Her lips. And her neck. And she reached to kiss me, and I reached back up. With my lips and cupped her back. With my hand. And my other hand reached for her. And touched her long neck, slender. Gently. “No,” she said, we “better not,” and drew back. As I did. It was her tight weave sweater. I write this dream down. This memory with a short pen, red-colored, but the ink not. Still, her lips, her sweater, her painted nails, all red.
- Alan Bern
I’m thinking of celandines, specifically lesser celandines; I’m thinking how they lit the whole wildflower meadow up with their February yellow; I’m thinking of my dad. He taught me to recognize them, how best to distinguish them from buttercups. I remember it like yesterday — the two of us crouching down in the long grass behind Muker church; the strains of a silver band floating across. He held a single leaf gently and asked me to look close and describe it. He taught me that the celandine has a heart-shaped leaf, then he marveled at the yellow of its petals, right there in that meadow, bright with a thousand fallen suns.
- Alan Peat
Driving home the other day as the road rose just outside of Caroline, there appeared ahead of me a brilliantly luminescent rainbow. It seemed clearer and closer than any rainbow I have ever seen, both ends visible, only a reach away. I always believed it impossible to really see the end of a rainbow, and in my memory I never have. Predictably obscured, tucked behind trees or buildings on the horizon —the pot of gold an illusory reward. This rainbow’s arc dramatically contrasted against the heathery purple of the sky, each color distinct in its spectral order. Toward the ends the fragments of light began to break apart, the finality a gently filtered view into a small grove of trees near a dilapidated farmhouse. I slowed the car, letting my imagination take me over to stand beneath those trees, the scattered light bathing me in radiance.
- Ann Carter
My husband died in December. When spring arrived, I realized I was responsible for the yard from now on. I opened the shed to find his garden tools arranged neatly against the wall. I developed expertise with spades, shovels, rakes, trowels, half-moon edgers, pruners, then hired a mason to install a bluestone walk from the driveway to the back door. He removed rocks and roots from the site, then smoothed it vigorously with the grading rake. The wood handle split, and the bent clamp couldn’t accommodate a replacement. At the garden store, I discovered that modern implements were made with synthetic materials. There was one rake with a shiny yellow handle, the color of bright lemon peels or honeybee stripes. It felt solid, about the same weight as my old one. I prepared the beds, sometimes leaving the new rake outside instead of storing it in the shed. Standing against a stockade fence, this rake broadcast loudly with its vivid appearance, “Here I am!” When the daffodils emerged in March, forsythia in April, daisies in June, sunflowers in July, I couldn’t have been happier to see my yellow rake join in the glorious community of colors surrounding me.
- Barrie Levine
I taught high school creative writing to a bunch of incredibly creative teenage boys. You get the picture, right? We spent the entire semester scripting and shooting videos. Someone told me an orange screen was even better than blue or green for inventing background. I purchased several yards of glowing, flaming, fabric and Velcroed it to an entire wall, ceiling to floor. I had to super glue the Velcro to the ceiling. As far as I know, the glue is still there, after 20 years. So . . . I discovered, from experience, the power of color on human emotion. We shot several scenes — drama, singing, dancing, throwing a Cabbage Patch Doll around like a football. After a few weeks, melodrama slithered its way into the group of rowdy, cheerful friends. Arguments broke out. Jealousy prevailed. One sixteen-year-old extremely talented young man cried the biggest tears I’d ever seen. “Wade was my best friend and now he won’t even let me be in his film!!!” The kid wailed in front of the whole class. Camaraderie died that day. I’m sure a screen of calming colors would have produced more amicable results. I discovered that boys need to have girls around to curb the more violent male hormones, but they did produce some hilarious videos.
