A Gemstone the Color of Oz
Paul Smith It was nice to study maps In grade school I especially liked the colors There were five or six standard ones Light blue, pink, yellow, light green Magenta Our forty-eight states each had A color of their own Cities were highlighted Topeka, Buffalo, Salt Lake It made sense that our country Was so orderly Africa was squared away too Each colonial power had its swath Italy, Germany, France, Portugal, Belgium You could tell the borders were secure By those straight razorsharp lines That dug in to the veldt And jungle to subdivide The tangle of wilderness It made me want to explore When I did Buffalo was no longer The eighth largest city And Tanganyika had a new name Where they mined Tanzanite They remained the same A cluster of people far away On another continent In a tiny country Looking like a gemstone color In a schoolbook Nobody Knows What a Lot Is They say she drinks a lot But I don’t know how much that is I know she brought me Zatarin Crab Boil When she came to the wedding I know our eyes met when She was at the other table Like they always did And she touched my shoulder When she came over The reception was in a neighborhood I overlooked or never knew Two rail lines paralleled each other Overhead One of them veered west A street away And the block had apartments Red brick walkups Whose concrete steps would be fun To run up together With someone On one of those blustery fall days When the cerulean sky is so blue Your eyes hurt The wind rushing in off the lake And she showed me pictures Of her two daughters Her sister said were wicked But not quite chuzma With eyes that sparkled So much like their mother’s I toasted all four of them |
Paul Smith lives near Chicago with his wife Flavia. He is a proud member of the Rockford Writers Guild, where he has had other poems and stories published.
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