There are no apple trees on our little acre
but mumma needs apples red and gold
for apple butter, jams, jellies and Quaker
crumble and apple pie when winter is cold.
She’ll need apples to fill the freezer
when we’re craving that sort of thing
I like apples and I want to please her
“Go find a wild apple tree,” Mumma says to me,
“One that’s got no claim or no one to care.
I saw one two miles up, apples falling on the ground.
It’s a sin when you’re hungry to let them pile there
higher than even the wild can eat down.”
So I’ll go and get the basket as big as I am tall
and strap it to my back. Mumma says
“Fill it high as much as you can carry, till over the top they fall.”
I find what I’m seeking, every apple not half eaten.
Bruises cook away, no matter how hard they land.
To reach the good fruit I climb as best I can while beaten’
and shaken the limbs with a branch in hand.
The fruit is wild and sour, even the ripest prize
good for baking, freezing, and rhubarb apple pies.
I’ll pick until I can hardly lift the basket to my back
and hurry home to hear my Mumma’s praise.
“Aren’t there any better? So many bruised black.
With sorting and cutting this won’t last the winter days.
“Find another tree to pick apples that are sweet.”
So off I went a mile or more and I found what I was seeking
just as it started to pour, now me with wet feet.
I can’t disappoint, so I started picking, sweeter than the others wild.
before I heard from a house across the field
“What are you doing there with my apples piled?”
an elder lady was questioning my yield.
If the tree was wild or if she didn’t care, I didn’t think to ask,
My face turned ripe as I stuttered and apologies fell out of my mouth.
as she walked across the field, chiding me in my task,
after lengthy talk of thievery, manners, and disrespect of youth.
“Take what you have and be on your way!” she said without a smile.
and off I went saying thank you, thank you, her back turned all the while.
but my basket being not as much as I could carry, not yet piled high
I found a few more lesser trees and hurried home, my back aching.
hoping my mother would be proud although I wanted to run home and cry
Mumma was busy cutting, sorting, peeling, freezing, baking,
I didn’t mean, the elder ladies apples to be stealing
but there is too much to be done, no time for tears or praise
Mumma says “Better known for next time, now to sorting and peeling.”
left are the memories of apple-picking days.