A Painting created by Paula Lifschey

Inspiration Piece

The Appange
Written By RJ Walker

(Response Piece)

In this corner we have the mean green machine himself.
Weighing in at 100 grams,
The merciless
Apple, the Green Grapple Snapple!!!!
 
And In this corner, we have the Umm Orange
Weighing in at a staggering 200 grams,
The fearsome
Orange, the… Orange Orange… Orange!!

And that is how my father always starts the story of my conception.

An act that most in the Fruit community consider an abomination.
But despite disapproval
From the fruits of their loins came me

The Appange.

Peel of an Orange
Seeds of an Apple
Citrus of an Orange
Texture of an Apple
Smell of an Orange
Stem of an Apple

But the soul… of neither.
You don’t know what it was like to grow up
Living as the wrong kind of fruit.

We crossbreeds are a mystery
An unknown anomaly
A collection of keys in a coven of combination locks
Where do we fit in?

Kiwinut hung himself  from the fingernail of a palmtree
He pinned a note on himself reading
“Let me rot and fall, then watch me grow.”

My father phrases his relationship with my mom that way
Because every moment was a fight
If I am to be considered the next big abomination,
The newest lecture at Sunday service
Then please pardon this apocalypse of diversity
And I’ll forgive you when you get left behind.

Written and Spoken by RJ Walker

The Appange

As I am a spoken word artist, I have provided a recorded performance of the piece. Click the title above to hear the audio version of the response piece.

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