Here, in the first world
in the North,
We buy a fruit bowl woven out of cane
for CAD$8.00 at a fair trade store
I imagine it full
of mangoes, oranges and bananas
poised on the table
still life evoking plentitude.

You carry it on the bus
jostling against your hip
when we stop for lunch in Chinatown
you leave it behind at the sushi place
where a pony-tailed girl
brings a porcelain tray of raw tuna for CAD$1.90.

You travel back to claim it
two buses and
a walk in the hot June streets.

Finally on the table,
the fruit bowl
tips drowsily to one side
under the uneven weight
of five Californian oranges.