Susan's comments (member since Jan 06, 2009)

Susan's comments from the Readers and Reading group.

I enjoyed reading The Help--was it fabulous writing??--no, but a fast, engaging book..as a Southerner I would like to say that the white women were exaggerated as were the black but from my observations,don't think the writer was far off the mark...sad..
Susan

Cantaloupe
by Lee Robinson

Friday I sniffed it
in the grocery store, turned it
in my hands, looking
for bruises
in the rough, webbed rind.
My mother's voice—the one
I carry always in my head—
pronounced it fine. Ripe,
but not too soft.

I bagged and bought it,
would have given it to you
for breakfast—this fruit
first grown in Cantalupo, not far
from Rome. I imagined you,
my sleepy emperor, coming
to the table in your towel toga,
digging into the luscious
orange flesh
with a golden spoon,

and afterwards,
reclining, your smile
satisfied,
imperial.

Now I open the trunk of my car
to find the cantaloupe
still there, flattened, sour,
having baked all weekend
in August's oven.

Grieving is useless,
my mother would say,
Just get another.

Bur why am I so certain
that no other fruit
will ever be as sweet
as that—

the one
I would have cut in half,
scooped the seeds from,
that one I would have given you
on Saturday morning?


"Cantaloupe" by Lee Robinson, from Hearsay. © Fordham University Press, 2004. Reprinted with permission.

JoAnn-
I use to be a Berg stalker--she would regularly stop at the local indy bookstore in Cincy--think I saw her five or six times...now, we live in Columbus and authors for some reason don't make their pitstops here...
Haven't liked her latest books..
Susan

Never Change by Elizabeth Berg is one of my all time favorite books..there is a scene in that book that is so poignant (spelling??) that thinking about it makes me misty..
Susan

I am reading The Road--a have to read for my book club--which I am the only member that either a. hasn't finished the book by our meeting date or b. is out of town for our meeting...so this month I am IN town and fell compelled to read but so far, DARK...boy oh boy...per Amazon it is a good read but hmmmm.