Ode to Yellow - after Olivia Gatwood

My favorite color is a sunny day
And a sunny day is honey on a spoon,
the daffodils blooming fresh and bright
like a promise, like a celebration.
the corn colored threads running
down her shoulders, meeting her elbows
pineapple juice in the morning

I want you to coat my insides like pure joy,
like heaven’s ecstasy
want you to fill me up
yellow paint like Vincent Van Gogh
I’m not too found of his irises,
but I liked the sunflowers

And I like the way the world tries to underestimate you
because your soft, right, optimistic
something precious adolescent girls can’t let go of
and that makes them naive, right?
Someone to be adored, protected,
laughed at?
But you have them right where you want them

The sun can warm and burn,
the bee can bumble and sting
bite,
make you hurt,
leave a mark on your wrist
The lighter that flickers when the house is asleep
the flames on top,
moving and shaking
ready to catch something
hungry to zap,
eager to burn
lions and tigers and the flesh of her sick skin

A concept I learned in Kindergarten,
when I grabbed a lizard by its tail
That love is exuberant and indelicate
and when Claire screamed
and everyone turned their back on my assailant ways
I learned that the world might love you more
if you were a shade or two lighter
a cream, a butter
something you can bake in a cake,
because lemons need sweetener
but the parameters on your happiness taste too much like insecurity
and how else can you get what you want other than to grab it?

You have no insecurity
you are shining and brilliant and bright
even when the world around you is a brewing blue,
a serious cobalt
a thundercloud raining on your parade
because they forgot you were lightning

Spring is my favorite season
because it is the season of you,
the giggle of pine trees
pollen coating every surface
My seventh grade converse,
monarch butterflies,
pina colada popsicles,
the lightning bug that blink and fly away

Yellow,
When the world tells you
that you are too much
too uncontained
too uninhibited
when they complain that you are some sort of lightweight

Yellow,
Remind them about the bees
Tell them about the goldfinches
and the bitter love of a sunset
on everything you wished to be

explain the multitudes you are and everything you love,
and show me how to love it too

Because I’ve been burned by a spark before,
and I’ve never felt more acutely alive.