The Olive Pits

Black and red,
green and brown,
Long and fat or thin and round;
Take a closer look at the olive pits,
They have a secret attached
And a secret within,
On their faces after they have been stripped clean,
Olive pits;
Traveling from throughout the world,
From everywhere in the world.
Take a closer look at the olive pits,
New they are works of art,
Each sculpted with remaining pieces of olive meat,
Rarely stripped clean,
Eaten and discarded;
Survived.
The mouth of women and men
Of every nation and nationality
Good and evil,
Child and old,
Each an artist
At revealing the core of a new generation,
Stretching across time,
Olive to olive pit,
Planted and born again,
Perpetuating the species,
If it is allowed to be said.
Or then again,
what kind of food is an olive anyway?
Loathed and loved,
Devoured and exploited,
Alive inside of
A unique nature
of each individual variety,
if it is allowed to be said,
a species,
and what a species,
this part of living.
Look again and see the olive pits,
the naked olive pit,
The taste of them still lingering
from their rolling around your mouth and tongue,
Sheering across your teeth,
Painting your gums;
A part of the planting,
Possibly;
The olive pits.

Paolo Li Campisi
2009