Day Three of the Unchronological Posts for Thirty by Thirty Challenge.

I’d do a better job posting if I were in town, but yesterday’s post was “Red.”  Since I’ve been with my husband, shopping fabrics for the next furniture season, I’ve seen reds called everything.  Here’s my response:

Red Clay

 Flipping through the fabric swatches
in hues called scarlet, vermillion, shrimp,
cardinal, crimson, American beauty rose,
I still see red, the color that runs deeper
than my red-blooded American veins.

 My color palette has reds too:
Alabama clay dirt red,
gravel-road-skinned knees red,
flogging rooster comb red,
first vine-ripened tomato red,
Radio Flyer wagon red,
watermelon heart red,
freckled faced girls’ pigtails red,
hot-temper red-in-the-face.

 If the paint stores could mix it
or the textile plants spin and dye it,
if OPI created a polish, the color
would look to me like home.