Hello and welcome to the Daily Poem. I'm Heidi White, and today is Monday, July 12, 2021.

And today I'm going to read for you a poem by American poet Marge Piercy. She was born in 1936.

She's a poet, a novelist, a political activist, and a prolific writer, she has published almost 40 books

about half and half poetry and novels. And today's poem is called Colors Passing Through Us,

and this is how it goes. Purple as tulips in May, mauve into lush velvet, purple as the stained blackberries leave on the lips, on the hands, the purple of ripe grapes, sunlit and warm as flesh.

Every day I will give you a color, like a new flower in a bud vase on your desk.

Every day I will paint you as women color each other with Hena on hands and on feet.

Red as Hena, as cinnamon, as coals after the fire is banked, the cardinal in the feeder, the roses tumbling on the arbor,

their weight bending the wood, the red of the syrup I make from petals.

Orange as the perfumed fruit hanging their globes on the glossy tree.

Orange as pumpkins in the field.

Orange as butterfly weed and the monarchs who come to eat it.

Orange as my cat running lithe through the high grass.

Yellow as a goat's wise and wicked eyes.

Yellow as a hill of daffodils.

Yellow as dandelions by the highway.

Yellow as butter and egg yolks.

Yellow as a school bus stopping you.

Yellow as a slicker in a downpour.

Here is my bouquet.

Here is a sing-song of all the things you make me think of.

Here is oblique praise for the heights and depth of you and the width, too. Here is my box of new crayons at your feet.

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