Annie

They brought her home in hazelnut season,
the sweet sad end of summer, and I knew
we weren’t going to be friends.

In the orchards the raspy branches
were browning with clustered nuts. Annie
couldn’t make pancakes,

her pancakes were fat and stuck
to the skillet and grew black spots. Mom
spoke to her warmly and laughed

like it didn’t matter. Between the bookshelves
they drank coffee and talked about things
I wasn’t old enough to hear.

September came on like a scent on the air,
the sky growing heavy, a promise of rain.
On the hillsides, hazelnuts

in their pale green husks. The sun. Annie
wanted to come too even though
she didn’t know how to do anything,

didn’t know how to fill a feed sack with
spiny leaf casings or bear sunburn or sit
in a shaded circle of heat and hijabs

eating salty goat cheese and tahini helva in
tiny slivers, cherishing the sugar on her
tongue. When she asked if we could

leave soon, I smiled on her benevolently
like an indulgent parent. All night the neighbors
husked hazelnuts on the concrete

outside their house, downing red tea
from fluted glasses. When the clouds broke,
bringing the cold, blue tarps came out

like umbrellas. My dreams were full
of their laughter. Of rain. Annie
took a plane out of Istanbul

back to where she belonged. When I think
of her now, I remember how she wrote
letters to her boyfriend every night

in big loopy print with hearts. The next year,
a great orange husking machine
with a hose like an elephant’s trunk

rolled through the village and spit out
smooth nuts, a fountain of marbles,
a job one woman can now do in an hour.