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Salmon Berries

Here is a poem by Kelsea Habecker to end a month of blog posts supporting Hunger Action Month. This poem is reprinted with permission from New Rivers Press. Salmon Berries It…

Here is a poem by Kelsea Habecker to end a month of blog posts supporting Hunger Action Month. This poem is reprinted with permission from New Rivers Press.

Salmon Berries

It comes down to this: what we do
with what we’ve got:
the sky, the sea beyond,
enough space, and tundra
just now berrying in this falling off
of the year. 

The women hunch low to the ground,
plinking their buckets
with orange salmon berries.
Their bright floral parkas enliven
the gray morning.
They work quickly without
lifting their heads.
A day’s worth of picking will yield
only half a bucket of the tiny berries
which they will hoard
into jam and dole out
through the long winter
that crouches low over the next hill.

This post was written by Kelsea Habecker. When she’s not living elsewhere, Kelsea Habecker lives, writes, and teaches in Indianapolis. Her book, “Hollow Out,” was published by New Rivers Press.