Blueberry Crumble

cinnamon seeps into the home and I can already smell the sugar crumble a fragrance of childhood innocence captures memories and recollections different times they were when fresh food could only be bought in season or harvested from a garden plot that teased my taste buds when growing beans and potatoes where for the winter alongside spicy pickled cucumber carrots and beet root were quietly flourishing under cover of fertile soil to warm as soup longing hearts and bodies when the heating stayed cold it was post-war and my family still remembered frost bombs and hunger giving shelter a garden loo I remember was painted and faded in Royal Blue with a heart carved out into the door although there was probably none every time you sat there you knew you were producing valuable compost sustainable living is neither a very modern invention nor flatulent science behind it a rampant blueberry hedge stood tall and proud in the autumn you had to duck and stretch out to pick the harvest from thorny branches did not mind the scratches and bleeding because hunters and gatherers know that food on the table required skill resilience as well as tough toil the lacerations were like medals and badges of honour for the pickers fuelled the collection bucked mixed with sweat from young skin full of endurance purpose and meaningful clusters of patience and strong hope for life pastry and home cooking in years when food had not to be fast much later a psychotherapy lecturer painted a picture of therapeutics and reminded me that blueberry crumble starts with flowering beauty proceeds through passion and effort with spiky endeavour to seed and preserving fruit and effort is a necessary rite of passage to reap I have succumbed to taking my pills and they assist me on my journey but when I feel blue I sit in my garden and listen for birds in the hedge share crops with bees and grateful wasps in silence no sting in the tale eat biscuits and feast on remembrance so that my nostrils fill with joy 21st August 2020