Writing an Ode

Look, buddy, you are way too complicated for a song.
Other musicians seem to do it well, but even my flat perspective of your personality
and the reason you exist could never fit into a lyric sheet of any sort. 
You are the epitome of you.  How could I catch that? 

-Citron

decreasing worldsuck

anger, humiliation, nastiness,
death, drugs, [you], depression
homelessness, hatred, hero-worship,
[your children], evil
conform or confront.

-Citron

What is a king?

In the USA
Our kings are not magic; no,
they have mistresses.

Nobody dies so
their heaven is fancier.
We don't build their pyr

Amids our own pyres;
we all burn together
our kings are with us

Everyone hates them
So we all burn together
The question remaining--

What is a king?  Where
is my magic?  Does he have it?
If I starve to death

in a gold-crusted
pyramid, who'se heaven do
I make easier? 

-Citron

vacuum

two uus
like an inside out fabric
the seams are out of place
and the stripes are of a watery hue
the crispness of lemon
and the neatness of city windows
has been punctured and sucked out.

and transported to the dark magenta pit of the vacuum.

-Pamplemousse

the idiot

letters look so much nicer when they're upside down
an elven tongue? a secret code?
merely a hand stand
perhaps this is how i think
when all my pulsing blood rushes to my hear
as if late to a funeral.

you are so desperate, friend. no...
you are not my friend.
you are so desperate, human i dislike,
(better)
why must all the little pinpricks on the globe like you.
seeking their approval, you make yourself
a pitiful spectacle.
a stupid little rodent attempting to befriend a lion.
how naive you are! truly.
i will not help you.
sorry.
i don't really know you,.  but i know i don't like you.

i dislike people who drink their cinnamon lattes with skim milk.

-Pamplemousse

sirens

the lolling female limbs of trees
faded slightly in the breeze
the constant pulse of the shoring waves
caused the rise of a milky haze
the aquamarine waterfall hair
with the dirty seaweed wear,
the navy skin of shells
the curious voices of muffled bells
they sang upon the stormy shore
mournfully, for their empty seamen store.

the blaring horns in the middle of the night
awoke my sorry overworked cartilage
lying on the creaky rectangle of wires and fluff
i wonder what the grave emergency is
could it be a nuclear war?
my organs could turn to orangine dust
and my fingers and skin
turn to strangled blue
it could be an attack:
from strange men, with crazed retinas
smelling death like dying mountain lions
hatefully striking out
at each abandoned roadside
i hear the sirens every night
and every night i invent an exciting story
to fill the voids
of my humdrum existence.

-Pamplemousse

Cloud-gazing

I am such a small thing! 
an intermediate step in the cycle
I lay on my back,
A blade of crabgrass
points up to the clouds
like by understanding one
I can harness the sky

and uproot myself. 

-Citron

Surfing with Spock

Emotion is fluid;
I strive for sincerity
and obliqueness. 

Everybody should. 

Emotion is fluid. 

Were we all to ride

the crests of waves,
life would be a thrilling adventure.
But we have social rules for a reason
and math for a rhyme. 
Emotion is fluid. 
Without cups,
it all runs together
and drowns all but the stones
in a rainbow. 
What if we are all sincere rocks? 
"You are not solid today"

I would say very sincerely

and we would all be happy. 

Everybody should. 

-Citron

The Best Kind of Dyslexia

I blink my eyes, and the sentences jump,
again, and the ink changes color. 
I slam the book shut
and spill coffee all over it
and a new paragraph appears,
as if by magic. 
Like a treasure map in          tales,
                                     fairy
an invisible pen scratches in
new landmarks,

and time lets me

retrace the steps of the one-legged
knave, the scoundrel
who hid his heart's treasure
in a box between the lines
and glued into the binding.

-Citron

Limits

Math and history tend to agree. 
A limit is a point that should be there,
whether in the reality of graphed equations
it is or not.       In reality,
the rock of human will beats paper,
and Homer was blind.

-Citron

An Open Letter to Artemis and to the Kids Who Think Nuns are Weird.

Zeus and Leto slept together
(Or however gods produce), but

they still respected their daughter

When she never replaced Zeus.

One so close to wild nature
So fleet of foot, so sure of shot

Could find a lover, gentle teacher; yes

Artemis could find a lot.
In all her forests, soft dark caves
She joins not in the ringmarole
Why can't she line up as a slave
And do just as the animals?
Oh Artemis, I do not try
To climb Olympus.  No, in fact
I just pursue a simple life. 
No clambering.  The opposite. 
And while one day I might well be
In a white temple as you are
I'll just be praying on the peak
(Or borrowing my husband's car.) 

What you consider godly I

consider part of happy life.

So thanks-- maybe I'm not so weird.

