Pumpkin
Who couldn’t love
a fat orange ball,
its innocent plumpness?
Rippled flesh
the colour of leaves
the colour of cheese.
All the rage in October
but in November,
punctured, sunken.
Who pushed a knife
into its face,
carved features of hate?
Pumpkins huddle at the market,
frost glistens
on their green stems.
Can you carry that?
the cashier asks doubtfully,
but I hug mine home.
About this poem
‘Pumpkin’ appears in Theresa Munoz’s pamphlet, Close (Happenstance, 2012).