Classic Poem

for Janet Powell

To cut
a mango
one takes a sharp, pointed knife
and slices lengthwise
close to the flats of the seed, two
thick scallops, then
leaving the skin intact,
cuts through the flesh to the skin’s inside
three lines the length of each
then four across, so that
cross-hatched
the scallops can be turned outside-in
to produce
twenty luscious morsels of taste.

That is one way: another
is to bite in
cleanly about the stem
and pull off the skin
more or less entire—this
so they say
best done naked
in a tepid bath
so that the juices can
dribble down the arms and breast
and scent the warm water with its in-
comparable fragrance.

Beyond this
and that almost nothing else
beats a green mango pickle
hard and fiery from one of Mrs Fernando’s jars
beside basmati rice
and a curry strongly flavoured with cardamom
I have almost nothing
to say about mangoes

except
that the large leaves
and great, welling fruit
of a mango tree by moonlight
are like gigantic tears

and that
on hot nights
one sometimes dreams
of the huge fruit
split
and lying on the ground
its thick juice
trickling slowly
into the warm earth
and wakes
and finds oneself weeping.