Nerdfighteria (a haiku)

The Internet, like
most scary things, has high points.
DFTBA. 


-Citron

"Cleaning out the cusions"

Cleaning out the cushions

of an old gray tweed-upholstered chair

I drew handfuls of old small things,

none more striking than this trio:

a clear blue marble, a hydrogen atom from Sam's model chemistry set, and a dusty yellow jelly bean.

I promise I could find a metaphor

Or a concrete here-is-life story

I could talk about the small things

Or the wasted things

I could talk about color

Or love

Or armchairs.

I promise. 

I also promise

that I won't.

This poem is not symbolic.

-Citron

Lead solution

There is a constant rapping on my skull, from the inside

Things want to get out—I need to be,

I need to be, they plead and hit and hit

And most of them are your fault, so I asked

If we can have some time for quiet from them and from you

Other times I will bring them to live here,

shoot them out of wrists and hands

and spray them around the house

like wildflowers in a yellowed vase.

When I can make them be for you,

Those hours.  And then the idea happened

That everyone in the potentially florid house might

Split themselves as Emily had.

There is a difference, if course,

Between a pledge and a surprise corpus callosum.

And when the new idea becomes giant and stretches into flaw and even,

Even though it’s new when it’s commonplace,

Nothing works.  The solution is no longer easy smooth or even potable.

Salt and lead live together,

And someone wants to drink.

I can live with water in a cup,

Although I lose my characteristic taste.

You don’t want to drink lead, in the first place,

And if you heated it enough to be a liquid

You would be a gas.  Leave it, and it will

just sit at the bottom

Gray powder in a pile on the floor of the vase

Just under the cut green stems. 

-Citron

Media confuses Me

I want to play in a band with a crazy name
like Galactic Minivan or Bad Words
or cOOL pOTATOES or Sauce
(The woman in the black leather skirt
was never told to dress modestly
by someone who loved her.) 

I want to be dirt poor
so I can see people under the skin.
That being said
I don't want to see their real missing skin
because dirt poor means desperate.

I want to be rich and famous
from the privacy of my own home
Everyone should love me already.

This catharsis is a severe imbalance. 
Someone important called it a spirit deficit.
The television switches from a concert in LA or New York
or somewhere else too far to walk
to a commercial about Fancy Feed Dog Food (with Vegetables! for your Carnivorous Mammals!)
I want to eat dog food. 

I really really really want to eat dog food. 


Citron

Letter to a Geographically Distant Friend (detail of a larger work)

-Citron

(the fame song)

I played the ukulele for a couple friends of mine. 
They all clapped for me afterward
which I thought was fine.
"I hope you're famous someday" and a few others agreed
But I'd hate to be famous-- that is not the life for me. 
When the whole world knows you, you're supposed to have won,
but fame doesn't sound like any fun. 

You could say it's for the riches-
the easy golden life.
Plenty of food to feed your kids
and a really lovely wife. 
A room for everybody and
just stuff from floor to ceiling. 
I guess it's better than a cubicle
or chronic stealing...
Money won't solve your problems though,
it'll just provide distractions. 
And on your deathbed you'll look back
at those faded attractions. 
"Why did I waste my time with these,
where has my whole life gone?"
No, fame doesn't sound like any fun. 

Besides, the whole idea that you'll make those A-list parties
only sounds good so you can meet the actors and the smarties. 
But see you are no different from the man you were at home
Neither are all these people-- they're just strangely all alone. 
Appreciate your friends now, don't lust after the A-list
The only difference is the fact that some of them are famous. 
I don't need to be known for the cool stuff that I've done
Cause fame doesn't sound like any fun. 

It's just a shared obsession, media's a business too
Reporters process people just like him and me and you
So masses think they know them and some sycophant gets paid
And that human in the spotlight has more carvings on his grave. 
If someone offerend me that life I'd turn and full-out run,
Cause fame doesn't sound like any fun. 



-Citron

The Cactus

On my porch there is a cactus.  I found it today, sitting in a sunny corner. 
Nobody knows where it came from.  I asked them all. 
It might be my cactus, but I don't remember getting a cactus. 
It might be my mother's cactus, but she doesn't remember getting a cactus.
It might be my brother's cactus, but he doesn't remember getting a cactus. 
It is probably my father's cactus, although he doesn't remember getting a cactus. 
It is cactus-colored, desert sandy green-- different from the wetter, brighter "weed" plants in the pot with it. 
They are new but it has lasted and will, probably. 
On my porch there will probably be a cactus
sitting in a sunny corner. 
I think it is my father's cactus. 


-Citron

individualism

Make the path and follow it
and it will be your path. 


-Citron

Conversations in Silico

I speak to my computer like it is a person
and sometimes it speaks back. 
Often it tells me about RAM,
that living memory.  Not the data that lasts forever,
but instead the awareness of a day. 

"Hold on," it says, huffing, "I can only do so many things at once. 
I can run math problems and talk, or keep my screen on.  Pick two." 
Sometimes, when my demands really push my computer
"I'm only one machine.  I'm made of metal and silicon. 
You can feel my edges.  Stop." 
it is easy to see where it begins and ends.  I can hold it in my hands,
although I don't understand how it works completely. 

It moves slowly through the harder tasks,
although it always moves. 

My computer remembers, and keep remembering what has happened
until at the end of even
an uneventful day
it is reduced to
crawling. 
I turn the machine off then. 


-Citron

incarnation

i owe you some congratulation
on the pomp of your graduation.

-Pamplemousse

dead mouse

electronic saunters
through the technologic field,
the computerized wildlife
stare

the metal deer
the stainless steel bird
turn their red laser eyes upon my sorry flesh

the sun even shines as a robotic force
with screws and silicon chips
the grass is sharp as a knife
and there is no soft spot of dirt
to lie on, as a healthy spotted pig.

i wander around this strange new world
overcome by machines,

i see a few meters away, a spot of white, on all the shining gray
i walk towards it, my bare feet cold from stepping on the
unfriendly steel,

and it is a dead mouse.

lying on the technological floor,
of the technological world.

-Pamplemousse

Gallery Saunter

Everything is white in galleries-
and I tell someone the metaphor
(a while ago.)
about how it means everything
and the art just stands out
like a house in a forest.  

(today)

The picture reminded me
of fish sliced open
and hit on the wall. 
How that fit in a frame"
I do like it"
and the next was of a conception
although the man only spoke of technique
hands.  His beard was just right.
I do like it"

and another was an old man
with checkerboard skin.
I do like it"

I would not let it stay in my house-
too hot, too cold,

broke my bed
intrusion
and bother. 
I will not buy this art.
                                                 
I like it. 


-Citron

BEETLES

When I see Beetles I do not think of beetles. 
Instead, when I see beetles I think of Beetles. 


-Citron