The Plum

It is hard to get a pit out of a plum. Harder than a seed or pimple or splinter. It isn’t a loose or free thing wanting to be born into or slurped down esophagus.

It is attached as if by roots to its womb. It is a heart it is a bone it is a tooth it is a child. And it is a violence I am enacting now, as I claw it out like a wolf to prevent the boy I nanny from choking.

Unlike moving a spider to another corner or a flower to another vase, a pit will not find another home. It will be done when I’ve done with it. 

I lock the stroller, pull to the side. The boy studies my hands with ripe eyes, memorizes the choreography of forefinger & thumb. He is clapping. He likes removing things. Does not think of it as loss.

When the pit frees it does so like a molar from a mouth, a confession after years of shame. The whole plum is crying purple. Even my fingers are red and thick. Blood is streaming down one knuckle. I’ve cut my finger.

A pit is a jagged thing. The top and bottom are rough as walnut shell. And the curved edges where top and bottom meet are as sharp as a sealed letter or beak. A pit can cut you.

For days my knuckle stings when coffee or soap or sandwich seeps in. At night alone, my own juices burn it. At work, the pit wound becomes a flaming mouth, rosy lips around mute slash, fighting infection, whispering what happened, what still might.  Reminding me what is true about soft things. About unwanted things. 

Three days later, about to fall asleep, my wound still screams when I bend my fingers around the notebook. I sigh, relieved—or reminded—that the unserious life I thought I was living is, apparently, quite serious.

I can be hurt by a plum, I can be hurt by a plum,

I repeat to myself. It sounds like a blessing. Like a prayer in another language that I am only just learning.