I didn’t wait to be old to wear purple.
I don’t need to dress in black to be a witch.
I’ve worn purple (with touches of black)
just for the love of it, all my adult life.
My magic cloak is rich magenta –
though I know why witches of old
wore hooded cloaks of black, as they crept
at midnight to their woodland rites.
It was dangerous then to be known.
Best to blend into shade, unseen.
It may still be wise, today, to stay discreet –
but now we’re disguised by light, by colour.
Even when I shift to dragon shape,
my silver scales have purple undersides
which cast a play of faint mauve shadows,
a ripple of lilac or lavender, if you blink.
But you won’t observe me shift. You won’t see
my dragon shape at all. You’ll never know
I’m a magical being. You’ll love me sweetly
in all shades of purple, believing I have no secrets.
The NaPoWriMo prompt for this day was to focus on a single colour. The Poem A Day prompt was to write a trope poem. (A trope is a common plot device in genre writing.) I chose the Fantasy trope of a human falling in love with someone who is secretly a magical being.
The first line refers to Jenny Joseph's wonderful poem, 'Warning.'
'Purple' is one of my favourite words, for what it describes and also for how it both sounds and feels in the mouth when said aloud. So this is a good poem to use in reponse to Friday Writings #125 at Poets and Storytellers United, asking us to write about, or use, a favourite word. ('Magenta' is a favourite too, for the same reasons.)