-This poem reflects on blackberries as a wilder form of summer abundance, where sweetness ripens in shade and asks patience, care, and a little risk.
Along the fence, beneath the leaves,
the berries darken in their clusters,
first red, then deepening into blue,
then near black with gathered sun.
The canes bend low with quiet weight,
their thorns keep watch along the reach,
and every hidden shining fruit,
asks patience of the hand that comes.
To find them is to enter shade,
to part the green, to bear the scratch,
and come away with summer stained,
a little sweetness on the skin.
So much of ripening lives like this,
half gift, half bramble, close and wild,
the darkest fruit held in the hedge,
until the season says now.