The Blight
The robust memories of last year's crop,
Ripen with the promise of the fruit that this year's will bring,
Blue for the memory, pink for the promise.
Yet blue gives way to pink in the unripening fruit,
And yet-grown berries plucked from the branch not by fingers,
but sickness,
Fall pitiful to the mulchy autumn grass below.
The Blight, from nowhere, creeps through my berries,
And the lofty promise of the bumper,
Remains unfulfilled.
—Tom Fleming
