I
Fall has started.
Students pile into their desks
as teacher begins the lesson,
with 32 apple gifts in her bottom drawer.

II
Wake up in the morning.
Walk down the stairs.
Grab an apple
among the bananas and
pears.

III
Sitting under a tree, dreaming,
disturbed by a falling fruit.
The apple that knocked your head.
The apple that discovered gravity.

IV
Lovers entwined in each others’ arms.
“I love you,” says one.
“I love you more,” says the other.
“You are the apple of my eye,” says the first.
The second smiles.

V
Kids running rampant,
touch football and tag.
Trading card games while eating lunch.
Lunch? PB&J;, a banana,
and Mott’s Apple Juice.

VI
One of the largest computer companies: Apple.
The Beatles music company: Apple.
Apples are the foundation of everything.
Makes sense,
right?

VII
The Disney hotel room was tan all over.
Even my 6-year-old brain remembers that.
The green sheen of the apple skin was
more appealing than the tan, for sure.

VIII
Apples, apple juice, applesauce, apple pie,
apple cider, candied apples, Redd’s apple ale.
So many choices.
So many variations.
None quite as good as the first one listed.

IX
The red on her lips matched the fruit’s skin
as she bit down into the juicy apple.
Within minutes she was down to its core
and mine.

X
Apply applesauce to the aforementioned area.
This isn’t a game, HeadOn.
It is just alliteration.

XI
The stanzas in this poem
couldn’t be more different
than apples and oranges.
Gotcha.

XII
Mi corazón se dispara a mi garganta
cuando yo te veo. Siento mi nuez de Adán se endurece.
Tus labios, rojos como manzanas,
se ven tan dulces.
Te extraño, Red. Y, finalmente,
te amo.

XIII*
This poem brought to you by:
Mott’s Apple Juice, Redd’s Apple Ale,
The Beatles’ Apple, Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak’s Apple
Sir Isaac Newton’s Apple, Adam’s Apple,
God’s apple, my apple, your apple, he/she/it apple,
It apple bit the apple.
The core of this poem, much like the core of an apple.
Seeds throughout.
This poem brought to you by:
My 15” Macbook Pro Apple laptop.
And the author, *moi. From my heart. From my brain.
This poem brought to you by apples.

It was a chilly June day
when mamá woke me up.
I didn’t remember much
except getting helped into my clothes.

When next I awoke, we were in the car,
driving past dusty mountain trails.
The sand on the side of the road would
        kick up in the air beside us in clouds.

“¡Es hora de levantanse!” screeched my mother
        as I groggily woke up once more.
        The beige and brown of the desert was
        now replaced with greens and blues.
        I knew exactly where we were.

As we shuffled into the bungalow,
I tried to take in all that my young eyes could.
The red tile floors went well with
the cream and burgundy of the bungalow exterior,
and the bunk beds in every room but the master bedroom
made this home away from home all the comfier.

After settling in, mis primos y primas
raced me to the fronton courts —
they were mostly empty — as our rackets
kept clack clack clacking against our legs.
I looked up and marveled at the size of the playing wall
just as Julio served the first round.

For dinner, papá made us all triples —
a Peruvian sandwich made with tomatoes
hardboiled eggs, sliced avocadoes, and mayo
all between two or three breads — and we laughed
the night away while listening to some Beastie Boys.

Mis primos y primas
me levantaron a la misma vez
que el desayuno estuvo listo en la mesa.
Avocados, tamales, mangos, y duraznos
eran suficiente para mi, pero mi pan
                                        francés con huevo frito y leche
                                        chocolatada completaron mis deseos.

        Afterwards, my brothers decided to
start up a game of hearts next to the
                                                outside grill as the Beastie Boys’
Hello Nasty album would blare for the
                                                cholitos to hear. Sometimes they’d
                                                jokingly put on some Britney Spears
                                                or N'Sync, but Barenaked Ladies was
                                                another favorite; as well as the Beatles,
                                                of course.

Hubo una vez un gran rey
que tenia muchas tierras,
un castillo, y tambien un amor.

Later on, I’d go play some pickup
                                        games of futbol and basketball. Maybe
                                        tennis and fronton, too. Then again, I
                                        did frequent the various swimming
                                        pools offered. Too many choices for a
                                        little ****** with more than enough
                                        time on his hands.

Finally, when it was time for bed
I’d think about my amazing weekend.
How time flies when you’re a child,
but at the same time, lazy vacation
days could stretch on forever.
And they always did at home here
in *La Cantuta.

Letters come & go.
Messages from home: love lost.
Jefferson Davis
& “Honest” Abe Lincoln’s war…
…nothing more than flexing strength.

The sun rises up
above the barren Culp’s Hill
as Ewell kept them
back, & Jackson’s wishes were
lost on Cemetery Hill.

Gettysburg was filled
with mudpits, puddlepits, shitpits
& every kind of
pit. Not any kind that they
wished to see as guns moved up.

The barrage of shells
from the artillery was
never ending, not
unlike this cursed war, all
while brothers & sons were lost.

The second day came
with no signs of stopping, he
packed his gear, grabbed his
rifle, & marched out to the
sound of Charon’s ferrying.

The medic rushes
out onto the battlefield
hesitating not.
His crude instruments flailing
about in his pack, he works.

Medicine, horror,
they were synonyms to him
as he braced the man;
scraping against flesh, he screamed.
This Civil War--hell on Earth.

Sawing off a leg
was much harder than once thought,
the medic then knew.
In the thick of battle, screams
drowned out screams, & drowned out screams.

Bullets whizzed by him
as he cleaned up his patient.
Or was it victim?
These days it all seemed the same:
North, South, free, slave, dead, living.

What once was blue ‘n gray
was now brown & black & red.
Explosions tore up
the land around him as he
cleared his vision & finished.

Out of the brush, fear
overtook the medic as
a man in blue clashed
with a man in gray; blood ‘n sweat
drenched both as life was on balance.

The medic was stunned
& failed to bring himself to
act at first. He shook
himself awake, & grabbed his
knife, & leapt into the fray.

His knife plunged precise
into the blue man’s heart. No
soldier, but knew his
stuff. The gray man thanked him, &
the South fought another day.

All for naught, for on
that third day, Lee ran with his
tail betwixt his legs
all the way to Virginia.
Two years later, all for naught.

July fourth, eighteen
sixty-three, no cheers, no love,
no wins for us folk.
Only them **** Yanks get their love
from home: letters come & go.

Sherman’s March left him
quaking in his boots; gone was
his love. Gone was his
home. Gone were his letters. All
of it gone. Gone with the wind.