Red is an imaginary carpet
dancing with desire,
lettering the days
with roses and birdwings.
Red is the sky
that turns the morning
into an omen, the night
into a full moon–
catching dreams
like a wayfaring balloon
painting the town with stars.
The NaPoWriMo prompt today is to write a poem that delves into the meaning of your first or last name. Roig means red in Catalan.
When I worked as a textile designer in the 70s and 80s I spent a lot of time matching Pantone color paper to customer colors and hand cutting and pasting stripe designs. So when I saw a box set of 100 Pantone postcards nostalgia made me buy it. I’ve done my poem for today on red 1797, above. I’m sure these postcards, and every other kind of commercial design now being done, is computer-generated. So much more accurate! And quick!
But I still like to work with my hands.
The poem itself has nothing to do with technology (the NaPoWriMo day 17 prompt is to “write a poem that features forgotten technology”), but I turned it into a haiku chain of sorts for International Haiku Poetry Day.
consider
the matter
of etcetera–where
does
it go?
where does it
end?
what follows
can’t be predicted…
And a little red retro music too.
My poem, “Interrogation”, is posted today as part of a sequence of poems inspired by the painting “In Equipoise”, by Teresa Vito. My thanks to guest editor Kyle Laws for selecting my work.
You can read it and see the original painting here.
K. 