घुड़सवार

I swear on the roof of my mouth. At the farmer's market

on Lyndale, a woman in a patterned linen dress

lifted a pint of blueberries to the light

as though checking a diamond for flaws

before setting it back and walking away.

The farmer watched her go. I did too.

I bought two pints and then a third

before I had reached the corner.

My mother ate blueberries from the carton

over the kitchen sink, whole fistfuls,

not even saving one for a pie or arranging them

in a white bowl with cream the way you're supposed to.

She had four children and a loud garden

and a lifelong suspicion of restraint.

I think of her whenever I see someone

handle pleasure so carefully

it slips right through.

The magazines will tell you to be mindful,

eat slowly, put the fork down between bites.

I know what they mean to say.

But blueberries don't wait.

The season is eight weeks. Maybe ten.

By September they're gone, and you're standing

in a supermarket in February

holding what was picked green

and now turned blue in a warehouse in Chile,

wondering why it tastes like an apology.

Take the whole pint.

Eat them in the car with your fingers.

Let them stain whatever they want to.

You wanted them, you're here, it's July.

Don't be the woman in the linen dress.