Blackberries for Amelia~Richard Wilbur

This poem, entitled "Blackberries for Amelia" by Richard Wilbur tells the story the name suggests, the story of the blackberries. The poem consists of five stanzas, each containing four lines with a abba rhyme scheme. The first stanza talks about the bushes before the berries have appeared. The second stanza talks about the flowers on the blackberry bushes, which will eventually become blackberries. The third stanza introduces a more encompassing metaphor, comparing the night sky, sans stars, to the blackberry. In the forth stanza we are finally seeing an actual blackberry. It first, however, seems to negate the metaphor of the prior stanza, the speaker instead choosing to focus on the berries beginning to ripen. The fifth and final stanza speaks of the end of the life of the berries on a bush, completing the life cycle the speaker has hinted at throughout the poem/ It talks about the time to pick the berries before the birds get to them, as well as what the speaker brings along to this seemingly annual excursion to pick blackberries.