Queenly Fruit

For two years you’ve grown
from the spikey leaves I planted,
and today is Lammas harvest.
Oh pineapple Queen
oh abundance of August,
your shape on my altar so regal,
between white tapers,
guarded by carved turtles.
Your ovate shape wears a green hat
that dances upward like flames.

Teaching me to wait
you have made me patient.
You grew it in me, a seed
slowly coming into flower,
finally fruiting in me.
Thank you for your waiting
for me to be ready for you.

Each jewel segment of your skin
once a flower,
and now two hundred
flowers have fused
to create the multiple fruit you are.
Oh Queen! Oh dream of marvel,
you model the pattern we seek!
I honor your graceful coherence.

Tomorrow in slow ceremony
I will break my fast and receive you.
You will bless me sticky with nectar
and my tongue will sing with happiness
and my taste buds
will skip and spring and leap and gambol.
Queenly fruit, long awaited,
I bow, I bow.

©Susa Silvermarie 2024