Light Theology and the Persimmon Tree

for Dorothy Bourque Miller

Her kitchen was always filled with ordinary light;
it was the one selected room she made all hers.
From the north window above her sink she gazed
at the white-tailed kites hovering over the ponds,
listened idly to noisy killdeers chattering through
the lazy afternoons in the pasture all summer long.
When she was not satisfied with the lovely things
she could bring us to, she thought selectively about
the fruited hedgerows and orchards this time of year.
Mayhaw jellies and muscadine jams were but some
bright possibilities, but they never passed the test.

Between the Charadrius vociferus in the pasture
and that north window was a persimmon tree.
When the skins on the fruit were just beginning
to put on a lemon sheen, she would begin to see
the red-gold they would become. She waited
for the first frost to begin to relax the branches'
hold and for the fruit to go into the manufacture
of the final sugaring before she wrapped each
globe in crisp white tissue. As the year parceled
out its dwindling light, she came to our back doors
before dawn, left us shallow boxes of golden suns.