The Apple

best unknown poets carrie jones
Dogs Are Smarter Than People: Writing Life, Marriage and Motivation
Dogs Are Smarter Than People: Writing Life, Marriage and Motivation
The Apple
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Hi! This year (2023), I’m continuing my quest to share a poem on my blog and podcast and read it aloud. It’s all a part of my quest to be brave and apparently the things that I’m scared about still include:

  1. My spoken voice
  2. My raw poems.

Thanks for being here with me and cheering me on, and I hope that you can become braver this year, too!


For Anne & Maxine

Why is it that the dead

Never listen to my pillow talk?

I am tired, but can’t sleep

Again and again and again.

You snore next to me

And occasionally twitch

As the dog snuggles in between us,

Released from her crate

Because she cries so much.

Again and again and again,

Why is that my whines

Never wake anyone up?

Not even myself.


The apple fell to the ground
joining the others; rotting
had already begun the way it does.
We all fall and crack. 

On the wire a squirrel ran to the right,
green apple in her mouth, prized
obviously, bigger than her head. Another
fell before a second squirrel appeared, apple
in mouth, bounding on the wire to the left this time. 

I know I’m not the squirrels. I know
I am not an apple (though I feel round lately), 
but I gather things too big to hold and drop 
so many, bringing them to the road 
where they’ll be carried off 
by others or maybe smooshed under 
wheels of cars or just left to rot. 
I know. I’m not the apple 
rolling aimlessly 
until I can’t move anymore.
I know. 

Hey, thanks for listening to Carrie Does Poems.

The music you hear is made available through the creative commons and it’s a bit of a shortened track from the fantastic Eric Van der Westen and the track is called “A Feather” and off the album The Crown Lobster Trilogy.

Author: carriejonesbooks

I am the NYT and internationally-bestselling author of children's books, which include the NEED series, FLYING series, TIME STOPPERS series, DEAR BULLY and other books. I like hedgehogs and puppies and warm places. I have none of these things in my life.

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