Julie Carter
Cobalt
Blue is white. A pinch of cobalt turns
the weave of yellow fiberglass to snow.
Like veins in pallid wrists, no one discerns
the brittle gleam of blue too far below
the shiny surface. Skin is almost glass:
too blue or pretty and the surface cracks
with ice or brittle chemistry. We're past
the days of arsenic or lead; our tracks
lead off to melanoma from the sun
that makes us brown. And still the gasps of blue
depleted veins scream out for oxygen,
and still the pretty fibers break in two
so glass can pierce the skin and welcome red,
that in its turn can turn us blue and dead.
