Painting Over Purple

"Purple Passion" Painting by K. Juchalski

Painting Over Purple


She knew it was over when he
produced the painting equipment.

They had left their limb wrapped
days behind a long time ago.
Their room was deep blue back in their early days.
There was no household list then, no
'who's turn is to change the sheets?
I did it last time' conversations with pauses
that wounded, a massacre of silence.

They changed the colour of their room
often since then, the blue always remained
her favourite.

Once when he was sleeping,
she wrote a poem in purple ink
in a hidden corner of the white walls.
She was love doped, loving herself in love,
she knows that now.
That poem was her last. To him anyhow.

She realises now that she is a love addict,
a girl in love with being in love,
'a serial romantic', Oprah would probably call her.
That's why she sought out a new man and a new room.

A pity her partner found out.

The painting equipment was produced.
He painted in silence.
Shame, he painted over her poem.
She had meant it then, all that love and lust
trapped in purple ink.


Brigid O'Connor

Posted over on her site Sort of Writing
Listed as #15 over on Magpie Tales 78