What Can I Imagine

by Diane Laboda

What will I dare to dream?

Beyond, above, to the heights of,

inside, outside, boldly going

where I’ve never gone before.

There’s no limit to how blue

the horizon can be. You say

peacock, I say azure. The same

blue-sky-pink the sun sets on

drawn across the pages of time.

I alone can decorate the depths

of fear or the inscrutable silence

of death. Color seems a windfall

on washes of gray and lonely

lavender tears that never lie.

If I pay close attention I can

stitch together a patchwork

of the lives I resemble,

re-assembling bits of mothers

and mother’s mothers samplers.

If I honor all that I am, I will

regard the questions with reverence

and patiently await answers,

which were never as fun, anyway,

and rarely what I was looking for.