Poem: How to eat a Guava

There are guavas at the shop and save.

I pick one the size of a tennis ball.

A ripe guava is yellow, although some varieties have a pink tinge.

It heart is bright pink.

If eaten wrong, the seeds end up in the crevices between your teeth.

When you bite the guava, your teeth must grip the bumpy surface.

It must sink into the thick edible skin without hitting the center.

Perfect times when to bite into a guava and not find many seeds is when the rains are plentiful and the nights are very cool. 

These guavas are very large and juicy almost seedless.

As children, we didn't always wait for the fruit to ripen. 

We just raided the bushes as soon as the guavas were large enough to break the branch.

A green guava is sour and hard. You hear the skin, meat, and seeds crunching.

You feel it inside your head, while the inside of your mouth explodes in little spurts of sour.

You grimace, your eyes water, your cheeks disappear as your lips purge into a tight O.

A dark green guava perfectly round and hard each $1.59.

It smells faintly of late summer afternoons and hopscotch under the mango tree.