Скачать или смотреть Cherry Tree: “Monticello Peaches” by Sandra Beasley

The name Cherry Tree was chosen as a sly invitation to ponder “the apocryphal story of George Washington’s ax, and (to) encourage writers to craft new and inventive ways to critique, to re-imagine, and to chop away at literary traditions…and to endeavor to serve as both a site of coalescence and protest and a vibrant archive of human thought and feeling.”

It’s here that we find Sandra Beasley in issue #7 writing about Thomas Jefferson’s fondness for peaches in his prodigious Monticello gardens. The peaches, of course, stand as a device to explore the complex and contradictory character traits of the Founding Father.

Food is a leitmotif that runs through much of Beasley’s poetry—she suffers from severe, even life-threatening allergies. Her 201i book, Don’t Kill the Birthday Girl: Tales from an Allergic Life was a full dive into medical data about allergies and her personal experience having to live so vigilantly. It is not surprising that Jefferson’s peaches caught Beasley’s eye, but not as a potential allergic reaction—as progeny born out of an oppressive state of human bondage.

Here is Sandra Beasley’s poem “Monticello Peaches” from her new book of poetry, praised by poet Ida Limon as “a rare and vibrant exploration of whiteness and complicity when it comes to America’s history and traditions.”  Made to Explode is published by W.W. Norton and Company.