Bryana Joy

The Mandalina Tree

In Adana the mandalinas are beginning to glow
on their branches like bulbs of warm light.

Twenty Decembers later and despite a bad year,
a dollar fifty will still get you a ten-pound sack.

I suppose that’s why I remember them, cobbled
circle and squirt, shining on the dining table

through every Christmas Day week; piled high,
going fast. That zip and tart is on my tongue still.

I want to make my home in a mandalina tree, to
smell all the time of citrus and the extravagance

of light. To everyone who visits me, I shall hand
a halo of orange, begging won’t you bite into

how good this world can be? I want to say war is
over if you want it and for no one to talk back.