" Against Still Life
Orange in the middle of a table:
It isn’t enough
to walk around it
at a distance, saying
it’s an orange:
nothing to do
with us, nothing
else: leave it alone
I want to pick it up
in my hand
I want to peel the
skin off; I want
more to be said to me
than just Orange:
want to be told
everything it has to say
And you, sitting across
the table, at a distance, with
your smile contained, and like the orange
in the sun: silent:
Your silence
isn’t enough for me
now, no matter with what
contentment you fold
your hands together; I want
anything you can say
in the sunlight:
stories of your various
childhoods, aimless journeyings,
your loves; your articulate
skeleton; your posturings; your lies.
These orange silences
(sunlight and hidden smile)
make me want to
wrench you into saying;
now I’d crack your skull
like a walnut, split it like a pumpkin
to make you talk, or get
a look inside
But quietly:
if I take the orange
with care enough and hold it
gently
I may find
an egg
a sun
an orange moon
perhaps a skull; centre
of all energy
resting in my hand
can change it to
whatever I desire
it to be
and you, man, orange afternoon
lover, wherever
you sit across from me
(tables, trains, buses)
if I watch
quietly enough
and long enough
at last, you will say
(maybe without speaking)
(there are mountains
inside your skull
garden and chaos, ocean
and hurricane; certain
corners of rooms, portraits
of great-grandmothers, curtains
of a particular shade;
your deserts; your private
dinosaurs; the first
woman)
all I need to know:
tell me
everything
just as it was
from the beginning. "

― Margaret Atwood , The Circle Game