grace
By
Dave Benson (My oldest son)

*

Blissful beginnings,

if they were that and only that,

would hardly be worth it:

Eve knew not just the color

of apple, the firmness of the fruit,

not just the white froth of its juice

overrunning the full lower lip

to become the stickysweet wetness

of her chin- Eve knew apple

in its essence; she knew apple.

There was nothing to decide.

It would have gone on that way-

had to-

like fibers finding their

rightness in a weave,

like the stuttering music,

after the rain, of every pendulous

drop dropping, full to falling,

leaf to leaf.

The winnowing of truth from fact

is bound to give rise

to its own illusions.

But from the way the sunlight sugared her

nakedness, the way the night coiled-

she knew others would understand.