The Miser's Horde by Anne Reeve
Speckled perfect pears stretch their heads upwards
As small oval damsons, electric blue charged
Watch thin bubbled blackberries bursting their juice
Whilst mellowed gooseberries stare with yellow eyeballs
Blackcurrants in their thousands wear dusky mourning dress
And stately rhubarb stand like sentinels huddled
Under shrivelled leaves.
Rough- skinned russet apples in their armoured copper coats
Nestle close to their tightly wrapped keepers
Slumbering strawberries, blistered, dream of the sun
Titianesque tomatoes, now scarlet pulpy rich
Spill out their lifes blood.
Ruby cupped raspberries wait ready for pie
As withering Apple Johns shrivel and die.
Aromatic apricots in dull amber hues
Envy bright shiny cherries their red satin sheen
Greengages in their plum- like disguise
Watch the quarrelling quinces, harsh and austere
Become fragrant quinces Persian gold spheres
Hazel nuts, bony held fast in a whorl
Sharp, sly sloes from the blackthorn peer
At loganberries lolling trapped on cobwebbed leaves
Rich plums parade in purple, royally robed
As silver spiders cast their tangled silken nets
The misers horde that once enjoyed the light
Rot in an attic, darkness, endless night.