneath

the skin a blinded

bee bothers the inner skim

of pulp and elbowed room.

 

Say to your lover’s face

that she is not a fruit

to be betrothed to, other

honey apples or shapely

pears take that win.

 

Then you will see the quince

for what she is; a jumbled

sack of runcibles, the blunt

tang of sad acceptance,

the acid rind of truth.

 

But enmesh her in the lapid

water, angle her by the stem

so that the bulge and weight

of her swollen heart parts

the ruckling water—

 

then you have a rival

sweetness. Tenderness

like that makes for a royal

garden, a night of spoons

and empty jars of moonlight.