Just quite content to shoot my deer

Without sleeping around.

-Citron

violet house

the metals of the teeth of the stairs
make me afraid
to step on the hallowed flowers that line the path
leading up to the sacred stairs
slowly rising to the ancient portal

to the violet house.

the dark inside the windows, peaking out through the panes
frighten my stomach
and the pale, dying wood on porch
encircle the building, that building
called the wise and fearsome

old violet house.

i will mar the untouched path,
and touch the untouched golden handle on the door
and i will enter the strange and mysterious air
that circulates inside the foyer

of the violet house.

-Pamplemousse

howl

you may howl of broken hearts
but he howls of broken people

the scattered remains of friends and foe alike
fill him with barbaric needs for sound

-Pamplemousse

rings

bells and chimes
the vibrate their cordial tones in my ears
the cartilage on the side of my head perks up
i want to be alone
leave me alone.

i feel drowsy and the rings do not cease
but in fact crescendo
the climax has come, they will go away
i think to myself in the midst of my headache

but no, they are persistent.
just stop, stop it i say.
my brain quakes from the noises.
my forehead shakes and belts
jerking
twitching.

the bells...
the bells....
do not cease again

-Pamplemousse

bicycle club

we ride in the park
a gang of ruffians
with baseball primary colored caps
and skinned knees
but we don't aim to please
we merely enjoy the bump of the road
as she caresses us over the pellets of rock
and the fragile little bones of trees
twigs and pebbles mean nothing to us
because this

this is the last summer.

but we like to forget that
and merely smile and clear our minds
as we look up at the sunlight fighting to catch a glimpse of us
from between the leafy green canopy
and the grass doesn't sway
because it is summer
and the wind has gone to vacation
like the clerk at the butcher shop

and i.
i ride on my bicycle
forgetting about what lies ahead
but still.
riding towards it.

-Pamplemousse

bricks

bricks spell death
bricks spell fate

they are the  foundation
the weapon

a symbol of solidity

of sinking low
slowly
pa inf  ully   slowly

into the murky depths of the sea's gaping wounds

-Pamplemousse

positive complaint.

Sometimes I think that nobody else in the world

loves other people like I do

I think you are wonderful,

truly darling and almost perfect.

Does anyone else love people like I do?

It takes so much effort,

a walk does. 

I might see someone I love

and what would I do then? 

It's so hard. 

-Citron

They forgot to tell us the point.

The clock is hooked onto the wall

and has been for fifty years,

one tick a second, every
second, except for five minutes every
three and a half
years to change the
battery is that the point of learning algebra?
she asked, feet seven
point two inches from
the square linoleum floor
tiles She landed with a double click
and began pacing across the width
of the 18x16 classroom: 

5 out of 250 fingers shot up coming with

"to answer problems,"

now every single student

(well 24/25 of the students--

one was asleep) knew

that for no reason in particular

they had to garble and fumble letters and numbers

for frustrating (180*x h/d) hours

until the symbol after one equals sign

matched the one at the end of the book.

Someone said they would need to be able to

factor trinomials

someday,

in a grocery store or on a train

because those were "real life" things they were approved to

understand. 

because that lady in heels forgot. 

The students remained dubious

(not even I write equations every time I cross a bridge)

glancing apprehensively at a dark pointlessness

that would apparently follow them

for the rest of their lives. 

-Citron

Australia

Just pick up an Austen novel
And you'll see what I mean
Everyone knows everybody
and they're all about twenty- Hey
Sure we have better medicine
and life expectancy
But they didnt know Australia
Or miss it like me. 
I don't know why you're there
I dont know why I'm here
I just know that australia
is across the world from me.
Sure all phtotographs must travel through
A darkroom and a film roll but
that art's a little different because
a piucture cannot see
And I know there wasn't facebook
in the nineteenth century
Which is why we have such prejudices in our society
And they learned to not miss people
cause of all their lost babies
So its nice I know Australia
And low child mortality
I don't know why you're there
I dont know why I'm here
I just know that australia
is across the world from me.

I'm not sure if its your birthday still
But it's the right day here for me
To sing a song about Australia
And what it means to me.

-Citron

Couplets from Myself

I found theses on a neatly folded piece of paper in a dusty corner behind a bookshelf.  I have no idea when they were written.  I usually only rhyme when I intend to set something to music, but these have nothing to do with any song I've written.  Sometimes I set down a verse or chorus for a song in my head that never works out... I'm sad I didn't finish this song, because I really like these lines. 

1.

my friends are too busy (+ nice?) to be judgemental

Criticism's rare and when it's there it's gentle

2.

If the tempo's fast people aren't too picky

That's how songwriting's different from poetry

Cool, right?

-Citron