For three days we have stared at the sea.
For three days we have watched its changing moods and colours, from turbulent grey to blue-green, to this ephemeral pink at sunset.
Tonight the pink is particularly brilliant, the calm lapping sounds like small reassurances of “everything is going to be all right.”
Having observed the sea, I know these reassurances are fickle. Poseidon is tempestuous, and the pinks could turn to angry storms of steel grey just as easily as they could fade to sunset’s late indigo.
We are, in fact, waiting for the sea to turn black. Not just twilight blue, or the deep navy in the hours after the lingering sun fades. We wait for blackest black, when no lights save for the moon and stars shine upon its still surface. We can only hope to encounter no searchlights, no vessels that claim to help but are really meant to keep us from reaching our objective.
When the pinks complete their inky transformation, we will enter the darkness. We pray that when we greet the sea at last, it will be more cool smooth onyx than roiling tar soup. We know there is a chance that we too could become one with the sea, could become part of its spectacular colours, like many of our brothers and sisters before us.
Despite this risk, we wait for darkness, watching the colours of this great obstacle to what we can only hope is our new home. As we wish away the sparkling pinks for dull blackness, we hope to one day look back at this sea with no fears and see nothing but calm pink water.
these words by Jo-Ann Zhou were inspired by the work of James Gilleard
wordandcolour 