You hung from the stem, a weeping wormhole oozing tomato innards...And I reached for the ripest, most Pristine of the plant but grandpa always taught me not to be wasteful, to cut out the bad with my knife.
So I reached for you,
Thumb soft against the unblemished Portion of scarlet skin, siblings, green, declaring that you.. Had never blushed so deep and warm a hue before.
They did not see me slice into the rot.
I swiped my blade Through Pandora's box And found no jewels,
Only snakes, worms, and slugs that coiled around my wrists like vile
cuffs and chains.
I daydreamed about Pristine Tomatoes.
I left you in the grass, hoping A ripened fruit's corpse would not be my blessing to your soft sisters and mother stem but you would creep back to the vine as a bloom, yellow and healed, “reborn.”
The snakes still pump venom at certain words and noises.
The slugs still leave slimy, pale, ghost-trails upon my skin.
The worms still tumble out of my lips and I think...That I should have let you spoil.