mmmmcclxvii

Ultra Unbearable

like a lot of life,
right? choir practice
in undergrad used to be
a wonderful way to pass
the time between what
we thought was the
important stuff.

on our nature walk on
that particular day the
cattails were weird, but so
pretty – their normally brown
fuzzy tops curled into the shapes
of tiny umbrella handles. they
were purple, i think.

purple is a color i often get confused.
i’m not color blind or anything, but i
do confess i wind up staring at whatever
it is and mouthing all sorts of things.
like violet, aquamarine, magenta,
fuchsia, spindrift, amber, umber,
and other colors the hues of
which i cannot seem to
clarify in my head at
ordinary moments.

purple is my 

favorite color.

but college choir tour,
springtime of 1988,
the first year i was
ever in love. one rainy
night in magnolia, i held
the umbrella for both of us.
i had actually packed an umbrella.
imagine that, me the responsible one.
walking from the methodist church where
we performed to each of our respective
sponsors’ homes for the night.
ours turned out to be a funeral home.
the place was huge and we were
giddy and felt the
embodiment of romantic,
scouring the dozens of rooms
for caskets that weren’t empty,
imagining the shag carpets
between the twin beds were
pathways through lavender
gardens where we could
get lost and miss
the morning bus.
surely nobody’d miss us.
and even if they did, they’d
never find us, the tall aromatic stalks
twice our height and then some.