I Am Red

• Emily Campbell, Grade 10
• Poetry
• 2009

I am the velvet petalled rose, the artery spurting blood, the strawberry lipbalm I love and the copper coloured curls on an infant's head. I am a plump cherry- ripe, sweet and tangy. I am the lethal buttshaft of cupid, striking through the tender hearts of youth, and at the same time, the bearer of grief, violence, sorrow and tragedy, cutting lives short. Once, I was a crisp, pristine white, but now I am forever stained- red drowns me, yet resurrects me. Red is anger, lust, hatred, spite and love. My blushing scarlett clouds smother the blue sky, arriving at dawn and departing at dusk. I am the chubby cherub's cheeks, warm, soft an kissable, as well as the austere apartment, with blood smears and corpses pooled in their own life juices. I sound like the affectionate sigh and the teeth gritting fury. Red tastes like slaty, metallic blood and sugared, luscious berries. The colour red threatens me, provokes me, dangers me... kisses me, makes love to me, and warms me. It stalks me, predator to prey in nightmares, yet fills my dreams with vacant, giggly, cloudlike fantasies. Red is the feel of a lover's lips upon your own, kissing you passionately. Red is the feel of a killer's moist breath on the back of your neck, their knife slitting your throat, releasing your crimson fluids, a waterfall cascading. Red is the colour I see when I picture my first love. I love him to death, yet hate him for filling me with poisonous hatred. Red is the love heart dark chocolate wrapper, which I sent to my love on Fecruary 14th, 2009. I never got one back. Yet still, I'd do anything to have him back for good. Red is good, red is evil, red is heaven, red is hell. Red is my colour. I am red.