The Combustion Of Apples Poem by John Beaton

By November, the old Gravenstein apple trees on our acreage have dropped their leaves for winter and we've harvested their fruit. This poem came to me while I was looking at one of them and thinking of Hubble telescope pictures of the Eagle Nebula, where new stars are being born in deep space. 

The first five stanzas each have four lines. Each line has five beats (e.g. old GRAVenSTEIN, your BOUGHS are SCABBED  and MOSSy) . The rhyme-scheme is abab, with a mix of single- and double-syllable pairs.  

The first three stanzas describe the apple tree and introduce the bridging images of artwork and fire. The next two stanzas begin with a one-word sentence to mark transition.  Then they step across the bridging images to the world of space. 

A rhymed couplet ties the apple tree and space subjects together and brings closure to the poem.  "Sound effects" include alliteration and internal rhyme (e.g. specks/flecks and tall/fall) .

This poem was first published in an e-book called "The Wolves Passed Here", which you can find . It has been republished elsewhere.