Synesthesia

Paint and ink
mean little to me. I
am not a visual man. Give me
the sound over the image.
Blue is tone not shade, frame
is drum not holder, line is path
through air and not on paper.

Red dog runs by the window
and I don’t see it as much as I
feel its bark, the cheerful
husk deep in the soft throat.
I know the cars on the street
by their songs and couldn’t tell you
their brands if you threatened
to strike me.

At midmorning yesterday I heard
a small child playing in the
neighbor’s backyard, calling to a friend
as she threw snowballs: “Bigger!
Bigger!” and I tensed up, ready to scold,
because I thought I heard a color in the cry.

Facing the yard and seeing the two of them
for the first time, seeing one white and one
black, heard them laughing (both now screaming “Bigger!
Bigger!” as they threw dirty old handfuls of
snow at each other, gathering more each time and
getting louder with every toss),
I looked down at the sidewalk
even as I was learning to trust
that my eyes, sometimes,
could tell me more than my ears would believe.