Complementary

The traffic light looms

A blistered ruby spraying blood across the intersection

It's light stutters,

And shadows that crowd the line of faces enclosed in metal fortresses deepen for a brief moment,

Like black ravines set alight in a landscape of sickly skin.

The red is back, an encompassing wound

And time pulses with scarlet indecision

There are thoughts of running through the massacre

But the seconds hold an overwhelming stickiness,

A haze of plasma chaining the drivers to their lanes.

The stirring of engines is suddenly ruptured by a startling snap of red to green

And the people continue to follow the path of the red light,

Only in its complementary form,

Their flesh cast in individual hues of viridescent pink,

Like zombies shuffling through the cities gloom,

Concealed and consumed.

Red and green,

Complementary in their conformity.

If only the people chose colour,

Not for its colour,

But for them.

Conformity is safe

And from the confines of my vehicle,

I am scrambling to breach the lanes