"New Color" by Mary Soon Lee

New Color

Mary Soon Lee

Yesterday, into the heaviness of the novel I was reading--

the over-abundance of meticulous historical detail,

the men acting poorly and the women paying--

"Color" Watercolor on Paper
By J. Artemus Gordon

came you,

inserting yourself

beside me on the sofa

with your book

about a fairy,

only the second book

you had ever read

for fun.

And when, late last night, after you fell asleep,

I read the pages where a young man walks to his death,

a section that resounded inside me like the words of an old hymn,

you were there,

asleep beside me,

lifting me out

of the waste of it,

and I don't know whether to wish you a childhood like mine:

where I finished one book and picked up the next,

reading and re-reading my favorites until they were part of me;

or to wish you

less solitude

and more time

giggling with friends

or busily searching

for the brand new color

that you first looked for

at the Children's Museum,

a color never seen or made before,

that I held back

from saying you'd never find,

no matter how many crayons you mixed.

Yesterday, as I read, 

my reading was colored

by you.

Poet's Notes:  I wrote the first draft of this poem over seven years ago when my daughter was six years old. As my poems age, I often retire them and store them in large binders with the other veterans. And sometimes instead of retiring them, I dust them off and try to revise them. This particular poem has been revised twice since I first wrote it, both times emerging a few lines shorter. I note for the curious that the novel I was reading was The Children's Book by A. S. Byatt. Despite its title, it is emphatically NOT a book for children.

Editor’s Note:  I believe this is an important poem to publish in a literary magazine.  We lovers of poetry and literature may lament those significant people in our lives who perhaps do not appreciate reading as much as we do.  However, those same people may appreciate the fine arts, music, athletics, or personal relationships and friendships much more than we.  Who is to say which is better or more fulfilling?