Their lipstick-color stains, their Alcatraz armor, their popping seeds and unflinching dance with decay.

Make a night of it.

Pomegranates are sensual, fair and square. Shielded in a dense, almost wooden exterior that requires all manner of skill to coax open, they play hard to get. The messiness of reaching their center eventually (key word: eventually) yields hundreds of seeds you must then shake, gently prod, or rub out of their shells. Not once do they stop and ask, can I make this easier on you?

It could be, and probably was, explorer food: these hardy, healthy sealed bulbs that take an army to squish, scratch, or bruise. I can easily summon visions of stacks of pomegranates aboard the vessels, some of the top ones toppling into the sea on particularly abundant waves.

To wait for a pomegranate to speak to you is to waste a pomegranate. They are of the more finicky variety of fruits. They can and will decide on a dime to leave you hanging. Open up an unblemished pomegranate to find sparkling, glorious abundance in one half, and mushy, stinking rot in the other. No mercy. But when it is good, it is great. Suckle the seeds, crunch them, burst them, slurp them down until you are so full you have to put the other half in the fridge. That is having a pomegranate.

The only thing standing between me and nature’s boba is modern convenience. To work overtime for my food is an affront. I have already toiled to pay for the thing (unless they are coming from your MIL’s garden, they are expensive), and now you are telling me I have to put in even more effort? But alas, in some twilight zone moment, my brain decides to embark on one of those delicious orbs. A quarter of the way through, and I realize I have not allotted enough time, but instead of being a source of frustration, a spell is cast, and I am elated. I dig out the big speakers, haul them to the kitchen, and blast Seaside Woman by Linda McCartney from her posthumous Wide Prairie album. Next comes Joan Armatrading’s Barefoot and Pregnant, and if you’re feeling like showing off, I Remember by Molly Drake. Pomegranate is woman, woman is pomegranate.

Once the deed is done, your kitchen looks like a crime scene. There are bits of pomegranate flesh and tissue stuck to your fingers, stuck to the cutting board, and stuck to the counter. You pick out the pale yellow flecks from the deep red bowl of goodies you intend to eat with a spoon. You shoddily wipe down the mess as your stomach rumbles; your body is signaling its readiness to devour. If your significant other asks for a bite, you oblige, but warning: their reaction will not satisfy you. As the old proverb goes, only the hand that bleeds with the pomegranate may know its sweetness.

This piece channels The Atlantic’s James Parker and his famous Odes. It’s great fun. You should try it.