Eve Remembering

1

I tore from a limb fruit that had lost its green.
My hands were warmed by the heat of an apple
Fire red and humming.
I bit sweet power to the core.
How can I say what it was like?
The taste! The taste undid my eyes
And led me far from the gardens planted for a child
To wildernesses deeper than any master’s call.

2

Now these cool hands guide what they once caressed;
Lips forget what they have kissed.
My eyes now pool their light
Better the summit to see.

3

I would do it all over again:
Be the harbor and set the sail,
Loose the breeze and harness the gale,
Cherish the harvest of what I have been.
Better the summit to scale.
Better the summit to be.

Credit

From Five Poems (Rainmaker Editions, 2002) by Toni Morrison with silhouettes by Kara Walker. Used with permission from The Believer magazine.

Author

Toni Morrison

Toni Morrison was born on February 18, 1931, in Lorain, Ohio. She received a BA from Howard University in 1953 and an MA from Cornell University in 1955. She was the author of one volume of poetry, Five Poems (Rainmaker Editions, 2002), which features poems alongside illustrations by Kara Walker. She is the recipient of a Pulitzer Prize in Fiction, the National Book Critics Circle Award, and the 1993 Nobel Prize for Literature. She died on August 5, 2019 in New York.

Date Published

01/01/2002