Even Green is Gray

further off, the second bank of trees
just shadows, hints in mists,
the next bank, only shapes of fog,
and beyond that, the unvaried dense of gray.

But, even gray, the grass is greener,
rain polished clean of drought, it shines,
and flowers glow with rubies, golds
and blues beside slate paths,
bright in the full gray of noon.

To pass these embers of bloom and feel
their burn through dim to the core,
is to touch the cool of gray, but to pass
and only pass reveals a shade of blue
that chills the prism of the soul.

An earlier version of “Even Green is Gray” appeared in Dazed Part of Light by Lee Robison.