For Oliver, finally a poem

because he gave an assignment, so I wrote one:

The Lie


When you ask me
how I'm doing, I think

about a worm that bores through
the flesh of an apple
for the bruises,

and I think
about how a cored apple
is still an apple

and I think about how the snow
in October cracked
our apple tree, ruined one piece
so that the whole tree
had to come down
and go into the chipper,

and how a thousand new apple leaves
spring out of the stump
because they have to live
despite having lost most of their body

so when you ask me
how I'm doing, I tell you
I'm doing fine, thanks.