Neil Carpathios

Contributing Columnist

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One of the joys of this past summer for me has been my weekly routine of heading over to Market Street Saturday mornings to graze through the wonderful fresh produce and baked goods on display at the open-air market. I have sampled just about everything several times over—from pies and breads to watermelons, peppers and cucumbers. The folks who grow and bake these delicacies are as friendly and kind as their products are delicious. I realized early on that I was going there as much for the human touch of glowing interaction as for the food. Smiles, chuckles, personal stories—all these have made my market sojourns priceless.

If I had to choose my favorite item of all, though, it would be the tomatoes. How I love them! Plump, juicy, meaty, sweet. My favorite way to eat them is with a bit of olive oil and sprinkled with sea salt and cracked black pepper. Sometimes a thin slice of fresh mozzarella and a basil leaf add to the mix. But I digress (and my stomach is growling and my mouth watering as I write this). I know that lots of people love tomatoes, and one of them was the great Chilean poet, Pablo Neruda.

Here is his poem that celebrates and honors this love of one of Earth’s treasures:

Ode to Tomatoes

The street

filled with tomatoes

midday,

summer,

light is halved

like

a

tomato,

its juice runs

through the streets…

The tomato

invades

the kitchen,

it enters at lunchtime,

takes

its ease

on countertops,

among glasses,

butter dishes,

blue saltcellars.

It sheds

its own light,

benign majesty.

Unfortunately, we must

murder it:

the knife

sinks

into living flesh…

child of the olive,

onto its halved hemispheres,

pepper

adds

its fragrance,

salt, it magnetism…

star of earth

recurrent

and fertile…

no pit,

no husk,

no leaves or thorns,

the tomato offers

its gift

of fiery color

and cool completeness.

Due to space limitations, certain lines have been excerpted, so I urge you to seek out the entire poem. I dedicate it to those wonderful people at the market who toil in their fields and kitchens to offer us, not only tomatoes, but so much more.

Address correspondence and poem submissions to: ncarpathios@shawnee.edu or Neil Carpathios, Shawnee State University, Dept. of English & Humanities, 940 Second Street, Portsmouth, OH 45662. (740-351-3478).