Because rain fell early
and long this summer, the yard
spawned hundreds of wild strawberries:
pendent hearts
below a canopy of leaves,
whose sawtooth edge we learned
to spot from afar,
but had to search for in sweat weather
when a porridge-white sun
made them fruit low
in the cool hutch of the grass.
Some grew no larger than a wart,
or a kernel; others, fingernail-size,
we called “huge,”
weighing them on an open palm
like garnets
fresh from the lapidaries’ quarter
in Tangier. Overripe,
some looked too bruised to touch,
but here and there
one grew perfect to form:
crusted with small seeds,
roly-poly, and symmetrical,
the textbook strawberry, Fragaria
(fragrant, sense-swilling),
ready for the margins
of a dictionary, and our plates.
Each day, before dinner,
we preened the lawn, crouching,
and swishing a gentle hand
over miniature orchards:
dragging on their stems
like bright red gizzards.
Those with teeth marks we left,
sensing disease,
and knowing how squirrels,
flushed up with nature’s bounty,
bite once from a berry
and move to the next.
We dratted their waste,
but loved their insouciance.
Few hours soothed us more
all summer than those
passed in the womb of the day,
grazing like protohumans
while squirrels foraged alongside,
using us scarecrows
to ward off the cranky assaults
of nesting wrens,
and the rabbits were so tame
we could walk up
and kick them in the rump.
Indoors, the wild-strawberry jam
we made with pectin,
in rainbow-washed jars,
fed us many breakfasts
on its rare, pungent curds,
and the treat of merely being
among the fruits of summer.