Sunday, 9 February 2025

white as if purity





















light shines white
as if purity
were the whole of it

out of broken light fall rainbow pieces
spectrum colours curved into difference

component hues
the stranded radiation with which
everything is made or illuminated

purity does not live in light alone
but in all the refractions of its unbending

our pale light and colour
join us to together
till we are all things and one

subtracted we leave a tainted brilliance
where the light remaining shifts into shadow

and pure white fades
runs to black
or pigmented absence

light shines pure
when the whole of it is complete
all colours contained
© BH, 2025

Against the present current of antipathy to difference, where so much of what we think or do is considered deviant - and that deviance is further decried as an assault on the ‘normal’ or ‘the same’, here’s a thought.

Fundamentally, the light we see as 'white' is made up of all the colours of visible light together - likewise, the light and colour we don’t see. All our differences add up to our purity, not the other way round. Otherwise, there is no light at all.

No comments: