How to Eat a Grape
Put one in your mouth.
You have to put one in your mouth before
you can eat a grape.
You’ve got one in your mouth?
Good!
Can you eat now?
No!
That’s not how you eat a grape.
You have to put another in your mouth
before you can eat your grape.
You’ve got another in your mouth?
Good! That’s two!
You can eat now?
No!
That’s not how you eat a grape.
That’s not how you eat a grape if
you really want to eat a grape.
One grape may be sweet
but one grape may be sour.
If you bite a sour grape --
well!
It puts you off grapes good!
So what can you do?
Add another.
Three?
Three is enough?
Three is not enough!
If one grape is sweet
and one grape is sour
and the last grape is sort of sweet
and sort of sour,
it doesn’t matter because
grapes are so little!
A grape is not even a bite.
A sweet bite, a sour bite,
it doesn’t matter if it is not even a bite.
Two grapes, three grapes …
Four grapes …
Five grapes.
Yes.
Five grapes is OK.
Five grapes are sweet.
Five grapes are juicy.
And five grapes fit in your mouth
easy.
You can bite five grapes,
the tight green skins popping
as your teeth squeeze them
and the juice
the juice gooshing into your cheeks,
and you swallow like you’re drinking
even before you chew.
But now you can chew.
One grape doesn’t let you chew.
It’s good for you to chew.
You need to chew the tough skins
and the tender meat.
You need to chew
or you’re really not eating.
Five is OK?
What about six?
Yes.
Six is OK.
Sometimes five is enough
and sometimes five is not enough.
Sometimes six is just enough.
But sometimes six is not enough either.
What do you do?
Add a grape.
What better?
Add another grape!
Wait! That’s eight!
Yes.
Eight.
There is nothing wrong with eight.
Eight is not bad.
When you want to eat a grape
and what you really want to do is eat a grape
you can eat eight.
Or nine.
All at once.
Nine grapes.
There’s room!
There’s plenty of room for nine grapes!
And if you slip one more in
for an even ten
who’s to stop you?
And if you ease one more in
for a lovely eleven
all the better!
And if you push in the thirteenth
and sidle it over to a cheek
to make space for the fourteenth
and press it to the other cheek
to make a place for the one that
ups to fifteen what
you haven’t eaten yet –
well,
you may have gone too far this time!
But maybe not.
This is not the perfect way to eat a grape.
No.
We’ve passed perfection some grapes back.
But there’s nothing wrong with it.
If you want to eat a grape
and what you really want to do is eat a grape
then sixteen grapes is too many
but sometimes too many is only one grape away.
And you have to figure it out for yourself
where that one grape lies.
So if you’ve made it to sixteen
(and I have!)
and your jaws don’t ache
and your throat don’t gag
and your tongue’s got room to move
then add a grape.
Add a grape!
Seventeen.
Eighteen.
Niiiiiineteen.
Tw …
Tw …
Twen …
Twenty!
Twenty is too many.
Twenty is too many!
Twenty is not comfortable.
Twenty is not pleasant.
No.
You wanted to eat a grape.
This is not a grape.
This is a melon.
This is a big melon pushed into your mouth,
little piece after little piece.
What are you going to do
with twenty grapes in your mouth?
What are you going to do?
Bite them?
Where will the juice go?
It will drip from your lips,
it will flood down your throat.
And the meat and those tough green skins?
Where will all that go?
Your tongue will have to fight it like a dragon.
Your tongue will have to be a mighty monster
in its cave.
This is not a bite.
This is it.
It is all you can do to.
It is a feat, a spectacle, a mountain!
Yes, I have done it.
I will not do it again.
I will never do it again.
It is a big struggle.
It is a big struggle and it is not worth it.
It makes you wonder
when you look at a grape
how it could get so very big!
But don’t worry about it.
Don’t let it be a problem.
There is no problem.
If you want to eat a grape
and what you want to do is eat a grape –
eat five.
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