Poetry Friday: ALWAYS WINTER

This is a poem by twelve-year-old Eva Dehart, from my novel, Eva of the Farm. Eva's parents have to sell the apple orchard where she lives, called the Farm, due to the bad economy and the fire blight that destroyed the crop.

ALWAYS WINTER

Yellow school buses squirt
down the snowy road
like Twinkies on wheels.
I wait for mine to gobble me up--
wait beside the "For Sale" sign
swinging in the wind.

I want to stay home on the orchard
instead of sitting
packed like a sardine in school.
I want summer--
     crickets rampaging
     hammock swinging
     skylight shining
     fish biting.

My bus screeches to a stop
to pick me up.
I stomp up the steps
into a stink like the inside
of an old man's boot.

Through the steamy window
I see Dad pruning the apple trees.
See scraggly branches
littering the snow like giant antlers--
and know that it is still winter
and probably always will be--
because there will never be
another summer
at the Farm--
because I will no longer be
Eva of the Farm.

--Eva of the Farm