Cobalt

It feels shallow to say that the sky is blue. It is so much more than blue, and yet what word could be more blue than blue? I want to call it periwinkle, at least in part because saying periwinkle aloud makes my soul laugh, but periwinkle evokes pale mauve and hydrangea blue and it is neither. It is not indigo, because that is the colour for the bewitching hour of twilight, and royal blue does not seem regal enough for the heart stirring colour above my head.

It is cobalt, and yet it isn't, having so much more texture and subtlety than cobalt. It is the coloured glass that my grandmother collected - tiny medicine bottles with cork stoppers. It is soft and velveteen, yet smooth and satin as well. It is pale at the horizon and brilliant at the zenith. It is so big and so wide and yet so near at the same time.

It is a colour that transcends spectrum and looks garish when captured in paint, and yet backlit by the sun is spectacular. It changes even as I watch it, each wavelength evanescent. A living breathing thing, the permeable skin which encases the Earth.

It's amazing how something so simple, so constant can make me so happy. I am not turbulent looking at the sky, I am instead transfixed, lips slowly curving upwards at the corners, involuntary cheer seeping in under my skin. I wish I could run my fingertips over it, if only for an instant, just to feel that life force and that little spark as it runs through me and makes me shiver. But instead I tip my face up, close my eyes and dream.