Every Shade of Blue

By Amina Rosa Castronovo

Don’t be afraid to get in touch with the deepest of your emotions, even the heartbreaking ones. There are oceans in you if you learn how to swim.

I only lied to you once.
You looked me in the eyes from across the room and asked me
If my favorite color was still blue.
I told you no.
That I had moved on,
I am vibrating a different color without you now.

I pleaded with you to stop asking me if I ever loved the color blue,
What are colors,
Do I see them the same as you?
I scream at you to stop talking so I can remind myself 
That I feel like a deep twilight around you.

You are an old memory,
Skipping down the sidewalk to my house
Reminding me of the whispering in my conscience that we met in another life,
A life that left behind a residue of crushed soot on chimney brick,
The thick dust staining my fingers with 
How my soul recalls kissing in the streets,
Speaking in poetry,
And a dozen dainty, ultramarine roses everyday.

Your question catches me by surprise; it muffles turquoise secrets 
I know but am not allowed to utter.
This silence paints me a persian blue, 
Brushing me with the strokes of knowledge that I can’t just pretend
You aren’t there,
How does one ignore the first chirp of the bluebird in the spring?
Just as March is sure to storm after the first burst of a bud,
With every new love you linger like a parade of snow on lilies,
Flinging open our window to let the aqua rain fly in,
Drenching our clothes in the celeste ink of love.

I am soaked with our small universe 
That is as light as crystal blue rivers and
As dark as the depths of the ocean—
Because where the sun hits has never mattered to us.

I shine this light on you 
When I say that you are everything:
The first bellflower popping out of the earth,
Waves lapping against the shore,
A new blanket of snow resting on evergreens during sunset,
And the periwinkle moon we dance under
To the melody the color of the sky

If you listen closely your voice is the background music to my heart,
The sound projecting a glow of bittersweet nostalgia 
Just like the Eiffel Tower’s light rains down onto the Parisian streets at night, and
Everytime I turn to you I prance down another avenue
That leads me to a navy solitude 
Echoing your baby blue voice that is bursting with the seas and skies
Of which the water you want to hide from 
In a world that prefers dry deserts,
And so you run from me because 
When our eyes meet I wear you like a sapphire ring around my heart 
As you send electric blue currents into me and                                                                                                                     
The way you look at me when the world cries
Is as if you are seeing
The color blue for the first time.

Alas, colors are fading away.
You are not blind or deaf to me, I know you see them vanishing too,
Is it too late to say that the waves on your chromatic spectrum
Are the only hues my light can capture?
This state of being demands, commands me to sew your lapis heart onto my sleeve
Because I know you will always be my coolest primary color,
Embodying a royal blue wedding gown in a musty antique shop,
But I won’t breathe in this confining dress.
I can’t be until you come to me.

Why must you swim away like a fish, yet be the king of the jungle?
I don’t expect you to be 
A fairytale horse galloping into the teal sunset,
Or even Prince Charming,
But now you have disguised yourself in the cloak of the unknown and 
Offered me an icy blue apple. 
How did you know that
Even if love was labeled poison
I would drink it if it meant a breath of you?
Taking a sip will force my poor heart to ache, 
So please don’t leave quite yet, now I know 
It’s always been you
The world could be every shade of blue.