i_need_to_colour_the_sky raze two of the cutest kids you're ever likely to see walk into the waiting room with their grandfather. after they sit down the colouring books come out. one girl has dark hair in a ponytail. the other has blonde hair down past her shoulders. sisters. it's hard to tell which is the older of the two. they both look to be eight or nine. the grandfather keeps trying to get the dark-haired one to work on a maze instead of colouring, without much success, ignoring the blonde-haired one who keeps asking for a crayon. "can i have blue?" she says. "cause i need to colour the sky." she's persistent enough to get what she needs. i don't know if there are numbers telling her which colours to use where, but when she smiles and holds up what she's done for him to see, it's beautiful. he says nothing. he tells the dark-haired one he likes something she's coloured instead, playing favourites and not even trying to hide it. the blonde-haired one grows a little sillier and less precise in her colouring, enjoying the wild bolts of sideways lightning a pink crayon in her hand can make. "look how pretty it is," she says. "stop that," he says. "you're melting the crayon. stop. you're colouring like a baby." but there is no right or wrong way to colour. every crayon, no matter how noble, is going to get worn down in time. look at the sky she made, i want to say. just shut your fool mouth and look at the sky. 140818 ... flowerock because the sky is boring and gray, no texture, no layers... just gray and wet. We need a bunch of kids to hold giant crayons together to color it in. 140818 ... epitome of incomprehensibility The child with the starry crayon: I sang this song once. The Internet won't give me the words but here's a recording of other people singing it: http://orianachoir.com/child-with-the-starry-crayon/ (They are hissing their Ss in what seems to me over-precision in the form of over-enunciation. But tastes in singing style are very very varied. In the children's choir I was in we were supposed to sing as if every vowel was an O. To my teacher's credit, it did help a bunch of kids sound less squeaky and EEE-ish.) 140818 ... tail-devouring snake As if my heart bleed open, my bones bleached white. No color in this body or this life. Waves knock through me, each one crashes leaves me with less me. Daylight is overexposed, emptiness stalks me in shadows and reflection. I see nothingness everywhere, and there is no where for me to be but not here. Eyes uplift to the sky and beyond, and my heart prays for release. Let me color the sky with my heart. Let me out of the human prison. 140819 what's it to you? who go blather from