i keep telling myself it is strawberry season somewhere

you have to forgive me 
for how naive i can be with my dreaming.
it is in fact not strawberry season somewhere
& seasons were invented by farmers who were
fearful of the dirt. they went outside 
& prayed to green leaves like skirts.
i am lonely & thinking of strawberries in their fields-- 
in their nests. i'm thinking of strawberries 
ready to hatch & shrouded by two or three broad leaves.
the crow lingers just above the field
full of red warm hunger. want to eat strawberries
but the farmer has set out glinting stripes of foil 
to scare the crow away. 
somewhere, yes, forgive me again, somewhere
the strawberries are swelling to size 
of faces. there is a strawberry 
the size of my skull or no maybe
my skull has always been a ghost-white berry 
waiting to ripen. redness is not always an indication
of taste. i am eating bitter strawberries tonight
& they tricked me with their strong sense of red.
i ask the strawberries where they came from
& their shake their heads on the paper plate 
i pluck them from. sour. each sour.
they prickle on my tongue but i eat them anyway.
they traveled all the way here to be devoured
& i will not deprive them of that. also 
there might be no strawberries tomorrow
& we might all start talking about 
our memories of strawberries. i will need
their bitter feet in my throat to tell strangers
how recently i consumed them. 
i will say something about how fleating 
every fruit is. all my strawberries
could sprout wings tonight too & just make off.
maybe yes maybe when this is all over
i will build a green house 
under the earth. i will hire angels
for sun light. dear god, how do you listen to me?
dreaming of nothing but strawberries.
i will wade into the side & sit 
in my greenhouse to witness my rows & rows
of endless strawberries in their endless seasons.
isn't that always the case. we turn towards
imagining our way around nature. 
yes, this is what i want. a living room
of strawberries. a hall 
of strawberries. an afterlife.