In the poem “Blackberry-Picking,” author Seamus Heaney uses imagery, diction, and metaphor in order to describe the narrator’s experience while picking blackberries with someone. Heaney uses imagery throughout the poem. He begins in the first stanza, line three when he describes one of the blackberries, “At first, just one, a glossy purple dot.” This clarifies the ripeness and desirability of the blackberry. The following line, “Among others, red, green, hard as a knot,” describes the blackberries that are less than desireable; the unripe ones. Then, Heaney takes note of a “rat-grey fungus.” By describing it as “rat-grey,” the reader is led to believe that it is something disgusting. Heaney also uses diction to aid