Green by Johanna Ely

That color which envelops lavender and lilacs,

a mountain turned back to its beginning,

a fern whispering secrets to the breeze,

the fortitude it takes to start a new life.

All that smells of moist earth and desire,

all that aches to bloom-

a grasshopper leaping

into its own dream.

The color of eyes that

have stared too long at the sea,

jealousy thinly disguised as love.

And when it cries out to me

the tired parent whose back aches,

I lovingly carry the whimpering child, 

the lost child-

I carry green.

Johanna Ely is the current poet laureate of Benicia, California. She facilitates an on-going poetry group, and hosts a monthly poetry series. Her poems have been published in both print and online literary journals, and in several anthologies. In 2015, she published a small collection of her poems titled, "Transformation".