In final autumn heat,
Two weeks after apple picking,
The bushel baskets sag,
Laden with the summer's pickings.
Growing sadness clings to me.
I sort the dead and dying
From the thinning lot,
Fearing loss of all to rot.
The first to go,
Soft and brown,
Nearly fall apart,
Require gentlest touch;
Dripping cadavers
Leave healthier neighbors
Wet, in danger of early death.
In separating them,
I hold my breath.
On spotted skins I then
Must concentrate;
Look for inner decay:
Sagging indentations,
Fallen stems;
Hollowed caverns
From bird bites and beetles;
The evidence of worms'
Varicose trails, faintly brown,
Just visible beneath the skins,
Revealing company within.
My eye looks inward first, then out.
I know what this malingering's about;
The cankers that I seek may find me out.
Hesitation clouds my separations;
I wonder what a paring knife might do
To save some portion,
To spare the summer work
Of apple trees.
I wonder, does the apple
Dread the knife, considering strife
As much as I, when I confess my sin
And writhe beneath the penance
My sinning puts me in?
We are torn with the realization of grace in the presence of remorse. With Lady Macbeth, we may curse the ****** spots, because we know the need for mercy and of hell to pay. Though a Savior stands waiting to heal and forgive, we writhe in our stubborn remorse.
Jesus paid it all. All to Him I owe. Sin had left a crimson stain. He washed it white as snow.
Knowing I am forgiven, I should rejoice, and yet I hang my head in sorrow. Mourning with remorse is not sweet sorrow.
The pain of pain is my foolishness in forgetting,
In my stubborn returning to sinning again.
O God, come save me from the chains I'm in!