The Colour of God

God is the first spoonful of heroin,
white as heaven,
the blink of the high,
a crystal roar of light,
the atom bomb
moving through your veins.

God is also the dark ebony of the earth
after a downpour in the country,
the clatter of rain roaring against your tin roof.
He is the black soil your great-
great-grandfather held in his Irish
hand, thrusting that hand of his
out to generations born of Canada.

When you were a child you saw God
an orange Tiger Lily, a satsuma, a mandarin,
a juicy orange from Florida;
you thought God was like the pumpkins in the fields,
loitering about, lounging like holy men
on Monday morning knowing they needn't
espouse another sermon til Sunday.

Maybe to Van Gogh God was a swirl
or a meadow of irises, blue petals
like velvet, like night, like the words: I'm lonely.

And to Rosetti, God was, a blade of grass,
a meadow, field, pasture, a clearing,
the endless mile of grass and weed and hill.

God's a good cup of joe, a mighty heave of java,
a cold pint of Guinness, a warm snifter of brandy.
Oh, God is the fresh smell of espresso beans
after a walk in the Carmanah when you've rubbed
your hands raw on cedar, madrona and sequoia.

And haven't you seen the face of God
in the burgundy ring from your lover's
wine glass as he leans against the table,
drunkenly, telling you why he cannot love you.
And this, too, the half-moon of your fingernails,
the pale rosette of your hands, the prismatic opal
of your palms which glide through the air
like pride instead of prudence, head held up.

And God, too, the wedge of lemon
sitting at the edge of your lover's plate,
which reminds you of buttercups
the rub upon a child's neck,
a streak of yellow to the chin.

But to you, the colour of God is purple,
and his voice sounds like violets
against rough stone fences in Ireland.
And when he covers your face
with his hand he smells like plums,
and you kiss his palm,
manna, to you, in the desert.
And when his fingers slide away from your face
you tilt your head,
to catch the last of him,
the leanness between shoulder blades,
the calluses on his heels,
the light wound like a grape
on his right calf,
the opalescent-lavender of his skin.

The way you kiss each of your
own wounds as if they were a mark from him,
the way you keep walking,
a journey without end,
to find him, to bury your face in his hands,
show him the bruises
like two cloves of pomegranate seeds
on each of your palms;
tell him how you will die for him,

tell him how you will live.

© Heather Simeney MacLeod