Apple Tree

I'm stood, hands in my pockets, in the garden of my family , watching my father pluck the underdeveloped apples from one of our thin trees. The earth is still dark in patches where the other trees burned.

He talks to me - amicable today - "You have to remove these smaller ones under the other apples. Otherwise they stop there being room for the fruit to properly grow."

And all I can think of is how very, very late it is. How much more you could have taught me, long ago, what you should have taught me instead of leaving me to learn. I should never have learnt some things so late on. And some things you should have stopped me learning all together. But today you're happy to ignore our past, and you smile like nothing ever happened between us. And for some terrible reason, I'm still here, stood in this garden, when I, too, should have left a long, long time ago.