Everything Never Comes Your Way by Nicole Stellon O'Donnell

Picking Cranberries

The week after you arrived, I took you

cranberry picking

on the trails close to town. 

You told me

about your husband, your clenched jaw,

the damage the pressure had done.

I picked, fingers pulling, cooling

against hard, dark berries.

Buckets filled, sun slanted

through the birch. That afternoon

our words puffed visible

from our mouths, and I knew what

it had been for you, arriving more

difficult than departing. I reached

for your bucket and poured in my berries.

I can see you

in your kitchen in December, the short day

peers in the window while your hands

break open the bag. One square of pale

sunlight on the sugar, measured, waiting.