Orange Contemplations

by Debra Bishop · 24 December 2014

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Christmas Poems

Pumpkin love and Halloween goblins on the eve
of ghostly party scenes.
Tangerine sunsets for my veranda’s view while
shades of cadmium Monarch butterflies float in
autumn’s blossom skies for all to see.
Vermilion cheese doodles and plates of fried
jalapeño Maui onions capped off with a sparkling,
gold lager for my lunch.
Apricots and pecans on creamy custard tarts, cakes
of shredded sugar carrots in bakery tins and crispy
glazed doughnuts, sounds sublime.
Roasted sweet potatoes latkes and rustic brassy
snails sauced in bitters and Schnapps on the table
a lovely aperitif.
Tang in jelly glasses and Winnie-the-Pooh bear
beds in spaces on my sleeping lover’s flamingo and
coral sheets.
Middle passage of seasons following warm, vibrant
breezes and Nat Cole’s Orange Colored Sky is sung
in collard green melodies adrift in Antelope
Canyons and Arizona’s salmon hued crags with plum
Peking duck and braised beets on the side while
Utah’s Delicate Arches bristle at fiery hairpin
banksai and rainbow mesa dunes hide cantaloupe
stealing foxes and mango furred tigers that roam
blazing savannahs and cocky roosters’ crow mornings
awake within chicken coops.
Irishmen tie on peach colored life-jackets on Big
Sur while islanders dress Dahlias in their hair.
Savvy Hindu Rajasthan, Buddhist Monks and Whirling
Dervish array themselves in ecstatic saffron dyed
turbans and Sufis drinking hot spiced mandarin
oolong tea.
The House of Orange in Amsterdam on Queens’ day
spread fragrant Australian eucalyptus flowers of
an intense cooper blush along the crowded streets
while orange tee-shirted visitors sail in
decorated boats on the canal.
Long limbed, ochreous orangutans and swinging monkeys
do their business on the velvet forest floor.
Touching skin the color of ginger bread melts honey
nectar lips to form brazen smiles and lighten heavy
spirits.
Exiting the stationery store of forgotten hours produce
panicky glances at the racing time as I ogle the car’s
rearview window, hoping not to get a cinnamon rum
printed parking ticket.
Ripping at the paper jacket and while allowing for no
bitterness I instead have a C.K. Chesterton’s moments
of contentment.
I relish the warmed car and the orange marmalade on Ritz
crackers with sliced kiwi and aged Mt.Tam’s tripe cream
semi-soft cheese.
Snug inside the car I marvel at Christmas cards, the gifts
of giving and the returns of love, a 11.5 pair of men’s
nectarine leather boots, a citrine topaz brooch for sis,
a Shitake mushroom making log, for an old friend and a
pearl finished, 10 pound blazing copper bowling ball with
bag as I observe F. Schaeffer’s magnificent ruins within
and without.