without the cream of human kindness

With all their faults
fruits to bear
heretics to burn
loot to share
In Eden’s garden
with points west
grows incredulity,
spread household pests.
When is truly
strawberry season?
faultless and fresh
faked colours show
irrigated with blood,
(as everyone knows)
picked by the blind
to avoid deceit
strawberries
for the garden
partying
picked to eat.
ploughing
ground buries
truth in graves
not too deep
to be recovered
and burned
while the innocent
sleep.
T.P. Wilkinson, Dr. rer. pol. writes, teaches History and English, directs theatre and coaches cricket between the cradles of Heine and Saramago. He is author of Unbecoming American: A War Memoir and also Church Clothes, Land, Mission and the End of Apartheid in South Africa. Read other articles by T.P..