Best Citronella Poems
The earth moaned
under the heat. On the porch
wicks drowned in melted
citronella candles
under limp wind chimes.
Withered vegetation drooped.
Finally –
a grey morning mist
gently
moistened cracked soil. The parched land
lifted
its head,
listened
as the wind chimes began to dance.
The thunderclap
announced the resurrection;
the downpour
was redemption.
August 27, 2018
For contest: Wind chimes
Sponsored by Edward Ibeh
The night emits a citronella scent
From tiki torches topped with living flame;
I swim in circles -- softly speak your name --
While starlight washes over us, content.
Cicadas still sing secrets to the trees
Like Summer's heartbeat throbbing in the dark --
While on a new adventure we embark,
Sped onward by a silent, gentle breeze.
Your kisses ripple slowly down my spine --
Your touch is strong and steady, like the tide --
Warm bodies wrapped in motion dip and glide --
You turn the turbid sea to fragrant wine.
The rising moon gives witness to my cries;
Tonight I drown within your ocean eyes.
It’s dusk in Texas in May
Keeping the June Bugs at bay
Citronella works in a way
Creepy-crawlies more dense in the day
Reading Kafka but only halfway
Focus not with it today
As the candle attracts other array
Wish they’d get out of the way
Reflecting on what I have done
"Metamorphosis" not accession
Possibly carved out more than a pun
For others to enjoy modest fun
Glad not to have invented the gun
Or to have met Attila the Hun
Had my short day in the sun
Did nothing to force me to run
Still have more than a quarter
And weary of being a boarder
Must get out from the eye of my warder
Honestly don’t wish to court her
My first stint here close to the border
And my stay getting shorter and shorter
Too many creatures for sorter
There I will find a "Castle" of High Order
From gnats and moths and things unseen,
I am protected by a screen.
Mosquitoes land and flit away,
Defeated for another day.
Where once a citronella torch
Repelled some pests, my screened-in porch
Works better for, as you'd surmise,
It's quite a lovely compromise...
I'm not indoors nor am I out.
The breeze dispels each shred of doubt;
Yet insects cannot reach my skin
Or that of others, safe within.
They fling themselves against the mesh
In search of juicy human flesh,
But I'm untouched inside my lair
Unless the screen sustains a tear!
The moonlight beamed on our whitened teeth as we wrote our names in the methylone stars,
Raspberry pixels leaked out of our cheeks as we covered our lungs in black velvet tar.
The wind blew your hair into an endless twirl as we dissolved our tonsil's confectionery swirl,
Red liquorice gloss dropped from your lips as the lime citronella cracked us like whips.
Analogies blend in the amethyst air as we painted our nerves with azure and cerise,
Rainbows fell from a digital sky as we glared at the sun with kaleidoscope eyes.
We poured all our closets into canals, we fed fake horses inside carousels,
We wolfed down our thoughts with our knives and our forks and washed it all down with
champagne.
Circles and squares drift out of your mouth as I turn to a voiceless skeleton,
Fingernails ran from my candy-coat smile as i breathe beside hollow mannequins.
Horizons slid from out of our sleeves, we're pasting sunsets behind forest trees,
We've cut down the curtains, we've locked all the doors, and now it's time to swallow the keys.
and its the bing bang boing but not bong ok nor beng or bung
A chicken diner stream is a recipe of combined cream but crossing a work surface is often best using traffic lights, zebra crossings and highlighted roadway maps. It is imperative to firm a very tight organised congestion. With cups to the left and glasses to the right the secret glow of gravity gravy is smiling at the floor. Yet shudders at the arriving sponge. Nodding. Nimble are the beetle bugs. Ooh a ballroom dancing spectacle for earthworms writing in packeted slices. Wow. Earthly eradication ejecting evil evolutionary evidence. But it could be said that dressing very casually is not the same as dressing in a greasy tissue. Fabulous isn't it? Queen gong on a long skinny street picks up a steeple and canters away. A catalogued misted mispronounced misprint of a moonlit mortal. Brighter is the bay before beauty bathes. And a beating bear brings bassist and bongos. Fantastical notions of a citronella cube. Formations frown upon upside down house bricks. And hot housework in leopard attire.whirling. A bun in a jar is neither a jar a bar or a bream in a stream. Straightforward structure strengthened strategy. And a large-scale looking leaking leaning lover. Haha now bake. Hahaha and bring a small frog and a little linguistic fish. Giggle then. Hehe head hornets. Xxxx constitutionalism z that was p y Q reporting on the corner from the facts. X
The scents of summer waft through the air
Warm and tantalising
Nothing compares
Soft perfume of coconut suncream
Smells of the salty sea
Distance aroma of fish and chips
Summer scents drifting free
Tropical fruit refreshing smells
Pineapple, mango, passionfruit
Freshly cut cucumber and salad
Summer scents absolute
Freshly mowed grass
The inviting aroma of a barbecue
Evening fragrance of citronella
Summer scents anew
Citronella
Her soul glows like a citronella candle flame at night
She doesn’t warm; just keeps the pests away with her toxic bite
She doesn’t need to beat those boys off with a bat
But she still likes to hit them, hear that crack
That wick’s so bright white they go blind when the see her sight
and look straight past her and see nothing of the poison hiding in her light.
But I’m a different type
I’m crazy as electricity
With me at night you can see
But stick a finger in a socket just to see what happens and I can kill you and burn everything you have – it’ll all be gone as hell
Watch out – I’m not your bedtime story in the light of your one night stand; don’t feel me up like you’re mistaking me for braille;
(That’s a rash, actually, so watch it.)
