Summer

Wheat Field with Rising Sun, Vincent Van Gogh, 1889

Summer

At midday when the sweltering mother

bedded in wheat and wharves rose

to give food

gold sea and salt bread to the city.

Deep from her blue apron pocket
she drew a ripe orange to slice
and squirt light
---your mouth was stained with sun.

Janet Frame, The Pocket Mirror, 1967

.....