I remember

figure it out

Once a year we would venture out

All packed tight

Into mother’s mini van

Our hearts ablaze with desire

For the best of the batch

And the title of the one who makes the best catch

Our tiny freckled faces

Bursting with pure delight

As we wondered through a pumpkin patch

The eldest, my sister, leading the charge

While my still older brother followed

 In a warm hearted chase

I myself, had fallen just too far behind

My own tiny legs the only thing holding me back

We danced around the “Ugly Ones”

And laughed at the ones

That resembled the faces of old men

Picking and pecking around

We tried to find the perfect pumpkin

Sister raised a tall one

And carried it high above her head

Waltzing her way to mother’s side

With unprecedented and mature strength

Brother rolled over a fat one

And foolishly attempted to transport his heavy load

With the pumpkin slipping through his fingers

And his feet sliding through the dirt

 He made his way to be near his kin

And I too young to carry my own

Had motioned to father, the small one

He picked up that pumpkin with one arm

The other he reserved for me

Two babies in each arm

My siblings had teased me

Yet now that I am grown

I can pick up my pumpkin

All on my own

But as I lift the smallest one in the pack

I also uproot a painful thought

That I am alone in our dear pumpkin patch

With the melancholy that stings

Like the last day off fall

And a simple but childish wish

That you two would just come home