The rot begins in the gums;
silent, red, a softness,

where strength once was.
It spreads

across the mouths of workers,
the backs of farmhands,

the hands of children
in the low fields.

They say lemons were found in a ruin,
but ruin has a hundred forms,

gazes that never bend to meet the sick,
and hands that never touch the soil.

Some wear armour.
Some stir tinctures in labs.

Some hoard yellow cures
in sunlit bowls.

Others swill lime wine
and call it providence.

They whisper it failed in the soil,
but the fruit never touched

the hands of the hungry.
No root was ever laid in trust.

The orchard of justice
has gone barren.

Who deserves the fruit of survival?
Those who serve, or those who sit?

They are tired of sick mouths shut
and full ones speaking.

They demand what grows in the sun
belongs to all who live beneath it.

A lemon for a Lord,
and rot for the rest.

No lime,
no life.

The last tree bears blood.
It will not burn if we unite.



Penned by my hand on the 10th of Lupar, in the year 979 AF.