Cindy Gregg: "Thoughtful Voyeur: Woman and Cantaloupe"

Watch her select it
over sassier summer
fruits, carved offerings
of purple, yellow,
red in a supermarket
stunned with
fluorescent light.

Seeing her slice it open,
ponder how the melon
secrets its exquisite
pastel beneath a rough,
webby exterior, silent
protest to the showy
outer life of
its every former
neighbor—apple,
banana, strawberry, grape.

Later on, recall
the knife’s decisiveness,
the sudden exposure of
such a pleasing hue,
its juicy glisten
brightening, gladdening
her stark white kitchen
with a brief and modest blush.
 

"Thoughtful Voyeur: Woman and Cantaloupe" by Cindy Gregg, from Suddenly Autumn. © Word Play Press, 2010. 

Art credit: "Cantaloupe Skin," by Paul Hartley.