I.

In the new supermarket all the vegetables perch on shelves,
clad in plastic, shrinking like a girl half-embarrassed by the cling of her skirt.
I just want to put two or three of something green in a single bag
but even the tomatoes wear wax.

II.

like apples
to Eve
I craved
the sweet ocean
inside each grape
secretly

III.

feeling wax on a tomato's skin
I looked down at the bundle
of grapes already in my basket
the boycott is over, I thought,
but I thought of skin
skin of grapes
skin of hands

feeling wax on a tomato's skin
the shiny fruit seemed false
red flesh like a warning, soft
like a sponge, absorbing water
flesh too-round, too-red
absorbing chemicals sprayed
over fields like lies on the airwaves
this is safe this is safe this is safe

I thought of hands, picking
tomatoes, lifting vines pregnant
with grapes, soft flesh
absorbing chemicals
until the skin blisters and peels,
until cells split and split and split, like lies
growing darkly within
this is safe this is safe this is safe

IV.

Like another ice cream truck
parked at the corner
the car's siren sings
its warning:
approaching war.
The grim tank
comes, serving insecticides
to the neighbors.

V.

I feel crazy with grief--
I want to run to the bridge crying "Stop!"
but when I get there,
I see we are all dropping
towards the water...
I eat grapes and tomatoes
letting the truth disappear
down the drain, I barely even clean
fruit anymore, in my grief
I have given up. The losses
come in so many forms, in tumors,
neurological damage, asthma,
and the innocence of fruit, nights
stolen from the streets, from abuelos
playing salsa and dominoes
and watching los ninos...
When the tanks came, spraying poison,
I ran inside, shut all the windows,
I wanted to cry to the neighbors, "Hide!"
but I had no proof. Only now I read
that they may have poisoned us
trying to keep the plague of insects away.
Not just the poison they meant to spray,
no, this poison brewed darker,
carelessly boiled in canisters,
turning against our neurons, sinister.
All this the company knew,
and sold the poison up-river,
where the price
was right. I pay in grief,
crazy with grief--I run to the bridge,
crying "Enough!", and let myself drop
into forgetting:
I eat green grapes,
savoring the clean,
sweet flesh.

-Kelly Vaughan, July 19, 2001