Water Baby and the Moon - Jessie Willcox-Smith
Blue
Blue is Greece where fisherman tame their boats,
where I float naked in the color of truth, the sea
Humming in my ears, lulling me with ultramarines
like a bsby kicking in amniotic seas, like god
Whose throne in this transparent blue bowl,
this star sapphire studded cradle of waves.
She must have blue skin andeyes, lapis lazuli
looped in strands andstrands around her rounded belly
And her breasts amply squirting blue-white milk.
She must make love on silk sheets of azure air.
She must have been there in the window,
that morrow shaft in the hospital wall letting in
Pale blue spring light the morning my daughter was born.
She hid in the forget-me-nots in thewallpaper,
Fluttered in the doctors and nurses blue medical gowns,
glinted in the metallic blue of the scissors that cut the cord.
Her blue threads embrioded the bloody placenta.
She colors the newborns eyes blue
For babies come from her inside out world.
she is in the bluish spit against the evil eye.
When I’m blue I close my eyes and see blue with my third eye.
blue light comes from the island in my brain
Where sunflowers crook their necks, weary of time.
sunflowers, your wild fire hair burns in blue.
Peaceful blue, luminous blue, keep my daughter safe.
She splashes her little feet in the Aegean blue sea,
Reaches her hands into the blue beauty. I hug her dry
in a towel deep blue as Mary’s timeless robes.
- Aliki Barnstone
Voices of Light
