Citrus Season
Tasting a new beginning with all the bite
The constant California rain has me feeling the feelings of ten thousand images. I walk through life with such vivid and sensitive sense memories that every turn around a corner begs the possibility of an entire film reel unraveling my emotional landscape.
Rain pulls things out of the depths for me. I grew up in the state of Georgia where thunderstorms are the norm. As I’ve finally turned the corner of being able to call myself a true Californian, I have consequently avoided all forms of heavy rain for over a decade now. In its absence, I’ve escaped its nostalgia and all associated memories of big swampy Southern rain swells.
Since I’ve been swimming in rain as of late, I’ve had the opportunity to revisit that coupled feeling of rain and—every emotion all at once. Longing, sadness, joy, rest, elation, excitement, lust, productivity, and thumbing through the lost and found box of dreams.
All the water has made California blissfully green. The wildflowers are popping up everywhere—so much so that I’ve been hunting them. I’ve been eating some of the sweetest fruits recently that remind me sensorily of vine ripe Georgia tomatoes. All the images are crossing wires from formative home to chosen home, and I’m relaxing into some hard won waking theta waves (so says my therapist) after an extreme work push, and poetry is popping up in my life like these wildflowers I’ve been hunting.
The writing cycle always feels like this: rain, waterlog, patience, sprout, spring, produce, revel, rest. California, as always, is providing me with the landscape I need to write after what feels like a months long drought. I’m looking forward to watching the trees and plant life continue to unfold and bloom into their infamous endless summer vacation here. One that begins yearly with citrus season.
CITRUS SEASON
Bloody and sweet
You’ve lined them up for me one by one
on the railing that cuts thru the canyon
My feet get heavy looking at you regard your work
A train in the sun, marking the beginning of the cycle
“They’ll only get bloodier
And sweeter,” you breathe out, in between darting eyes
“They will peak before it even registers and then we’ll have to
wait
patiently until next season”
So I learn the sour on the tongue, orient my storms to this pleasure
One by one peel back the rind and let my fingers dance down the centers, covered in juice
Unhitch each cabin with my mouth
It’s citrus season, baby
And I’m here to drink