Oranges, Lemons and Knowledge

A Poetic Fable

In a sunlit land where the trees bore gold,
The people were raised on sweet fruit bold.
Oranges hung like halos in air,
Their juice a joy, their taste most fair.

Children learned early, with sticky delight,
That oranges meant the world was right.
They sang orange songs, wore orange crowns,
And scoffed at fruits of lesser renown.

But far beyond the citrus hills,
Beyond the brooks and daffodils,
There lived a people, quiet and lean,
Whose trees bore lemons, sharp and clean.

They knew not sweet, nor sought it much,
Their tongues were trained to bitter touch.
They drank from wells of yellow zest,
And called their tartness nature’s best.

One day, a stranger crossed the line,
A lemon-hand with eyes that shine.
He entered Orange with open hand,
Curious about this fragrant land.

He bit an orange. His face lit wide
“What magic grows on your sun-kissed side?”
But when the Orange folk saw him chew,
They stared, confused, unsure what to do.

For how could he, with lemon soul,
Possibly grasp the orange whole?
They whispered, “He lacks the tongue, the grace.
He’s lemon-born, he can’t know taste.”

Then they offered him a golden sphere,
To test his claim, to draw him near.
But he peeled it gently, took just one bite,
And nodded slow: “It’s sweet. But light.”

A gasp ran through the citrus crowd
“How dare he speak such heresy loud?”
They plucked his fruit, they scorned his name,
Declared his lemon roots a shame.

“But taste,” he said, “is not a war.
It’s just the door to something more.
Your sweetness shines, your trees are grand
But other truths grow on other land.”

They could not hear him through the pride,
The sweet had swelled their hearts inside.
And so he turned, without a fight,
And walked back home beneath the night.