Six Notebooks

The colors
I have to say the colors
The colors are nothing short of
Driving south from the West Side of Saint Paul
On Highway 52, somewhere near Hampton
The colors, they are nothing short of
Driving south, Nine-Forty-Seven Ante Meridiem
Looking to the southern Horizon
A strip of orange pink salmon blends
Into an array of blue clouds, not clear sky
A medium blue cloud
Bursting into darker blue cloud then
Fading through all the blues
Merging into a panoply of greys almost
But not ever quite white
I would take a picture for you
On my phone and send it
But we both know
That the camera of a phone never captures
Not the way the Renaissance painters could
In their luxurious oils
All the colors and their shades
So instead I will say to you
Thank you, for sending me south
Today, on this glorious morning
With the oranges pinks salmons blues greys almost whites
Of the clouds that I otherwise
Would not have seen
On this seventeenth of January in the common era of twothousand seventeen
Thank you
For the colors
And the thought of your hand in mine
Twining like a chain through the distance
To rest gently in mine.

​PWS 2021.01.17