What Are Your Colours?

“What are your
Colours?”
His eyes boring
Holes into me.

He expected me
To answer
As though I was
His subordinate.

Instead,
I took a good look
At the depressing room
To which the guards
Brought me.

The walls were brown,
The floor dust
Flecked with dark browns.
Blood.

“WHAT ARE YOUR
COLOURS?”
I can feel
Anger rolling
Off of him.

I decided to answer
But refused
To look at him.
“Black.”

A gasp spread
Across the room,
As though it
Traveled from one man
To the other.

The angry man
Turned to the Ghandi-like man
Who just nodded.
Black was a truth.

In unison,
Everyone stepped back,
Some looked away,
Afraid I might make eye contact.

Black meant death
In this land.
It meant a darkness
That held many mysteries.
It meant I had
Seen many deaths,
Perhaps, I had even died.

“Red.”
Ghandi nodded.
Truth spoken
Into the stuffy room.
Another step back.

Red meant blood
In my presence.
Blood shed.
Perhaps, I had shed it.

“Blue.”
They realized I spoke
Only truth.
Ghandi stood still.

Blue meant seas,
Oceans, endless horizons.
I was a traveler.
I had seen things
They never would.

The angry man smiled.

“White.”
Although my other colours
Spoke of darkness,
I still possessed
The purity all men
Were born with.

The angry man
Spoke to the guards
In their tongue
And two cruel looking men
Took me away.

With rough hands
They took me through the city,
Passing through bazaars
Rich in colour,
Scented with more spices
Than I ever knew existed.

They deposited me
At the gates of the city,
At the entrance
Of the great desert.

At that spot,
I dropped to the ground.
I sat in the way
The eastern men sat,
But instead of a cool
Mountain top,
I sat in a hot desert.

The cruel men
Stood guard
Until they were sure
I would not return to the city.

I felt him
Before he spoke.
Ghandi.

“He sent you here
Because Blue
Is one of your colours.”

“Blue people
Never survive the sand.”

“Then I shall sit here
Until I absorb
The colour of the sands.”
And I sat,
Drinking from my flask
When I needed to.

Each morning,
The cruel men visited me,
Expecting me to be gone.

Each evening,
Ghandi would visit,
Bringing food
And more water.

On the fourth day,
Neither the cruel men
Nor Ghandi found me.

I had entered
The great desert.

Two months later.

“What are your
Colours?”
Queried the man
Who was a dark
As a moon less night.

“Black,
Red,
Blue,
White
And the colour
Of Sand.”

“What are your
Colours, my friend?”