WOMAN WITH GOLDEN APPLE (NO ORDINARY FRUIT) AFTER LOTTE KRAMER’S “BOY WITH ORANGE (OUT OF KOSOVO)”

DOROTHEA SMARTT


A woman holding a golden apple in her palms 
has crossed the boundary, uncertain yet hopeful.

She waits there, glances back at stony ground—scenes
when her desire was too held in check, diminishing.

Now, with this globe she’s grasping, something beckons;
its small oval assurance, a piquant promise of juiciness

no one shall deny. She dares a smile at signs of surrender
within her. Packed precariously about a soft-spiky seed.

Soon she will uncover the arousing body, touch tangy lips,
kiss a loving woman; traverse any stings of this asylum.

Born and raised in London, Dorothea Smartt has been described as a “Brit-Born Bajan international.”  She is a literary activist, live artist and poet.  She is the author of the poetry collections Connecting Medium (2001) and Ship Shape (2009).  This poem is from Reader, I Married Him & Other Queer Goings-On (2014).