Honest-to-God Color, God said, for Artists by Marianne Boruch

Honest-to-God Color, God said, for Artists

by Marianne Boruch

The Paris Review,

Issue 191, Winter 2009

Honest-to-god color, god said, for artists.
But first, graveyards, to grind the human femur
in secret, for bone black. And cuttlefish
for sepia, ingenious spray when they

fear things, which is mostly in that water.
For blue, miniature wars to come, pilgrimages,
and rapes some will consider a hobby.
The trade routes: mules, slaves bent low with cobalt

or lapis. And yellow? From piss, out of cows eating
only mango leaves. That will be rumor, little dried cakes
of it. What color am I? thought god, just past
the ice age. Let there be mirrors! though nothing

looked anything like god in them, world
coming to detail quickly, over eons. Leaf. Rattle.
Out of trees an owl frenzied, mobbed by five
shrieking crows. Red is blood-red eventually.

http://www.theparisreview.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/5985