Incompatible

Hues of want beneath hazel,

Olive green and pale yellow and navy,

Radiating and swelling like a fever until

It leaked from between my teeth

And between the fingers that slowly rose above my head

And traced my body down to the cold floor.

Puddles gathered.

I assumed to other eyes it was black and white,

Coalesced into a blur beneath the hazel,

Undetectable.

But a muddy blue stared and beckoned

And the color had no choice

But to let go and bleed through to them.

Behind this muddy blue sat a deep crimson,

Pointed and acrid and resonant.

From warm fingertips that patiently searched,

It cascaded into the puddles,

Billowing like clouds of fiery smoke,

Racing upstream,

Penetrating the wall of hazel

Until my lungs filled

And then ached.

Your name rose in my throat.

I nudged it forward.

The warm fingertips lifted,

But the crimson remained

And mixed where it shouldn't have mixed

And turned it all muddy brown

And then black.

Beneath the hazel now,

The color and the colorless wrestle.

They only stop when he smiles.