The GRAPES Fell..

 "In the souls of the people the grapes of wrath are filling and growing heavy, growing heavy for the vintage."
                             -John Steinbeck (Grapes of Wrath, 1939, Pulitzer prize)

 Yesterday was the day to pick the grapes. Storm or no storm. Dull earth to mud. Worms flying.Ghosts of summer gone. Cold and biting, a hint of sun. Then no more.

 Chill and cold. Rainy and Blustery. Descended from the calm that was and the turmoil that be.

 Even the hummingbird, still humming ,  was not whirring about. He sat on empty branches waiting his turn  in the wind.  As the grapes fell. And the mud sloshed at our feet.

Ocean strangely quiet. No waves. No turmoil.  Just silence as the storm of all storms came out of the east.

 The grapes fell. The forest plumetted into an abyss of darkness and apprehension.

Skies once lightened as if a tiffany lamp somewhere burned...... And those who knew not of grapes and storms and days of toil,  relinquished  all and  basked in the moment.

 It was not to be, however.......

 As the last of the grapes fell...... juicy  mounds piled into bags and buckets, exploding with the slime of green eyes.  It was time to go. The day was late. The time fleeting like wind upon the rooftops.

 The Crusher waited . To embrace the  grapes that had fallen. In their silent screams, they became vague and abstract.

Resulting in  green, gooey pulp. Not far from  that awful green jello someone always brings to dinner parties. Green like a crayon had melted into its depths.

Liquid  glop in one  continuous thread of  pungent green flesh.

 Forcing the fruit to bleed green blood.Lamenting in the death of the grapes.

 Pouring. Draining . Piling into carboys. A new home. A new place to be.

 An interlude  to sit and stir . Stir and sit. Waiting  for the carboy  to ingest  pounds and pounds of sugar  dumped into  its belly. A pivotal moment in the life of the grape. A pivotal moment  for all.

  We mark time by watching the crystals  fall.

 It seeps. It melts and oozes into the juice.  The grapes are as one.

 Last prize is  leftover juice. Dark, unfiltered. Tart, sweet and fresh.So fresh it sings.

 The stuff before wine, after the grapes fell.  In five or six months it will waken from its winter sleep. And we will greet it anew, knowing that the grapes have fallen to be brought forth anew  in the spring.

 "The sun , with all those planets revolving around it, and dependent on it, can still ripen a bunch of grapes as if it had nothing else in the universe to do...." -Galileo Galilei (1564-1642)

Photographs: M McConachie Woods