Bittersweet
Walking down the road around Christmastime
my dad said, “One of these days will one of you
boys pick some of that bittersweet for me?”
“Your mother loved bittersweet,” my mom said.
My dad said nothing but I knew this had to be
the reason he’d asked. My brother woke early
the next morning to hunt. He didn’t shoot
a deer, but when he came in bitter
-sweet was twined around the barrel of his gun.