Apple Cart Poem by Linda Hepner

Apple Cart

Rating: 5.0


The apple cart came rumbling down the street
Pushed by the apple man who’d piled it high
With golden ruddies, juicy firm and sweet,
Their happy nipples pointing at the sky.

We saw the pyramid he’d built with care,
Picking each fruit and placing it so that
Not one pure skin was bruised, the perfect fare
Presented like a treasure on which sat

A crown of apple leaves and painted sign:
“Picked this very morning by my hand! ”
He meant to say “These apples are all mine
So buy them dearly from my apple stand.”

Around the market women push and scrum,
Bargaining, flirting with the country men,
Filling their baskets, peach and pear and plum
And purple eggplant, then they come again

To stare at rosy apples on the cart
Too perfect to disturb, the farmer still
And smiling by his rosy work of art,
The crown of leaves upon the apple hill.

Then all alone a girl with face aglow
Walks up, admires and looks him in his eyes;
She wants the apples on the bottom row,
She’ll pay whatever she has got, implies

That never will he find one such as she
Who’ll bite his apples with such sharpened teeth
And savor every drop: the cider tree
Will spread its heady fame, the fruit beneath

Is what she wants, and leaning near
He lets her reach and pull one apple out…
The country apples lose their last frontier,
Collapsing on the cobbles, roll about

And many lost, he scrambles to retrieve
The ones remaining, lying at his feet,
While listening, continuing to believe
The cider from them will be fresh and sweet.

12.21.05

COMMENTS OF THE POEM
Hugh Cobb 21 December 2005

A lovely moral tale well told. The fabulist's art is not lost on you. Lovely work. It tells one story and underneath is a deeper tale just as well told. I bow to you.10 from me. Happy Chanukah, Hugh

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Richard Dates 06 January 2022

I can taste the apples and the cider.

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Brian Dorn 29 March 2006

Apples always make the best poetry fruit! Interesting poem! Brian

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Linda Hepner 12 March 2006

Max Reif imaginatively read this on his website, acidplanet.com Thank you Max, you did a beautiful job! Admiringly, Linda

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Chuck Audette 05 January 2006

A great visual story, wonderful rhymes and flow. A core truth -a pretty woman always upsets the apple cart. I like the parallel between the perfect woman, and that perfect apple. Think I have to make this a my favorite poem.10++ chuck

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Max Reif 03 January 2006

Excellent storytelling, Linda. Your use of words is, probably consciously, reminiscent of Robert Frost. Your rhymes are seamless. I'm still pondering what the 'moral' is. It will probably dawn on me soon.

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