The Apple Graveyard - Madison Wiser
Editor's Note: This was a submission to the 2016 Horror Fiction Writing Contest.
When autumn rings its brisk bells
The living like to go apple picking
They have a long history with apples
Golden ones seem to have started a war
If you ask some, they’ll say Eve picked none other than an apple
It is the perfect start to their month of decay
This ritual of apple picking
The dead are fond of apples, too
But theirs don’t grow in sun-soaked orchards
They grow in my home
The Apple Graveyard
Legend has it that the property used to be an orchard
Now it’s abandoned, left to the mercy
Of courtly apple trees with twisting trunks and bowing branches
The apples fall in piles, ankle deep
Burial mounds of fruit
By day, bees crawl along their red flesh
Work their way into holes burrowed by worms and yellowed bites taken by deer
The air is ripe with buzzing
By night, the dead arrive to do their picking
They give the fallen apples a home in their morbid recipes
Festering apple pie and spoiled apple cider
The dead like them rotten to the core
Just like with the living, apple picking is a social activity
Two ghost gentlemen walk side by side
They both seem to have misplaced things in a place called Vietnam
One his wife, and the other his life
Another ghost picks nervously
She appears hollowed out, more bones than spirit
Murmuring about someone named Cal O’Ries
Turning an apple over and over in her hands
Another ghost girl, hollowed out in a different way-the knife
That took her life still resides in her side-goes to her
With a basket made from dry flowers and funeral clothes
Takes the nervous ghost’s hand
And they pick together
The young ones are still children, even in death
They pelt each other with apples and run through piles of leaves
I’d like to tell Death that she is a thief
And from them, she has taken too much
I hold onto the hope that one day
I could tell the families of the children
How their spectral smiles make the graveyard glow
As the night grows older, the dead grow friendlier with one another
They trade recipes and life stories
Some even find family, great-grandparents meeting great-grandchildren for the first time
Laughter bubbling, songs rising like will-o-wisps, ghosts gathering in circles
To celebrate in festivals of moonlight
Sometimes, they even pull me in to join
I see how the dead are mourned
With flowers, and sobs, and black tie funerals
I wish I could shout across the world, to all the living ears,
The dead are merry!
Día de Muertos got it right
Parades and sugar skulls are far more up their alley
The newly dead arrive at the Apple Graveyard
With God, or Allah, or Nirvana, or nothing at all on their lips
They leave singing the praises of their own life
I’m happy to offer one last respite
Before they tug down their shirt sleeves and go about
The “business” of being dead
At dawn they haul up their baskets
Take their last pick of the apples
Say goodbye to one another, unsure of who will come again
And welcome the daylight with outstretched arms
Let the sun burn away the edges of their hazy bodies
Not consuming fire, but preserving fire, homely fire
Their spirits revel in the warmth
Season by season, I care for the graveyard
In winter, when snow cradles the apples as they give themselves up for the soil
In spring, when white buds decorate the branches
In summer, when the fruit grows rich and heavy, dripping off the trees
Especially in fall, when I wander among them
Greeting the bees with sugar water they drink from my cupped hands
Luring shy deer from the woods to feed them
This morning, my foot snags on something beneath the piles
I push aside a cluster of apples and jump back
Glaring back at me is a tiny, light-up sneaker
Attached to a small ankle, swollen with bee stings, pale with death
My hands tremble, and my chest grows tight
As I imagine the new ghost child tonight
Running around the graveyard, lighting up the apples with his shoes
I tell myself, “Don’t fret.”
He simply got lost on his way to the orchard
Instead he’ll find new friends, not just his end
Here in the Apple Graveyard
When autumn rings its brisk bells
The living like to go apple picking
They have a long history with apples
Golden ones seem to have started a war
If you ask some, they’ll say Eve picked none other than an apple
It is the perfect start to their month of decay
This ritual of apple picking
The dead are fond of apples, too
But theirs don’t grow in sun-soaked orchards
They grow in my home
The Apple Graveyard
Legend has it that the property used to be an orchard
Now it’s abandoned, left to the mercy
Of courtly apple trees with twisting trunks and bowing branches
The apples fall in piles, ankle deep
Burial mounds of fruit
By day, bees crawl along their red flesh
Work their way into holes burrowed by worms and yellowed bites taken by deer
The air is ripe with buzzing
By night, the dead arrive to do their picking
They give the fallen apples a home in their morbid recipes
Festering apple pie and spoiled apple cider
The dead like them rotten to the core
Just like with the living, apple picking is a social activity
Two ghost gentlemen walk side by side
They both seem to have misplaced things in a place called Vietnam
One his wife, and the other his life
Another ghost picks nervously
She appears hollowed out, more bones than spirit
Murmuring about someone named Cal O’Ries
Turning an apple over and over in her hands
Another ghost girl, hollowed out in a different way-the knife
That took her life still resides in her side-goes to her
With a basket made from dry flowers and funeral clothes
Takes the nervous ghost’s hand
And they pick together
The young ones are still children, even in death
They pelt each other with apples and run through piles of leaves
I’d like to tell Death that she is a thief
And from them, she has taken too much
I hold onto the hope that one day
I could tell the families of the children
How their spectral smiles make the graveyard glow
As the night grows older, the dead grow friendlier with one another
They trade recipes and life stories
Some even find family, great-grandparents meeting great-grandchildren for the first time
Laughter bubbling, songs rising like will-o-wisps, ghosts gathering in circles
To celebrate in festivals of moonlight
Sometimes, they even pull me in to join
I see how the dead are mourned
With flowers, and sobs, and black tie funerals
I wish I could shout across the world, to all the living ears,
The dead are merry!
Día de Muertos got it right
Parades and sugar skulls are far more up their alley
The newly dead arrive at the Apple Graveyard
With God, or Allah, or Nirvana, or nothing at all on their lips
They leave singing the praises of their own life
I’m happy to offer one last respite
Before they tug down their shirt sleeves and go about
The “business” of being dead
At dawn they haul up their baskets
Take their last pick of the apples
Say goodbye to one another, unsure of who will come again
And welcome the daylight with outstretched arms
Let the sun burn away the edges of their hazy bodies
Not consuming fire, but preserving fire, homely fire
Their spirits revel in the warmth
Season by season, I care for the graveyard
In winter, when snow cradles the apples as they give themselves up for the soil
In spring, when white buds decorate the branches
In summer, when the fruit grows rich and heavy, dripping off the trees
Especially in fall, when I wander among them
Greeting the bees with sugar water they drink from my cupped hands
Luring shy deer from the woods to feed them
This morning, my foot snags on something beneath the piles
I push aside a cluster of apples and jump back
Glaring back at me is a tiny, light-up sneaker
Attached to a small ankle, swollen with bee stings, pale with death
My hands tremble, and my chest grows tight
As I imagine the new ghost child tonight
Running around the graveyard, lighting up the apples with his shoes
I tell myself, “Don’t fret.”
He simply got lost on his way to the orchard
Instead he’ll find new friends, not just his end
Here in the Apple Graveyard