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The day the red-ones drew the curtains and chose the orange-one
to mind the white oval that had embraced the black-one
nearly three thousand days --- that day
was the day the blue-ones formed
a veined parenthesis to contain the pulsing mass
of the red-ones, spilling sideways,
was the day the red-ones and the blue-ones
never turned to purple and the green-ones
stayed scattered, shoots pushing up to be counted,
was the day the brown-ones huddled and burst, and
waited for the white-ones, the eye-holed pointed ones,
to bear a burning broken cross, its twisted arms akimbo,
was the day the pink-ones, like the blue-one who
missed her grip at the finish, snatched steel from
between their legs and bound themselves each to each,
was the day the tan-ones veiled themselves
into invisibility,
was the day the yellow-ones shifted, and strove
for the exits,
was the day the beige-ones bent double, and breathed
dios mio,
was the day the rainbows clung together, their colors melted
and shriven,
was the day a keening Hallelujah rose up from the teeming streets
and evanesced into the violet sky,
was the day I waited for the raging ones to bring a yellow star
for me.
Deborah Kahan Kolb is the author of the forthcoming chapbook Windows and a Looking Glass (Finishing Line Press, 2017). Her work has appeared in Poetica, Veils, Halos & Shackles, and Voices Israel. She lives in Bronx, NY.