Harmonious Light
by Terese Mason Pierre

I

Where is the living moment saturated in color?
At the end of revolution and arms, we expect color
to spring from the sidewalks, a whole new-colored
era. When the imagination fails, it removes color
from each essential issue, colonial animals coloring
need with greed, unity with division, robbing color
to dilute to sameness, under one flag’s colors.
Now, we witness the earth exhale an eager truth, give it color
where there is none, share a fresh capital greener in color
than money: trees and flowers instead—their colors
adorning hearts, without property or struggle. The color
of the soil darkens in this confident sun, and only utopia colors
our thoughts, a gift longed for and received. What is the color
of progress, and how should we paint these walls, colored
sand for now, but later, something to match the ocean’s color.

II

In our eco-friendly home, you tell me you like the color
of my skin when I blush, we eat a meal of deep-colored
vegetables: aubergine, spiced quinoa, spinach, beets that color
our teeth with health and small adventure. We find a new color
together in the shower drain, smiles split by the evening’s colored
light. You say, remember when corporations trademarked colors?
And we laugh, because we don’t remember. We don’t color
the long moment with such history anyway. Instead, we paint colored
stories that weave wonder with courage, to add hope and bright colors
to my body making a new life, matching the world’s future in color.