Today I took some time
from staring at the stars
and ambled to the market.
Nothing too fancy, mind,
just one of those stack-em-high,
sell-em-cheap brigades
that are all the rage
in Germany. Perhaps attracted
by the colour, I got to thinking
about oranges, how lonely
they look arranged in single-file
and not the most efficient.
So I took out my parchment,
scribbled some calculations
to find the Egyptians were right
all along, and that pyramids rock.
Now I sit and wait for the world
to catch up, four hundred years
and one big computer, to prove
what any self-respecting orange-stacker
could have told you if you asked.
© Maurice Devitt
Maurice is reading for an MA in Poetry Studies at Mater Dei, and has recently been short-listed for the Listowel Writers’ Week Poetry Collection Competition. He is working towards a first collection.
