Free That Wild Berries Should Grow by Gloria Whelan Page B

neat rows that Grandpapa keeps trimmed. Blackberries grow in a tall tangle of briars. The shoots were higher than my head and covered with thorns that tore my dress and scratched my arms.
    I would have given up, but the berries were so plump and juicy. And they were free — a gift.
    We wore straw hats so that our hair wouldn’t get snagged and strapped pails around our waists so that our hands would be free to pick the berries. In no time the bottoms of our pails were covered, and the blackberries began to heap up. Our hands were stained purple and so were our mouths. While I picked I could hear Grandmama singing a song. She wrote down the German words for me and told me what they meant:
    Mit den Händen: klapp-klapp-klapp,
    mit den Füssen: trapp-trapp-trapp,
    einmal hin, einmal her,
    rund herum — das ist nicht schwer.
    Noch einmal das schöne Spiel,
    weil es mir so gut gefiel.
    Einmal hin, einmal her,
    rund herum — das is nicht schwer.
    With the hand: clap, clap, clap,
    with the foot: tap, tap, tap,
    this way once, that way once,
    turn around — now that’s not hard.
    Once again the happy game,
    because it feels so good to me.
    This way once, that way once,
    turn around — now that’s not hard.
    She pointed me in the direction of a bush where the ripe fruit hung in thick clusters. “Over there, Liebchen.” Liebchen means “sweetheart.” It was Grandmama’s kosename , “cozy name,” for me. She seemed so happy that it was hard to remember that sometimes she is cross. Just like the blackberries, I thought, you had to get past the thorns to taste the sweet fruit.
    We got home with the blackberries just as Grandpapa returned home from Greenbush. He had gone into town to buy a part for the water pump, which had stopped working. Something went wrong with the pump about every week. Then we had to use water from the rain barrel or drag up pails of water from the lake. “Look what I have,” he called to us. He was waving a letter. “It’s from Switzerland. Kurt and Ruth are safe. Now we must make plans. They can have one of my apartments.” He meant the same apartment building where my parents and aunts and uncles live.
    â€œWhat about a job, Carl?” Grandmama was heaping the blackberries into a pot to make jam. Even if the world was coming to an end she would still be working.
    â€œI’ll call the art school. Both of them could teach. In these hard times there won’t be much money, but if things get a little better someday they might have their own art gallery again.”
    The blackberries and sugar were boiling on the stove. It smelled wonderful. All afternoon Grandmama and Grandpapa made plans for their friends, and at the end of the day, besides all their plans there were thirty-five pints of blackberry jam.

September Storm
    I watch the storm unhitch
    the yellow leaves
    from off the birch ,
    grab the poplar by its scruff ,
    toss two helpless
    gulls that hover
    above the tumbled waves .
    I watch the bank
    I’d walked upon
    crumble like a slice of cake
    into the gully’s belly .
    I know that ground ,
    I know its fleece of chickweed flowers ,
    its golden dandelions, its taste of sour sorrel .
    I know fall will follow
    on the storm
    to sweep summer
    into the net of my
    remembering .
    Yesterday while I was packing my things the storm came. It happened so suddenly we weren’t ready for it. It didn’t start with a few plashes of rain on the sidewalk or a dance on the lake. The sky exploded with flashes and a roar of thunder. The wind threw a fit. A minute later the water came down as if someone were throwing it at us, just as Grandmama throws dishwater on her roses.
    We ran through the house shutting windows, but the rain was ahead of us, and we had to mop the floors. When the rain was shut out we stood at the windows watching the show. It was a real roughhouse. The birch tree bent over until its branches swept the