A Tribute

Hemingway the Grocer

See him now
sorting the produce,
shifting it, feeling it--
not for him the rose-dappled
blood orange,
nor the bibb lettuce with
a tendency to red
at the edge of the leaf.
No broccoflower or pluots or
apples that taste like grapes.

No, only the hardest,
roundest, most perfectly
formed, and truest
lined up one after another
on the big black bench--
the pile of discards
far outweighing
what remains.