Writing in response to reading

This is a tribute to Hailstones and Halibut Bones: Adventures in Color by Mary Lee O'Neill. The Scouts reference is to the mascot of the school where I taught when I wrote this. Alamo Junior High in Midland, Texas. School Colors/ Red and Gray.

What is Gray?

Gray is a cold, rainy day sky
The feeling when you say goodbye
Smoke curling upward
And a dove’s soft wings
Gray is a city’s concrete buildings
Lumpy oatmeal is gray
And being sick on your birthday
The velvet fur of a Persian cat
A child’s pony with an old straw hat
Gray is the color of Grandpa’s beard;
The ominous clouds of a thunderstorm feared.
Melancholy is gray
Deep down inside.
Losing love when you can’t decide.
Elephants, Mondays, and
Pencil lead.
The color of the Scouts,
Paired with red.
Gray is a game, not quite won-
Black and white
Swirled into one…
Gray is the space between
Wrong and right
Dropping your ice cream after
Only one bite.
On gray days we curl up
With our nose in a book
And don’t give the gray world
A second look.