Thirteen Ways Of Looking At Orange
After Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird by Wallace Stevens
I
With longing
And sharp nails
I consider the orange.
II
Five oranges perch in their little tree
Exuding banal sweetness.
III
Lust for orange
Can send a woman
Into a splendour of madness.
IV
Peel, moonlit on forest floor
Thin white curls discarded
For idiots to follow.
V
You can’t look away
From her dusky shimmer
Those slow-opening Hot Tropic lips
Accompanied by swish
Of falling skirt – orange, of course.
VI
A man, a woman and an orange
Three objects
Eternally irreconcilable.
VII
They climb into orange sky
Where steely towers grow
And men yearn for absent gods.
VIII
Bring me oranges
And I will be your slave forever.
IX
When darkness comes
Orange is a fleeting dream
Beyond your grasp.
X
She cannot conceal her orange-flecked teeth
As her fingers grope towards
Another globe of pleasure.
Marmalade gloats on thin white crisp.
XI
We will gather a billion billion billion oranges.
They will fill the deepest black hole
Shine brighter than the sun.
XII
Air chokes its toxic warning.
Orange insect
Blunders into human.
XIII
The last sunset
Will be orange on steroids
Will be laden with metaphor
Will be remembered
Until the last human bleats
Echo through barren plains.
Somewhere, in another world
An orange eye blinks.
Jennie Ensor is an author living in north London. (Blind Side, her debut novel, was published by Unbound in 2016 under her pen name Jennie Ensor). Jennie has a BSc in Physics with Astrophysics and a Masters in Journalism. Her poems have appeared in publications including Agenda Poetry, SOUTH, Orbis Quarterly International Literary Journal (latest March 2015), London Grip (2014), Ink Sweat & Tears (2014), Dreamcatcher (2014) and Poetry Salzburg Review (Spring 2015).