Marginalia with Orange Peel

Poetry Runner-up of the Surging Tide Summer Writing Contest
Selected by Hua Xi

This is a lovely poem with beautifully arresting details, such as that of a thumb being plunged into the core of an orange, splitting it open. That image stayed with me long after I read it, just like the last line of the poem "both of our hands smell like oranges after". There is a lot of the everyday here, small moments like coffee runs and loose sweater threads, and the poem gives these small moments great care and makes them sing. It is a gorgeous reminder of the power of attention, of living attentively, particularly in the presence of those we love. - Hua Xi

I’ve been thinking about how we got here--
peeling an orange on the swings, the mulch
solid beneath our dangling feet.
We block off time in our calendars for coffee runs
and that Wendy Cope poem.
I, too, am glad I exist. I, too, am illegible--
my tongue ribboning, dashes loosening
the wayward yarn in my sweaters.
As we listened to our teacher read
a poem about rambling to a loved one, you
turned to me as he read the word unspooling--
catching, almost imperceptibly, the salt
licking down my cheek. Cradled in the gentle deluge
of this love, I am unflinching
and honest. I ramble too much and don’t write enough.
Still I watch you dip a blunt, graceful thumb
in the orange’s core, splitting its sinewed flesh into
not-so-perfect halves. And you are scattering
dandelions as you breathe yes,
the truest word there is. In the margins, you scribble
stray exclamation marks softly and with exact care as you place
the bigger half of the orange in my waiting palm
There is a poem in this. I am thinking about how
both of our hands smell like oranges after.

Back to: Issue Ten

Next: Sandra Nuochen 

Smile Ximai Jiang is a poet from Shenzhen, China and resides in Massachusetts. She serves as an editor for Polyphony Lit and The Lumiere Review. Smile is a 2023 poetry mentee of The Adroit Journal’s Summer Mentorship Program under Mario Chard. Her work appears or is forthcoming in Peach Mag, Palette Poetry, Kissing Dynamite, 
Surging Tide, Rust & Moth, 
​COUNTERCLOCK, and diode poetry journal. Smile loves sumo oranges and her cat. She tweets at @smiii_jiang.