It had stopped raining, but it was a grey November day as I walked down a hill in the Kitsilano neighborhood of Vancouver. Passing a planter box in one of the front yards along Balsam Street, the colours of Swiss Chard called out to me, demanding a long slow look. Nurturing greens, cool blues, majestic violet, yellow, orange and red, a symphony of color, a choir of voices, all calling out to me from a little planter box in a residential front yard. ‘Come on over and hear what we have to say’!

Ah, such a lesson.

Scientifically, colour is reflected or emitted light, but I like to think of it as the voice of light. Color speaks in a visual poetry that channels the ‘long slow look’ with expressions of emotion, mood and feeling. It captures me, taunts me, soothes and holds me, asking only that I slow down, look and then listen to the voice of colour.