Newton had falling apples

Tonight's poem is by me:

Gravity

Newton had falling apples,
bouncing down on his head. One jarred
a thought out of that mind-mist, and suddenly
we had a name for the way an apple glistens, bending the
branch, and drops from and old-skin wrinkled tree - so quick! -
and rolls unto the overgrown patch of hard pebbles and bent grass.

I have a falling moon, bearing terror huge down on me,
sweating light until my pupils are craters pocking
the never-been seas and those rough hills with
no valleys. But there are no green men here,
where the american flag once stood,
proud and starched.

And yet if Newton had bit into one of those apples, maybe a bit juicy, maybe a bit sweet,

What would he have discovered then?


I stretch my fingers around my moon, digging the tips into the craters
and pull it towards my wide mouth (the first taste is nothing like
cheese)
and
I
swallow
the
moon,
impossibly whole.