Orange 🍊

Orange
If the earth is an orange,
then God is the patient man with soft and supple hands
who loosens the peel,
first by rolling it gently between his palms,
slowly detaching it from its orb,
moving the surface just a fraction to warm up
this place or cool down
that, to shake us up or rattle the
weather. His hands are warm and careful
but the orange is delicate and
sometimes the juice escapes
or a piggy goes dry.
There are no band-aids for oranges.
Trial and error,
love and gratitude,
are the best we have.
If I were God,
I’d be tempted to juggle with my orange,
to throw it up into the sky with my soft and supple hands,
perhaps marveling at the way it spins or
the way the sunlight catches its surface.
I’d want to throw it, perhaps for my dog,
but my dog would have a soft mouth.
My hands are old and gentle
But I still have a twinkle in my eye.
And sometimes, I’d just want to put it in a bowl,
a smooth wooden one with brown knots,
with all the other fruit,
by the window and the light,
so it could rest.

I believe I wrote this poem in 2005.