Red

I have a great friend who is a poet - it feels nice to write this. She is also a visual artist and an illustrator. She wrote this poem recently. Hope you like it:

When he is silent he does not
colour her directly but she
feels red sparks in her temples. Her
ears prickle when he has a lot
of red things to do. He has mail
to be red. There is lunch he must
red, then he needs to call red and
then red and red and red. She does
not understand what this means and
waits for him to explain. 'After
red,' he tells her. 'After red I
will tell you. After red I will
love you.' One day she gets it. Her
forehead stings. She thinks 'It sure took
me red enough. I need this like
I need a hole in the red.' She
longs, at last, for cool, or for
heat that does not feel like setting sun.
It is less the colour she feels
than the ache of being after,
than the deep burn of less than. She
will remember someday but not
today how to scorch and ignite.
She will be a glowing iron.