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Waiting for Oranges
This poem was written during a workshop on Creative Expression given by Gayle Schucker and Beth Greenspan at the Alternatives '90 Conference in Pittsburgh. Beth asked us to observe our present environment, then to imagine a place where we would like to be in the future. Poems were written from this meditation, each a journey from Here to There.
I am waiting sitting on the rock,
Water is falling across the room
A lobster tank perhaps, or air conditioning.
An ice machine hums hoarsely beyond formica.There is not much longer to go
In this place where I am breaking the rules
To gain solitude. I am waiting,
Staring at salt and pepper shakers
Placed on empty tables,
Listening to the bubbling water
And other machines that capture silence
When the people leave.I am waiting for the oranges promised
Before I moved to this rock,
Before I left the desert,
Before the earthquake came,
Before the red and the black returned from the Alps,
And before the Himalayas crumbled.
Before the deluge.Home is a small town where the people are,
People who know me, 1600 souls and no more.I am waiting for oranges,
Round and pimply in a lunch bag,
Fruit packed by my mother for school,
Or by an unknown friend at summer camp.I seldom eat oranges now,
They are stacked by the hundreds,
In ascending rows at the Shop N Save,
Plentiful and cheap,
But not very interesting.It is the solitude that beckons,
Solitude of mountain rock and waterfall,
Sustained by the gift of an orange,
A compact fruit, bright and juicy,
That comforts in the event of thirst.It is the solitude of sitting at an empty table
And knowing that a mother cares.- Sally Clay
Alternatives '90
7/13/90