ISSUE FIVE: “Yellow is time's favorite color,” by Kathryn Ross

Yellow is time’s favorite color,

just think how it dyes fabric
and flowers and paper and teeth
and bones and eyes and afternoons and
sunset skies, leaves and trees and
grass and sticks at summer’s end,
paint on white houses, fingernails
and books and plastic and jewelry
on its way to bronze, rainwater in
buckets and sidewalks stagnant,
earth and hair and metal signs
under relentless sun, canvas
and bags and clothes and
shoes and wedding dresses
spun from cotton and lace,
stars breathing last breaths,
skin the moment rigor
mortis sets in.

Kathryn Ross

Kathryn H. Ross is the author of essay collection Black Was Not A Label from PRONTO and Black Was Not A Label (2nd Edition) from Red Hen Press. She holds a BA and MA in English and Writing. More importantly, she adores cats, warm baths, and Daniel Radcliffe movies. Her work ranges from sentimental and absurd shorts and poetry to lamentation essays about living as a young black woman in America. Read her at speakthewritelanguage.com

Headshot: Whitfield Photographs

Photo Credit: Staff