-This poem reflects on fallen fruit beneath a late summer orchard, where what escapes the harvest becomes nourishment for insects, soil, and roots in another quiet cycle of abundance.
Beneath the branches, in the shade,
the fallen fruit lies in the grass,
some whole and bright, some bruised and split,
their sweetness opening to earth.
The leaves move softly overhead,
while wasps attend the broken skins,
and bees find what the hands have missed,
among the clover and the stems.
Nothing here has gone to waste,
though not all harvest fills a basket,
what falls becomes another gift,
returned to soil, and wing, and root.
So much of late summer knows this,
that giving does not end with gathering,
the orchard keeps another table,
for everything that lives below.