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Banana Child

 

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Walking through a banana plantation

with my not-so-small son

we tread on crisp fallen fronds,

 

our frayed espadrilles slipping sideways,

rustle to an autumn crunch.

 

Rain echoes slow, stuck on a hollow note. 

 

From the multi-layered hearts of the adult trees,

infant banana plants suck and begin to grow.

 

My son, a farmer, says ‘only the strongest survive,

the rest are sacrificed, 

you know Darwin’s theory?’

 

Rain echoes slow, stuck on a hollow note.

 

A mother plant, fingers bunched into safe

green fists, is opening.

Below the male flower hangs crimson.

 

The plant has fruited in nine months, 

and after harvest it will die. 

 

Rain echoes slow, stuck on a hollow note.

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María Castro Domínguez is the author of A Face in The Crowd, her Erbacce–press winning collection, and Ten Truths from Wonderland (Hedgehog Poetry Press), a collaboration with Matt Duggan. Winner of the third prize in Brittle Star´s Poetry Competition 2018. Finalist in the 2019 Stephen A DiBiase Poetry contest NY and highly commended in the Borderlines Poetry Competition. Her poems have appeared in many anthologies and journals such as Apogee, The Long-Islander Huntington Journal NY, Popshot, PANK, Empty Mirror, The Chattahoochee Review, The Cortland Review and Backlash Press. 

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