The Orchard

The Piedmont’s rolling green hills were showing

The first reds and gold of autumn.

We could see the Blue Ridge Mountains in the distance

As we walked a red clay road in crisp cool air, the sky

An azure sea touched with white like a tattered veil

When we picked apples at Drumachers Orchard

I’d never been to an orchard

A man at the gate sat on an old tractor

With a pouch of tobacco in his hand.

Walk the dirt road, he said

As he spit tobacco juice off to the side

Watch for the bees, and stay on the path…

Fallen apples under the trees, rotting fruit

Feeding frenzied Yellow Jackets among dead leaves.

Josh running here and there

Be careful where you step!

But he stayed on the path…

It’s late afternoon, time to go home

Mom and Sis buy pumpkins and apple sauce

At the wood plank table set up

On hay bales in a barn by the road.

The barn smells of rotting apples, juice, and jam

Cider, vinegar and apple butter.

A woman scolds her son

As the orchard worker smiles, and takes my money

But doesn’t seem to notice the Yellow Jackets in the air

Are you on the mailing list?

Josh runs up to us, smiles when he looks my way

“I love you Dad,” he says. “I love you.”

~ ~ ~

This was originally posted on Medium.

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