- Carole Johnston
Days following the vernal equinox, a halo of fresh green crowns forsythia bushes; purple and yellow crocus pop up from a winter’s sleep; and the first brilliant yellow marsh marigold unfurls amidst verdant greens in the nearby wetlands. Each morning, mid-day, and late afternoon, our patio is a riot of color as smaller birds come to feed. The male goldfinch now sports brighter golds in his plumage; these will brighten further each passing day, while his mate is still attired in light olive garb. Dark green holly branches fail to hide the dazzle of a red cardinal nor the blue, white, and black markings of the smart-looking jay. The bravest is the diminutive chickadee, noted for its black cap and bib and blue-grey waistcoat. A pair of mourning doves, in their spotted garments of muted earthen hues, satisfy themselves pecking at fallen seed. Dark-eyed juncos, also ground feeders, are first to arrive in winter and linger into the depth of spring. Their slate-colored back is in stark contrast to a pure-white bill and underbelly. Frequent visitors also include the tufted titmouse in his soft grey feathering and pale peach-colored flank. Whenever the larger red-bellied woodpecker approaches to feed, all other colors scatter to the breeze.
- Deborah Burke Henderson
The clear glass vase is six inches high and a shade of blue unlike the sky, unlike a robin’s egg, unlike forget-me-nots. Its blue is the color of water surrounding a tropical island — smooth, silky blue water that bathes the white sand underneath. Its slim, elegant neck rises to a scalloped rim that opens out like a flower. Embedded in the glass are tiny bubbles that catch the light, like fizz in champagne. I bought the vase in Beirut, Lebanon, when I was twenty years old and thought it a miracle that it made the trip home in my suitcase, unbroken. In summer I fill it with daisies, snapdragons, lavender, zinnias. In winter I set it in the window where it glows in the light like a splash from an exotic blue sea.
- Emily Johnson
When I was a child, communism was in full swing in my country. But for me, too young to understand how things were, everything seemed fine. In the second grade, I joined The Pioneer Organization. As a new member I could hardly wait to get my Pioneer's necktie, which the older boys had and wore with confidence. After I took an oath of allegiance, I was given a small, triangular, red scarf, with an outside border of red, gold, and blue. “Red symbolizes the blood of our ancestors who sacrificed themselves to defend our country over the centuries.” I remember those words, and how proud I felt of this achievement. I thought my life was just beginning. I dreamed of all sorts of great deeds I would accomplish in the future. But two years later, due to some infractions of the rules, and various small misdemeanors, I was punished by the school principal and my precious scarf was taken away. I ran home in tears, deeply ashamed. It took a while, but eventually I was allowed to return to the organization and I could resume my role as a “leading pioneer.” My red scarf, faded by so many washes, continues to hold vivid memories for me.
- Florin C. Ciobica
I work my way gingerly down the narrow, twisting, serpentine gorge stream in the inky pre-dawn darkness that fills the forest. I choose each step carefully to avoid slipping on wet algae-coated stones. The stream is my trail. My destination is a place on the stream that opens into a vast space edged by tall forest-topped rock walls. I reach a 10-foot-high waterfall, the last obstacle before gaining entry into this hidden forest glen I call the cathedral. I’ve been here countless times before but never at such an early hour. Gazing beyond the waterfall into the darkness below I am struck by a strange sight. A brilliant piercing shaft of low morning sunlight has traveled from the sun almost horizontally through the entire forest, unfettered by branches or leaves, emerging from the foliage to cut across the darkness, landing in a small cave-like hollow on the rock wall to my right. The depression in the rock is glowing brilliant orange as if a pool of molten lava is resting within. My hope to discover something magical has been rewarded!
- Frank Muller
It's not by chance that in so many places and for so, so long it has been said that someone who sees the color green deeply will become a bird. That is their reward. So, when you said that you want to see green deeply, I took it as a call. Just walk out and you will see green as the palette, green as the landscape. Every shade of green, buds a light white green and bushes a darker green and field stalks even darker. And grasses and shoots and trees, everything green: evergreens and pine needles and leaves. And green does not assert its primacy dominantly. Green accepts its place. Green offers itself up as a backdrop for the bright splashes of other colors: yellow and purple, red and orange, mauve and taupe, all brighter by green. The backdrop for river and rock, also brighter by green, and foreground for the sky. The color of life is green. And wait, I hear a call, I see a lifting, I feel a lightening. Was it you who called? Was it you, my love? Where will I find you? In the trees? Up above?
