Blackberries

The sun burned crowns on our heads
yet I thought nothing of nobility.
Green vines heavy with blackberries     we
picked enough to fill three ten gallon buckets.

Before noon we carried them into the shed
as sparrows do souls     silent bursts
of light     damp earth.  My grandfather
adds     subtracts.  World War II

in calluses     femur unable to release lead.
Gray     hard city to powder     smoke
liberated the dead.  
Red stripes rose     fell.

Give me your hands.  

He sees saltwater octagons     skyscrapers     singed
paper whirling through the body.  Magnolias
distant as poplars     walnut.
My spine is a cypress with jagged bark.

You are the last of us.