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Nothing Must Be Blue
David B. Dawson
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When I was no
more than seven
I spilled a blue snow cone
on my church clothes, my white pants stained,
sticking to the car seat like flypaper.
When I was not quite seventeen
I saw swamp gas rise
from the graves in a Texas cemetery,
blue ghosts floating upward into Spanish moss.
No more than three years later I heard Furry Lewis
play the blues with ancient fingers on rusty strings,
his right hand strumming a rhythm like a ceiling fan
in a hot and sleepless bedroom.
When I was forty-seven
I used a Parker fountain pen
to write blue numbers on the blank check
that paid to bury my father in his navy blue suit.
Yesterday I looked at the clear sky and remembered
an argument I once read, that the sky has no color.
It said the sky can be any color it chooses --
"sky blue" is an illusion, a trick of the mind.
None of this has any business being blue.
Except one thing: There is a light in the dark center
of wherever I am: A jewel that always shines
as blue as peace.
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David Dawson is a
Memphis writer who spent his professional life as a journalist and editor before
recently retiring to concentrate on other endeavors. Dawson has lived in Texas
and Missouri, but has lived for decades in Memphis, the city where he was born.
He makes his home these days with his wife and two teenaged children, who
tolerate forays into music (especially whistles and guitars), photography, dog
wrangling, and numerous social causes that he hopes will leave the world a
decent place to live.
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