Color of Pain

Call me Crayola.
The only sharp
bright red one
in your box of dull
gray stubs.
Creative carmine
mocks your gnarled spirit
cemented in ashen complacency.
Courage!
Forsake all others!
Step off the slate
and dive headlong
into the color of pain.
I am your ruby temptress
poised to kick you in the bland
and spatter your drab
in vermilion agony,
like a gunshot wound to the throat.
The fear and surprise in your eyes is amusing.
Warm crimson seeps through your clutching fingers.
Can't staunch the flow
when scarlet ignites.
Rubicund tendrils pierce imagination
copper odor singes nostrils,
prickling taste buds
until garnet drool oozes.

Did you not read the warning
on the side of the box?
"Play with fire
and you get churned."

 

 (c)2008 Lucie Raposo - All rights reserved (republished 2022)