The pantry and fridge are gone
and all their store of foodstuffs;
the bed and all the bedding, gone too.
But here, on our fire-blackened land,
are plants that could serve—
if only we knew
how to gather and prepare them—
as both larder and linen chest.
Tender shoots taste good raw;
older are best steamed.
The narrow leaves can be dried
and brewed for tea.
From the flowers comes nectar that yields
a rich and spicey honey.
And the fibers that loft
the seeds to be borne on currents of air
can be spun and used in weaving
or stuffed into pallets for sleeping.
All that, I learned from reading, have never
gathered the plants, or seen them gathered,
at any stage. The Kalapuya, who
passed down the practice
generation to generation, had been banished
from this canyon long before our time.
The willow-leaved shoots crowding the edge
of the concrete-walled crater
where the house had stood
I barely noticed until the flower-stalks
appeared, dangling deep-pink buds that
opened into frilly magenta blossoms.
Ungathered, they lift bright panicles
amid charred stumps and slash, drawing
bees to drink their nectar, transport their pollen.
They spread networks of roots
through the cindery soil, holding it
for species that need
the ground prepared for them.
We who came to this land, then canopied
with Douglas fir, big-leaf maple,
Oregon white oak, a mere
quarter-century ago—we for whom
a quarter-century
is a long time—we, too, need
the ground prepared for us.
Neither natives nor pioneers,
we can only honor
know-how and knack we don’t possess—
and savor the sudden emergence
of brilliant color, delicate form,
out of ash and char.
—
Eleanor Berry’s latest poetry collection, Works of Wildfire, won the 2022 Grayson Books Chapbook Award. Previous publications include Green November (Traprock Books, 2007), No Constant Hues (Turnstone Books of Oregon, 2015), and Only So Far (Main Street Rag, 2019). A past president of the Oregon Poetry Association and the National Federation of State Poetry Societies, Berry holds a Ph.D. from the University of Toronto and has taught at colleges and universities in Wisconsin and Oregon.
