By Prem Gongaju
Pausing between bites of the golden pears,
My taste buds turn tipsy with the aroma
Of nectar permeating the olfactory sense.
Perhaps these pears were magically imbued
With the love of my Kumari chhori—,
A filial piety fermented in the vase of longing;
Or because the unassuaged dryness
In my mouth was suddenly awash with
The aromatic lush from mellow pulps,
Awakening my taste buds from hibernation.
In truth, they were not ordinary pears.
Its golden hue is due to the care of the Sun
From dawn to dusk. Luna and her stellar troupes
Took turns fussing over the fruit at night,
Sprinkling the freckles of stardust.
The sap-rise from the bosom of Mother Earth
Seeped slowly up the taproots to the heart of pear,
Vouchsafing the sweetness at its prime.
By the way, young Aurelius had it green when he
And his pals robbed the pear tree “heavily laden with fruit,
which was not tempting either for its color or for its flavor.”
They “dumped out the huge load of pears to the hogs,”
Paving the Augustinian way for the psychology of sin
And guilt instead of the ode to sweet golden grace.
Later, his Confessions made him a homo religiosus.
As for me, the season of the manger and the Magi
Was redolent with the fragrance of fecundity
In all things great and small under the golden sun.
-PREM GONGAJU
-Samapta-
