Blackberry Eating

Blackberry Eating

I love to go out in late September
among the fat, overripe, icy, black blackberries
to eat blackberries for breakfast,
the stalks very prickly, a penalty
they earn for knowing the black art
of blackberry-making; and as I stand among them
lifting the stalks to my mouth, the ripest berries
fall almost unbidden to my tongue,
as words sometimes do, certain peculiar words
like strengths and squinched,
many-lettered, one-syllabled lumps,
which I squeeze, squinch open, and splurge well
in the silent, startled, icy, black language
of blackberry-eating in late September.


Galway Kinnell (b. 1927)

What I Did Today

Today I:

* paid the utility bills
* cut out fabric for a doll quilt
* made a pumpkin nut bread
* saw that the weather forecast for the next two weeks is for 70-80 degrees every day
* did two loads of laundry
* started a list of what I want to do this weekend
* knit a pair of pink mittens
* began knitting a pair of baby bumblebee socks
* mopped the kitchen floor and did some other maintenance housework
* watered my flowers and herbs
* put stale bread out for the birds and filled their bird bath
* thought about getting out the Fall decorations, but decided to wait
* swept the front porch
* ironed John's work shirts for next week
* made an appointment with a heating contractor about installing a new furnace
* picked up books, DVD movies, and books on CD at the public library
* looked at possible new curtains for the bedrooms
* ate leftover pizza for dinner
* began reading Charles Todd's A Duty to the Dead
* said a prayer for all those affected by 9/11/01

Summer's End

No! Sob! I'm not ready! Yesterday evening I realized it was getting dark much earlier. A few leaves are turning color. It's cooler in the mornings. I can still keep the screened, sliding glass door next to my desk open and listen to the wind rustling in the leaves and the birds singing, but how much longer will it be before it's too cold and the leaves and the birds are gone? Last night, just before I fell asleep, I heard a flock of geese honking as they began their long trip south.

I'm going to go eat another fresh peach, knowing that soon there soon will be no more, and muse over summer's end.