Still Life Poem by Morgan Michaels

In a blue bowl, a yellow apple,
an hourglass of air, a second apple,
a pair of peaches, a golden pear
some thorns of air, a smiling banana,
three brown and hairy kiwis.

Meet to the blue last week, now,
doubtful of their roundnesses
after all this time, or, after all that time,
their roundness doubted by us-
not untrue: they're no longer so round.

And one pomme is duller
now(certainly no brighter than its fellow)
than the day it was placed there, just washed;
the wrinkled pear doesn't bask so saucily either;
the smile's less fresh, the kiwi's practically jelly.

Not to worry. They're still table-wonderful
in their sunny, crenellated way-
not for eating now for painting, to be cobbled
into abstraction, for the things they be.
The blue holds, depending on your mood.

Only the air's unchanged.