June 15, 2026Thrashers and cardinals dart through the brush, throughthe season. Trees begin their letting go as we walkalong the Depot Trail. Bikers and runners pass like pearlsstringing us to this wild chandelier of a plant—magenta stalks, purple-black berries. Cartoonish. Overripe.Poke salad, you call it. Toxic. Yet you crush a fewbetween your fingers, streak them under your eyeslike war paint. A boy again, unafraid.For the rest of the day I live inside that gesture, a small delightin the age of grief. Runners wavinggood morning, a fawn feeding in the woods, a black catcrossing the path. Weed of old spellsand sweet poison keeps me from myself,from the thing that calls me to sorrow.I must have called to it once, to its yellowingheart-shaped leaves, and it remembered.