The Pecan Grove

I assigned myself a little project that I don’t want to let go unfinished.  As it turns out it was just a little over a year ago that I decided I should write more about my experiences as a Latina/Chicana growing up in the Westside of San Antonio: http://redpetals04.wordpress.com/2010/06/01/summer-linens/

Please consider this poem my second in this series. It still needs some finessing though and so it may change a bit over the week. The first in my project was “What You Can Count On” in Xicano Poetry Daily.

“The Pecan Grove”

What I first knew of risk I learned picking
pecans – harvesting with my father in

the Fall. We’d walk along with fallen branch
and plastic bag in hand. Our eyes watching

the tree tops for the right gesture – a cloud
shielding above perfect clusters of shells.

My father would aim, fling a broken branch
up to spark cascades of fruit* to our feet.

The autumns were coated with pecans – warm,
stirred like leche quemada made at home.

There were visitors too. Who’d sit with my
father with a handful of unshelled nuts.

With each crack and bite, the more relaxed the
exchange of their words. Truths upon more truths.

Shelled selfs – cascading, plucked and opening -
Picking up words – those in tact, the rancid too.

Pecan shells on the table at parent's house (2010)

Pecan grove I visited as a kid.

* Pecans belong to the fruit type “Drupe” http://waynesword.palomar.edu/fruitid1.htm#drupe

Not technically classified as a “nut”

Thanks!

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