- Ian M. Shapiro
My uncle Morty was classified 4F because he was colorblind. “I guess you could say I was mortified,” he wise-cracked. When I was nine he was my favorite uncle because he was a snappy dresser. Once I asked him how he could pick out such sporty ties if he was colorblind. “Trial and error,” he said. “It’s the smooch factor. You know what smooching is, don’t you?” “Sure.” “Well, when I go out on a date, if a girl isn’t willing to smooch I figure it’s because she doesn’t like my tie. So I give it away.” “Wow, that sounds expensive.” “It’s worth it,” he said. “Not only does it make me seem generous, but it practically guarantees one less competitor in the smooch department.” Something told me that he was joking so I decided to change the subject. “But, Uncle Morty, how can you drive if you can’t tell a red light?” “Simple. I just go with the flow. When the cars in front of me slow down and stop I know it’s a red light. And when they start moving, it’s green.” “Yeah, but what do you do if you’re the only one at the intersection?” “Then it doesn’t matter whether the light is red or green. If there are no other cars, I just keep going.” Unfortunately, Uncle Morty wasn’t joking about his driving. A few years later, a pickup truck smashed into him when he failed to stop at an intersection. After that, if anyone inquired how he came to be confined to a wheelchair, he would say that he was wounded in the war. And, even though he was colorblind, he bragged about his purple heart.
- Jack Goldman
Strolling the stone-paved walkways of Venice, I am delighted by frequent flashes of orange. No, it’s not costumed Carnevale revelers lost on a back street, nor rogue gondoliers swapping out their traditional white, blue, or red stripes. It’s not an invasion of Princeton or Syracuse alumni on tour, nor fruit trees of a Grand Canal palazzo. It is, simply, the Aperol Spritz. One of Italy’s most popular cocktails, this modest “cooler” is made by combining Prosecco, soda, and ice with the herby, florescent-orange aperitivo. It is enjoyed, I can attest from years of over-indulgence, by tourists and locals alike. Frequently served in stemmed goblets and garnished with a mammoth green olive or an orange slice, the Aperol Spritz is as pervasive as the bridges crisscrossing the city’s canals, and with good reason: ordering one at a street-side bacaro immediately gives you the feeling of being a true Venetian. Sipping an Aperol Spritz, I become — if only momentarily — one of those beautiful, well-dressed people who seem to populate all Italian cities. A perspiring glass in hand, I lean against an Istrian-stone wall to watch friends and strangers gossip and laugh, as our globes of bright-orange liquid swirl in the late-morning sun.
- Jim Mazza
When I saw it on the toddler swimsuit rack, a deep emerald accented with a fine white stripe, I quickly flipped to the size. 4T. My dear little 3T water sprite was, and still is, tiny. My hands found the price tag — a designer suit (Pierre Cardin) but only five dollars, a close-out special. It would only need a stitch at the back for this year, then it would be a perfect fit next year. I scooped it up. Jennie instinctively recognized the suit as stylish. She looked adorable in it — a pixie running through the sprinkler, prancing up and down the lawn. Then, at Rehoboth Beach that summer, she wore it happily, fearlessly, dancing in the waves. At the end of our second beach day I asked her to wait while I got her infant brother’s paraphernalia together. As I lifted Joey into his stroller I turned to Jenny, but she was gone! My husband stayed with Joey as I ran for the lifeguard and gave my daughter’s description. Then we both spotted a distant splash of green. Jennie was calmly waiting, on the top boardwalk step, for us to catch up. I always recall that emerald green suit fondly, not only for its beauty but also because it was the flag that helped us find Jennie, our jewel.
