Purple Frogs

There are places painted purple in my mind,

the ones you return to hoping to find pieces of people lost and parts of yourself you left.

Even though I see shades of green reflected in the river

oranges gifted by August sun,

I feel it in purples.

Run ahead,

fill your pockets with tree frogs and if the light falls just right maybe around the next bend you’ll be 8

and hear your siblings taunt you into the water

your dad telling you to leave the frogs where they are

maybe the purple will dissipate

but the shade isn’t the same and the late summer sun doesn’t dance through the branches as you hoped it would

I want to see you at the edge of the rocks, your eyes trained on trout - but there's purple in your place

The road is closer, water murkier and when I wade out it barely reaches my knees

And even here, even outside of my mind the evergreens and August hues are lost in deep violets

but when the prints come back I miss that summer night 16 years on I drove until I found the spot with tree frogs

so I’ll sit in the shade of this memory a moment longer

wondering why people say they're feeling blue when grief is a purple that saturates