Blueberries
Around noon
we head for the CPR tracks
with pint buckets
to pick the wild sweet berries.
we head for the CPR tracks
with pint buckets
to pick the wild sweet berries.
Within twenty minutes
our work is done.
our work is done.
I think of as a child
how we placed our ears
on the steel rails
in anticipation of
the afternoon train.
how we placed our ears
on the steel rails
in anticipation of
the afternoon train.
How our crazy cousin Cooper
would crouch on an overhanging pier
near the abandoned apple canning factory.
would crouch on an overhanging pier
near the abandoned apple canning factory.
The stainless steel Dayliner thundering past
Cooper inches from death.
Cooper inches from death.
I think of how our brother Bob
died tragically
after slipping down
a flight of stairs at school
& doing his knee in again
died tragically
after slipping down
a flight of stairs at school
& doing his knee in again
our memories of him terribly alive
as we scatter his ashes around
my grandmother’s house he loved
& visited each summer in Nova Scotia.
as we scatter his ashes around
my grandmother’s house he loved
& visited each summer in Nova Scotia.
Now back home in Oz when I eat blueberries
I think of Bob, the long defunct Dayliner
I think of Bob, the long defunct Dayliner
Cooper hanging on the pier for dear life
the wonderful clanging & hoot of the train
the wonderful clanging & hoot of the train
as it flattened our coins clunking into Aylesford.
