blackberries

Photography by Zoe Pessin

Does anyone know what it means to go home?

I tried it once and I ended up at our blackberry bush begging for what we had before. 

Giggles turned tears used to sprinkle the floors

Of our tiny home with only four doors.

often I wish I could see the twins

My mind traces back to clouds of dismay

That hot afternoon in the middle of May,

The curb was boiling but I insisted on waiting. I had to

See the twins come home.

As the sun got tired, the curb got cold

And I waited for the twins to come home.

I sat with the blackberries, sour and weak.

the twins didn’t come home.

the blackberries didn’t get sweet.

The day before I wrote to my daddy,

To tell him I was alive.

He wrote me saying my mom left him for the sky. 

He watched her last breath place her atop a cloud,

Blackberry stained lips and satin slippers went up and never came down. 

That was the last one I got 

Because he went fast after mom

pierced himself with something shiny and sharp

and blackberry jam oozed from his heart. 

I'm still waiting for him to write to me

telling me how

he joined the twins

But the letter never came

And blackberries never ripen

That week in December, right before Christmas, was when I chose to rest

I said goodbye to the curb and the great four doors 

Leaving them each with a kiss

And I think about home at the blackberry bush 

With mama, daddy and the twins.