- Joan Leotta
One of my first memories is of my grandfather, my father’s dad, who died of a stroke when I was six. We called him Pa. I must have been four, maybe three, when he and my grandmother visited us in Pittsburgh. The details of the occasion are fuzzy. I don’t remember why they came or much of what we did. But I do remember one thing perfectly: the shade of red that we used to paint the round picnic table on our patio. It had a burnt tone to it, a bit darker than a brick. It was the same shade that he had used to paint the fence around his yard in Niagara Falls. After he died, every time I thought of him, I thought of that color and of the long, smooth brush strokes he showed me to make to apply it evenly to the table. After we were done, I couldn’t touch it or the paint would come off, so I stood there next to him, admiring our work, watching the color dry into the early spring sun.
- Julie Lind
When I ask what kind of vase it is it's a teardrop people say bottom heavy as if it was just shed a pale purple transparent body shaped as if a bubble was pressed flat without breaking a treble clef curve lips for an easy pour into another's heart or this shapely body like the bass viol he played in the Chicago Lyric Opera suddenly he disappeared after choosing it saying to his wife send this for their wedding it is perfect for them elegant subtle and then 9/11 happened right before the day and they could not fly until a few months later we were told it was while he looked at our web page photos so happy we had found each other was gone he was our favorite so funny and sweet Rick's younger brother Steve at 45 we had wanted to repeat our musical wedding for him now only this teardrop he gave us now caressing that shape we add iris lavender violets lilac watered with tears as his strong graceful bow leans into our song
- Kath Abela Wilson
Gently, between forefinger and thumb, I hold just one. Soon, I will drop it with a soft plunk into my pail where it will join countless others. But for just this barest moment on a sunny morning in July, I allow myself the pleasure of pausing in my hurried gathering and look at it. Blueberry. If I were Pablo Neruda, I would write an ode to its color — deep blue, with a bloom like a slight frost or the finest sifting of last night’s moonlight. And look how the color shines forth when my finger and thumb disturb the fragile mist and reveal the deepness beneath. So blue, it’s almost black. Now, as I hold it poised above the pail, I hesitate. Maybe this one is for now, not later. Not for blueberry pancakes or blueberry muffins or even a handful scattered over my cereal. This one is to taste while it’s still full of sunshine. Still holding just a hint of the soil in which it grew. So I place it in my mouth. And I savor the tiny pop when my teeth break through the delicate skin, the littlest flood of juice, the brilliant flavor on my tongue. Indeed, if blue has a taste, this is it.
- Kathleen Kramer
On a particularly long road trip, my brother introduced me to the game Slug Bug. Also known as Punch Buggy, the object is to hit one’s opponent after spotting a Volkswagen Bug. Saying the car’s color is optional but my brother insisted we include it. He’d always win, of course. Lucky for me, our games never lasted long. I’d complain of a sore arm and my parents would reprimand my brother. As much as I hated playing Slug Bug, I loved riding in my aunt’s VW Bug. Arabella was a warm, sunny yellow, a car as fun as its owner. I only got to ride in Arabella when my extended family would meet at my grandmother’s house in Northern Wisconsin for vacation. To escape the heat, we’d pile into Arabella and head to the lake. Slug Bug was the furthest thing from my mind as we put-putted down the backroads, laughing as each bump caused Arabella to catch air.
Marcie Wessels
Daddy built it to last. Steel pipe sunk in gallons of concrete with an extra long board balanced perfectly at the center. Built to blend with the foliage near the small “lake” — the pipe and plank the deep green of a summer forest, almost unnoticeable at the back of our yard. This was no ordinary see-saw. There were no “sissy” handles — just a carved-out space for your hands. It was high — my feet didn’t touch the ground when it was perfectly balanced. It lasted through hurricanes and flooding — always there for us to try some astonishing new feat. Sometimes a backyard rodeo — what would it take to buck someone off the other end? Sometimes an acrobatic apparatus — how far from the center could you walk and keep the deep green plank off the grass? Sometimes simply a means of keeping a younger sibling occupied while, a book in one hand, you pushed gently with your feet. When last I saw it, at least 45 years after Daddy made it, the color was only slightly faded, the plank just a bit warped. Almost hidden amidst the azaleas, camellias, live oak, pine and popcorn trees — the green see-saw still standing.
