Pomegranate Flowers: NaPoWriMo 2022: Childhood's Fruit

[4/26/2022]

Berries dot my childhood memories,

Peering out from bushes, vines, and leaves.

Blueberries earliest of all,

Frosty-pale and summer-sweet in farms.

A bigger, older hand to hold -

Perhaps grandfather in his white sun-hat -

And reckless seeking out of treasures,

Tempted into eating as I pick.

Black dewberry-creepers next,

The risky treasure,

Twined through neighborly chicken-wire.

Edge down the house’s alley

By the climbing-rock named Peter,

Pick carefully, or the thorns will take their price.

But most beware the Christmas-red,

Soft globes, yellow-white and sticky inside.

That red is a warning, a bright stoplight,

They are poison to children we know.

Good only for crushing underfoot,

Or decorating mud-pies,

Still stubbornly they grow.