Perhaps it was November,
a Saturday morning.
I ate berry pie at the diner,
across the street,
where railroad tracks
and a playground ran
along the right-of-way.
It returns to me,
this gray and cool morning,
not cold.
The air feels damp.
I am a man of many childhoods
and old age longings,
recorded like tree rings inside me.
My sister fed my brother and me,
secret treats,
for two poor boys,
– a poor sister,
who waited on counter,
blackberry pie and hamburgers.
I taste the blackberries.
I remember my sister’s hands,
juke box music
in the background.
The mood of a child
looking down the street
full of her goodness,
leaving a diner,
ready to play.
An old man
drinking coffee in his yard,
watching her,
at the window of the diner
waving good-by.