- Margaret Walker
A wee dot of purple on the road on my final stretch to work gradually becomes my friend and colleague, Barbara, riding her bike to work from her home five miles away. I drive an hour out from Boston, a far more daunting distance, but being a real fan of exercise, a trip she’s made on her bike to prove she could do it. I’m careful to pull far over on the two lane road and get past before I toot good morning. It’s freezing out but the roads have been cleared. Her purple coat is barely knee length, though. She arrives after me, face rosy, hair windblown. I tease her about being a purple blob on my horizon. When we talk about colors we like in clothes she always says, anything, as long as it’s purple. Judging from her work clothes she’s not kidding.
- Pris Campbell
I was ten years old, shopping with my mother, when I found a violet umbrella in the rain gear rack among the black, polka-dot, and clear plastic selections. I kept going back to look at this rather large umbrella with a fancy gold-tone handle. Talked my mom into buying it for me. The next day, it rained! So I trotted off to the house of my best friend with my new find. “Where'd you get that? A purple umbrella?” quipped her sister, a notorious teaser. “Not purple, violet,” I corrected her, emphasizing the lighter color. “Okay, but it looks purple to me!” All summer and into fall, I was teased as the girl with the purple umbrella. I didn't care because I felt very special whenever I opened and walked under its violet expanse.
- Theresa A. Cancro
Water in motion conjures a froth, the white, white with silver that gleams on the top of waves in the Atlantic Ocean and Lake Ontario, the ripples in creeks like Fall Creek and Cascadilla. I can blow up every stream to river size in my mind and I am canoeing down the Genesee River or I imagine a tiny me where I raft like Huck Finn on a good strong oak leaf. The color is the same, the color of motion as water sprays over rocks even though the music changes from quiet streams like now I lay me down to sleep to the roar of cataracts like an orchestra wearing earplugs. The water sprites are silver white dancing and singing, the colors in the fountain foot of waterfalls like cumulus clouds condensed and wildly bubbled through with carbonation. It’s alive.
- Tina Wright
I can remember being asked by friends, when I was young, what my favorite color was, and my first choice had been green. I had chosen it because of it being the color of so many plants that I thought it was the color of life itself. Sometime in my college years I realized that my preferred favorite color was shifting to blue and that I was not asked about my favorite color very often. Nevertheless, I offered, every now and then, that my favorites were blue and green and how happy it is for today to let you all know this obscure information!
- Tom Clausen
I was not a particularly precocious child but there was one time, in the first grade, when I had my moment to shine. It happened on the day our teacher, Miss Eisman, called us up to her desk, one at a time, so we could choose a sheet of colored paper (called construction paper, but I didn’t know why) and we were supposed to say the color we wanted. So my classmates asked for blue, red, yellow, brown, pink, orange, purple. When my name was called I walked quickly up the aisle, pointed to a sheet of light green paper, and said “I’d like the chartreuse one, please.” Miss Eisman was surprised. She asked how I knew that word. “Because it sounds like Charlotte Russe,” I said, giving an answer that made absolute sense to me. Charlotte Russe was my favorite dessert — a creamy, custardy, fruity cake-like confection, with a cherry on top, served in a small paper cup. And if you couldn’t wait until you got home from the bakery you could eat it while you were walking, because the woman behind the counter would hand over a small wooden spoon if you asked for it politely. Miss Eisman had never taken much notice of me before that moment but, as I took my sheet of chartreuse paper from her hand and turned to go back to my desk, she said “You’re a clever little thing, aren’t you?” And since I was taught not to contradict an adult I said “Yes, I am.”
- Zee Zahava
