Coloring Today
 
Did you color when you were a child?
Did you lie on the floor, dreaming
up ways to make your pictures sing
with all their hearts, like the birds
who delighted following a shower?     
Did you wish you had a blue
that came halfway up to the sky
that was waiting for school to let out
for the summer,  just for you?  
That the Crayola saying Yellow
was warm and buttery like the sun?
Green a lot greener,  red as red
as flowers you could not name,
but knew to be friends?  Friendly clouds
floated dollops of just-right cream
you could taste.  No white in any box
up to that.   Tell the truth.  You
were dying for a brown warm enough
to do justice to a cow on a hill
you passed once.  Red barns
and silver siloes and trees leafing
umbrellas to make shade.  All
you can do is your best.  Just let
imagination add its touch.  Guess
what?    Pictures can sing!
 
In what is called the North Carolina triangle,
talking this minute.  Azaleas, dogwoods,
and redbuds vie in every shade of pink,
white, lavender, and salmon.  The redtip
at the mailbox is frilled with white lace.
Air a satin slip you don't need to pull
and tug to get on.  Drought-robbed earth
sports a   new  nubby coat of green.
If I died, don't tell me.  Let me color
to my heart's content.  Better yet,
come color beside  me.   Got lots
of crayons.  Don't have to stay inside
the lines, and trees will give us shade
for free.  Worth the trip, believe me.
Finish the book, we'll draw  pictures
of our own.  What do you think?

(c)  Phyllis Jean Green,  2006