My Reading Rainbow

The words fall like Irish cats and dogs
book after book,
for fun and for study
book after book
a literary monsoon

And when it stops,
Apollo: god of wisdom and poetry
drives his flaming chariot into the sky
and lights my reading rainbow

The red ranges from me over the vast sea
to Thailand and her blood-red poppies,

the orange to Britannia
land of Oxford, Marlowe and Stonehenge

the yellow ties me to a Ukrainian farm
where men expertly harvest the shining hay,

the green ties me to Sweden
her viking fields like emeralds in May,

the blue ties me to mussels on the coast of Oregon
clinging to rocks amid Poseidon's endless dance,

indigo ties my heart to a land I don't know:
rich Africa from whence very humanity grows

and violet goes to the garden of Epicurus
where grows a tranquil prim-rose