I don’t have veins, I’m all wired instead
You can kill me with a switch, but I will never be dead!
outside
inventoried oval-stoned
cathedrals appealing
chiming crimes of passion
woke citronella
fog
hung in cement-hamocked snowdrifts
cloaked slow on slick-stained windowsides
tenement sheets
with the pomegranate notes
of rhythms unrhymed
while all the uptown laundromarts
rising up
from insomniac-scrambled sidewalks
corked-copper moon tumbling earthward
like a sweet
sweatshredded pennants
of sun-saliva silks on rain-dribbled cotton
then
cherry-flat footsteps lust-percussive
under shamble-wracked sills
pause and then pass on
momentarily appeased in time by
blued bars on fly-fouled panes
bell tower-balanced above
taverns abutting back alleyways of
need
by fireplace mantle-pieced nooses
of nylonic shirts and poly slacks
and musts dusted-down
past stockinged-lidded faux plastic lampshades
passed on past magnolia movements
of fingertips on muscle surfaces
in-side
defoliate-spun spinnakered islands
chocked choked
in passing lynched adhesion
ignoring nicotine-papered stripteasing walls
or scotch-spat skirtings
creeping pedestal for
a moulded tangerine ceiling stuccoed into sudden mute
breath
rinsed down a night-scented-taking-stock
split-mirrored motel door
they go lunging over greasy chapels of
grit-grained
breakfast jasmine-tea-stained mock vinyl rugs
squeaking cot now like some
concreted river bed's of slump
of stun-spurned wants broken down
consciousness half-considered
stirring
She stood by the citronella
staring at its jagged leaves
hoping they would grow and carry her away
Rooted in the ground, eyes drawn into its foliage
the caretaker peered over his cigar at her despair
removing the belt from his waist
his "sword" of fury
she called it his sword
for she did not know war
but she knew pain
the sword of fury thrashed down upon her back
she collapsed forward to the ground like a wounded soldier in battle
her face in the brown dust
blood seeping from her nostrils
igniting the soil with red
the caretaker smirked at her pain
she looked up through tear filled eyes
and saw a callous soul
the citronella plant was more righteous than him
in her desperation
she silently begged that the citronella
could lift her away from this hell.
Single slippered Cinderella
Yesternight’s ball bella
Angelic voices heard a cappella
Followed by lovely clarabella
The dinner served was paella
With a side of shredded mozzarella
While faking a case of salmonella
Cinderella invited her fella
To follow her into the cella
Lingering aroma of citronella
With a pleasant tinge of canella
No secrets told near mimicking corella
Misplacing both shoe and umbrella
[ Clarabella = instrument much like a flute; Cella = a room in a temple; Corella = a cockatoo ]
AP: 3rd place 2025
Submitted on April 28, 2018 for contest ANY RHYMING POEM IN APRIL sponsored by LAURA LOO - RANKED 4TH
it is circulated deep into the soil
that you’ve wore the dress of paraffin
in the multidimensional wind of the winter
the cash-memo of the recently purchased
gold-bangles
would reside for some time more
then all the pregnant women
would assemble in the river-ghat
to meditate on the paddy-blossoms
all diamonds and clubs
would overcome their insomnia
through this arrangements
the crushing-news of fostering
flows
this dilution is well-known
the river-ripple of the air
after reading the sun
would keep some extension of dahlia
on its palms
in an unwritten evening
the demi-god-birth of the fire-flies
would break
their easy dead bodies
by the instigation of the surges
would ring … and ring… and ring
and spread cheerfulness
the elderly rain-tree comes to spray anti-biotic
on the spoilt top-branch of the young lad
covered with citronella
Oh wow a mystic meaning manifesting majestic majorities. In a purple eclipse. In a towel hung geometrically on a towel rail. Hum then. Queues upon queues of geometricians on hoops. Linguistic lingering then. Leaping. 1 2 3 static clothes horse jump. And a sanctimonious tissue paper lovingly caressing a bottle of detergent. At once a wish a washing machine rises up and leaves a building for to wash is to wipe and to wipe is to wait and wonder. And how remarkable that the pin in a drawer can magnify a strip of wood. Glowering in a wonderful way. And appeasing the western void. Of a characterful carrot and clam dinner singing harmonically on a plate. In a cousin related dramatic arai. But no whish of whiskey in a dropped out ball gown. Rusting in a charity shop. Smiling and smirking at a coherent cigarette from a dusty lip. And its two three four then. Formational freeing fraternity. And still the wide mouth of a citronella candle corpse should stay the same until an opulent petulant money gram steals the floor in a televised and videoed event. Yet to arrive is here and yet to come is a dramatic drum kit to attain gold medal status at the high jump and the javelin and the synchronized swim from a swarm of swords. Echo not a pattern of viola or cello. And chomping is a dawn chorus of worm digging wading birds. Data derisive design. Hahaha put a skirt on a mind and sip not strip. Hahaha put on a suit and shift around a floor in a bobble hat. Hahahaha mystified snowman. Xxxxxx pie of picture. Xxxxx drawling draw lines. Xxxxxxx Neruda Herodotus z xxxxx amplitudes z this is the p y q reporting live from a tent carrying a wisk, a cattle grid and a plain arched waltzing walnut. Pickle that at 89.0 *** s y what z z z z z z z z.z-zz!
Beneath the comforter curled, fetal, praying;
within the sacred orange of stucco robed walls,
students of Buddhism huddled kitten like laying;
while sound ricochets rattles down the red tile halls.
Liberty shakes the panes, lights the cobalt sky.
Sirens upon the rubble of imperial dreams, strew refuse, ply.
Primary colored prayer flags wave brazenly as the riots ooze.
Saffron incense mixes with the poison of citronella smoke loose.
The pallets pon planks shake novitiates like dies in a rattle.
Outside, down alleys, through flowered vines; Nepali’s battle.
fireworks of July...
lawn chairs line...the twilight sky
...citronella oil
5/12/2018