I was there, watching you Rummage through the chestnuts, Possessing the eyes of the grocer, you Rolled over watermelons like headstones

Searching for Whitman with a fever,
Interrupting his whisper Rustling through the lettuce, I held out a paper bag

But the summer sky was blind, Rolling up my sleeves as you were The only customer, mumbling to avocados Skirting the breath upon the wind, I had no words

To wipe upon my apron, an ear To the sea of green bananas, Like a schoolboy who’d forgotten his lesson, You must’ve foreseen a famine.