was starting to rot. I cut carefully

around the edges, juices dripping down fingers 

Into mouths that eagerly waited to bite 

into the sweet yellow flesh. No one lives 

in that house since you left. It lies abandoned,

a shadow of what had been, a house full of memories

the walls a reminder of all that we once were.

That tree still stands outside our verandah silently witnessing 

all that is no more. No one tends the tree 

yet every year it blesses us with mangoes 

small and sweet juices dripping, slipping

between fingers,like our lives passing by

relentless, unforgiving, un-contained.