Fruit Stand

Amanda Gorman is the Inaugural Youth Poet Laureate of the United States and Founder of Onepenonepage.org. Her first collection of poetry, entitled “The One for Whom Food Is Not Enough”, was published by Penmanship Books in 2015, and her work has appeared in The Wall Street Journal, The Huffington Post, and award-winning anthologies.

Fruit Stand

I thought that to love

Was to be broken open.

His tongue carved out the red in my mouth

Like a knife gutting the meat of a watermelon.

I knew love like honeysuckle knows spoon.

When he touched me, I felt my insides scooped out onto bed.

A black, wet crop

Too bitter to savor.

I wish I could speak with lemonade on my tongue,

Milk and honey lacing my teeth.

But I am more vinegar, cinnamon and black vanilla,

A rind’s sour darkness I hope deters

Men from devouring my sweet over and over.

I’ve always been a thistle of a woman.