Looking at the Flavor of Color

Again I am adding a post in addition to my regular schedule. I was compelled to do so for the W3 prompt offered by the Poet of the Week Aditi Sharma on the Skeptics Kaddish. Aditi challenged us to write a Pantoum about “anything dreamy, something non-existent in the real world, or just about your real-life dreams”. Because I love the Pantoum I couldn’t resist. Which is why you have to have stamina to read this poem all the way through. I considered chopping out part of it but, hey, I like it the way it is.

I see deep greens in azure streams
Murky depths where the light is low
My prism eyes detect the separate dreams
I feel the colors of the swirling flow

Murky depths where the light is low
Rough red and saffron through my hands
I feel the colors of the swirling flow
My crimson blood released to foreign lands

Rough red and saffron through my hands
I taste the tang of purple, indigo and drink it in
My crimson blood released to foreign lands
Running carmine and cobalt off lip and chin

I taste the tang of purple, indigo and drink it in
My mouth is not big enough to contain the swell
Running carmine and cobalt off lip and chin
I hear humming wave and chiming bell

My mouth is not big enough to contain the swell
Bass brown countered by soprano buzz of blues
I hear humming wave and chiming bell
My soul sings in counterpoint in forest green hues

Bass brown countered by soprano buzz of blues
Inviting me to become the water’s bride
My soul sings in counterpoint in forest green hues
I want to be washed, soaked in color, tie-dyed

Inviting me to become the water’s bride
I pray for more than black and white
I want to be washed, soaked in color, tie-dyed
No artist’s palette can contain the sight

I pray for more than black and white
My thoughts are drenched in grue and bleen
No artist’s palette can contain the sight
Hope is water wings glowing octarine*

My thoughts are drenched in grue and bleen**
My dreams float above the water line
Hope is water wings glowing octarine
Caught on fire and drowned in brine

My dreams float above the water line
I see deep greens in azure streams
Caught on fire and drowned in brine
My prism eyes detect the separate dreams

*Octarine, in the Discworld books, is known as ‘the colour of magic’, which forms the title of Pratchett’s first ever Discworld book. According to Disc mythology, octarine is visible only to wizards and cats, and is generally described as a sort of greenish-yellow purple colour.

** Grue and Bleen are sniglets to describe a color that extends to include shades of blue and green.  An alternative, meaning the same thing, is bleen, though linguists and anthropologists tend to use the term grue. 

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