When Lemons Make Poetry

This morning I have bunches of pale yellow roses that are the last of the season from a bush I just pruned-a month late.

My rosebush was transplanted, to my backyard fifteen years ago, from someone who tore up their garden to put in kid friendly landscaping.

I also have a dwarf lemon tree.

Which made me think of that platitude, “When life gives you lemons, make lemonade.” That cliché sucks-big time.

Lemons = Lemonade

 

This phrase makes a euphemism for disappointment, a sorrow, or a hurt seem so cheerily remedied. 

Life doesn’t give you lemonade.  

Life gives you lemons. You give you lemonade. 

 

Making the lemonade is not an easy process. There is a knife involved. Cutting, twisting, squeezing, and getting a sting from the lemon juice that found the microscopic cut on the side of your fingernail.

After that, you strain the pulp and seeds and pour the result into a pitcher. You’re still not done. Some people don’t want to go through these steps. You have to stick with it, be strong. 

You have to stay with the process, feel the pain, deal with the sting, the squeezing, the separating, look for the honey, the sugar, something to sweeten the tart acidic taste.

It’s a series of steps, it’s not a Lemon=Lemonade instant drink.

And when you stick with it, you have fantastic lemonade which you garnish, with berries or mint. 

I was mulling over all this when I came upon an email from a friend, Michelle Wing.

Michelle is the inaugural featured writer of a new website, Off The Margins, dedicated to women writers.

Her artist statement captivated me. Her poetry, this one in particular, blew me away.

Body on the Wall

They send me a slip of paper
Anger Management – Certificate of Completion
And his name.
As if.

As if twelve weeks of one-hour sessions,
of talking about his feelings,
of tips on counting to ten,
could make him into a new man –

could undo the damage.

I know too well he can con anyone:
Police. Lawyers. Landlords.
Me.

And this piece of paper is the last slap
I am ever going to feel.

I walk to my closet, and get my dancing dress,
the little black one that twirls when I move,
that reminds me of freedom and the time before.

Do you want to know what he is like?
I’ll need some tools.

Scissors to slash the hemline.
Blades to rip open sleeves.

A lighter to torch the fluttering strips.
Dirty boots to grind out the flames.

Then a razor, to nick my forearm
so I can smear blood across his name
and pin that piece of paper to my ruined dress.

I bandage my arm, find a hanger –

It is my body on the wall, bruised and battered,
and nobody, nobody, can say they don’t see.

 

After reading, my lips formed the word “Wow,” my head nodded. I thought of the lemons in my past.

Lemons didn’t only make lemonade, they made poetry.

 

Go and visit off the margins. Read more excerpts from Michelle’s new book of poetry, “Body On The Wall.“ It debuts May 15, 2014.