My Mandarins

It happens that I like my mandarins just so.
Orange. Juicy. Flavorfull, with white pulp.
But above all, silent. Secretive. Still.

I can't stand it when my mandarins talk to me.
I don't like their jungle stories,
Stories of blue parrots and coarse, dark hands.

I like to eat my mandarins on September afternoons.
I slowly ripen in the sharp light of my white room.
I'm here; my mandarins are here too.

I don't ask them how they got here.
Let them not ask me.

It's not that I'm in a bad mood.
I'm not malicious. But I will be myself.
Let my mandarins be my mandarins.

That's it. Oh yes. The orange silence.
The curves like smiles in my fridge.
There in their room in the sharp, white light.