(i. blue)
she's the cold lace wrapped around his heart; all synthetic smiles and sweetly quiet beauty. the spaces between sky-colored irises. he's helpless because of her, and she doesn't know.
sometimes he looks up and sees her empty eyes staring at him. he thinks she sees him, but really all she's looking for is the beginning and the end of something, anything, that she label. a concrete truth. he's transparent tears, and her dresden-blue gaze can't focus on that.
(ii. purple)
bruises like tattoos line her arms, each a story told in colors fading and fresh. she's made of blood which is red when it's full of oxygen, blue when it's used up and going home. so why is her skin colored like amethyst?
she doesn't know. she's hard like gemstones, carved and polished into what she thinks they want: reflecting back light at all the right angles.
(iii. red)
the sun rises again on a sleepy little suburb, and he's still awake, lucid dreaming of finally going home. he watches morning creep up bloody like a knife, and thinks of the ways things can go wrong.
sailors take warning, he says to the dawn; but the carmine sky ignores him.
he's never been to the sea. he feels his heart pumping and hopes that maybe today will be a better one than the day before.
(iv. orange)
every day, they eat lunch nearly together. in the same park, when the weather's nice: she wanders away from her dreary shopgirl job to eat fruit outside, and he finds himself drawn to benches she's walked past.
when the sun is shining down, his skin is almost titian; and then she sometimes notices him, peeling tangerines and looking fixedly away from her.
her coral lipstick leaves traces on her coffee cup; she wipes it away, not wanting to leave something of herself behind when she doesn't have to. when she looks up again, their eyes meet and for a moment she sees him.
(v. yellow)
she's tied up in routine because she believes it will save her. long blonde hair loose, falling down her back, she gets up after the sun to leave her house, go to work. it's a ritual just as much as her subconscious knocks-on-wood, the reflexive way she holds her breath walking by graveyards.
and every day she talks to all sorts of people; but in her head they are all the same.
he's starting to recognize that. but because he's in love, he thinks she's golden: removed from the everyday, she can only see on the universal level.
truthfully she's trapped in amber, waiting for a paleontologist to make her beautiful.
(vi. green)
the boy with the ivy-colored eyes grows tired of waiting. he's not meant for patient forest growing.
in the evening he finds her walking home. the dusk settles around the pair of them, heavy with the lost dreams of a thousand other lovers. 'I know you are,' he tells her; hands her a bouquet of forget-me-nots. she looks at him blankly, trying to focus on the honest face before her.
she's not used to being cared for.
'the flowers reminded me of you,' he says, hating the mundane banality of it: how can he tell her that ancient holy jade is nothing in comparison to her grace? that he would tear down mossy trees to clear her path, build high stone walls to keep her safe?
all she sees is the pale frosted flowers, and a life where promises are hyphenated and left behind. her vision as mangled and fragmented as her heart, she thinks it's the future.
he believes he's showing her the past, without his love.
eyes wide, she tries not to let her fears spill down her cheeks. she turns and leaves him there, a nascent ghost.
in the darkening air, cobalt steals over her face, her lips;
she is alone and hollow as the sky.
Author notes
the colors i used are blue, purple, red, orange, yellow, green.
options 2 & 5. the words I used are: evening, morning, fruit, tangerine, artificial, tears, forget-me-not, sun, sky, orange, green, blue, purple.
this was kind of an experiment with vignette form, but I liked the way it turned out. I think that this is one of my favorite poems [that I've written recently, at least]...
A contest entry
- You are a walking contradiction with broken stardust irises by rainbows..
1397 points, ended July 17, 27 entries
Gold trophy winner
• next poem in this contest, remove from contest - Contest of Colors! by MysteriousWhisper.
600 points, ended August 23, 28 entries
Gold trophy winner
• next poem in this contest, remove from contest
Thoughts?
Comments
1 - 6 of 6
-
Damn, I could quote every bit of this and tell you how much each individual line is, but I'd rather just say that you have an incredible style.
-
hmmmm...Very interesting
Well written poem. I like your use of metaphors. It sounded very methodical though and not very natural but, I still like it. You seem to have a very unique way of thinking. -
artificial smiles
-okay, this might just be me but i kinda depise those to words juxaposed. i'm sorry, you dont have to change it or anything. it's just kinda of stale i guess.
the spaces between sky-colored irises
-ooh, i love how that reads. it's kind of distant, dream-like.
he's transparent like tears, and her dresden-blue gaze can't focus on that.
-get rid of 'like' to make that a metaphor.
each a story told in colors fading and fresh
-i really adore the rythm of 'fading and fresh'.
reflecting back light at all the right angles
-that is a great line. i like how you've ended that stanza with this. quite effective.
sailors take warning, he says to the dawn; but the carmine sky ignores him.
- i LOVE that. there's something about saliors in poetry that is just so gorgeous. so calming.
hopes that maybe today will be a better one than the day before.
-i guess what i likke about this is the understatedness. i like the way this is almost cliche, but somehow you move away from that.
her coral lipstick leaves traces on her coffee cup; she wipes it away, not wanting to leave something of herself behind when she doesn't have to
-i like how much that line explains and the subtlety it does it in. the small things like the fact she wears coral lipstick is a really nice character touch and the last bit about wiping lipstick away really defines the girl's personality.
truthfully she's trapped in amber, waiting for a paleontologist to make her beautiful.
-aww, i adore that.
oohohohoohohhh the first two lines in green are fucking boss. LOVE that analogy!!
and a life where promises are hyphenated and left behind++ she turns and leaves him there, a nascent ghost.
=beautybeautybeauty!! damn.
-
-
whoa, I don't even know where to start
thank you so much! changing those things. & yeah, i really appreciate everything you said.
"here's something about saliors in poetry that is just so gorgeous. so calming."
i feel exactly the same way.
-
-
Wow. This is amazing. I love what you did with your prompts. ♥
her coral lipstick leaves traces on her coffee cup; she wipes it away, not wanting to leave something of herself behind when she doesn't have to.
For some reason I really love those lines. ♥
-
-
I agree with that aswel.
-
Adding your comment:
1 - 6 of 6
