Text Box: # Text Box: POEMS & SUCH Poetry Editor: Steve Bell The InitiativeText Box: Text Box: The Produce Man Steve Bell rough, wrinkled hands of a man reaching out to the avocados the potatoes and the icebergs who had never floated in the sea and he gently assembled them by type, by group or shape or scent all different, yet side by side together resting, waiting, longing to be chosen for a feast. The produce man concentrates on the fruit on the vegetables and yes the hard-headed nuts who would escape their fate by diving into baskets of fully clothed rice. He speaks to no one. Unless they ask, Where are they? Or, are they fresh? He smiles, answers politely as he watches over his children as the mechanical misters shower the salad fare while the other greens, reds, and browns just enviously stare. Text Box: Standing, stooping slight overhead the fluorescent light as he moves the produce anticipating the moment of the frown as he discovers that some rotten, spoiled souls of soil and sun must sadly be thrown forever away. Holding the mourning in his heart grief, a grim reality. But! the brothers and sisters of the harvest They come! in the morning on the trucks. Early. Before the shoppers arrive, exiting the boxes ready for His hands.