Color Wheel

Residents of Yorkville guzzle beer in vats. (mnemonic to memorize the spectrum) 

 

Crimea river / said Donald to Vladimir /And we'll cut a sliver just for you.

In this great spinning, 

even though the man of no substance

is a colorless man,

yet garish with superlatives, 

must each day be dark and stormy

from smoldering graves and molten

metals gone to particulates?

Gaza is caged and parched

while Ukrainian air is ashen with malice

to make over colors on the map,

while his nothingness, wrapped like a flag

with red tie, white hair and blue suit, 

waves in star spangled subversion.

 

Or can we breathe with green yearning

for the unconditional victory of meadows?

Am I allowed to celebrate 

the forty-watt lamp of sunrise,

the yellow number two pencil?

Even purple prose must be forgiven.

What is the color of silent guns?

I’ll settle for the blue green

negotiation of a teal sky,

a golden cargo on the Black Sea

from a ceasefire across amber waves of grain.

Where a crop of grey landmines

once shadowed the land,

common yarrow now grows wild again.