Breath & Shadow
Winter 2017 - Vol. 14, Issue 3
"Paint"
written by
Frances Koziar
It would be easier if people were only one colour
Sapphire, say, or emerald
If they let you name them, fix them
into place, rather than hiding
in a spectrum of deceit.
It would be easier if people were only mean
or only nice, if the cruel and abusive didn’t flicker
like fireflies, confusing you
with moments of light in the darkness.
It would be easier because those other moments
are what make you believe your lies
and hope, that make you stay in faith and claw
the truth from your eyes and dismiss
the memories that have taught you
that that brightness in the dark
of their souls is only the contamination
of paint.
Frances Koziar is the author of teen fantasy, "The War of the Shard", nominated for iUniverse's Editor's Choice Award. Her short fiction and poetry has recently appeared in Yarn Magazine, Romance Magazine, The Poetry Institute of Canada's fiction and poetry anthologies, and Axil Art Magazine. She is a hypersomniac and graduate student at McGill university.