Color complicates.

It was more than one day.

I have collected a million little black dresses.

I know this. I know this for sure.

My friend who is an artist calls it 'the color that is not.' I call it 'the color that contains all.' Forever damning myself as that girl who saw the glass half full. 

When I was a child in the 70s, it was beautiful. It still is, of course. 

I remember the First Argument.

"It is God's Will." God's Will. My relatives "knew". The 'N' word was wrong, but the reason was right, they said. The South. The war.  They tried to hide in that reasoning. They tried to hide there. The Southern Romance. The Southern Romance That Never Happened.

I had no name for it when I was five. But I knew there was no 'they.' There was no 'they.' I never believed. God must be wrong. He must be mistaken, I thought then. And I was right. There is no 'they.'  There is the 'us' recognized and the 'us' rejected. Because there is shame in the hatred. I knew it even then. Even before I had a name for it. 

 It is a story and then it is many stories.

I remember the first black dress. It sported long, dark columns of sleeve and many buttons down the front. I loved it. My father hated it. But where to wear it in a small town with no place to go but the Tastee Freeze or to church?

But then, I only wore it once after all.

He was sixteen. The little car spun out in the rain. He stayed in coma for  two weeks. But he wasn't there anymore anyway. They told me in gym class, and I turned my back to the room and forced myself not to cry. I put the dress in the trash after but I kept a button in my jewelry box to remind me of something.

After the woman left, my friend's grandmother got out the Lysol. She sprayed the chair. "There might be germs," she said. I was confused because no one was sick. What germs? I couldn't tell.

The second dress I wore to a party. It had no back to speak of and a gold sash in the middle. I wore high black shoes. I felt like a sexy woman for the first time. I carried a black bag. I lined my eyes with black. One of my friends rolled his eyes and stomped away, complaining I was "not being genuine." I thought of my overalls and my jeans, worn always before. Oddness. I let there be confusion. Who was I? The woman in jeans or the sexy dress? I was too young to know I could be both.

I miss that dress. 

I had such a crush. He was already in college. Too old! my mother said. He saw me as too young. Jailbait. But he was kind. He played the saxophone. He called it his 'ax.' He talked too much, to the amused horror of his best friend. He was so tall. I yearned to be tall. He made my name sound beautiful. My cousin called him my 'nigger' friend. I cried for everyone involved and raged but didn't feel any better afterwards. 

 The third dress happened at the lowest weight of my life. It was very short and tight, a zipper up the front. I sat at the bar, crossed my legs and ordered a drink. But my boyfriend was too busy setting up his new drums. I thought, "Musicians. Drummers." I've never stopped thinking that. Later, after we broke up, he talked about how it was his favorite dress. I never even realized he could see it. Or me.

He didn't like "them" either, even though he was, as my mother fondly called him, a Yankee. "They" were lazy, those imaginary people sitting in his head. He was not. But he was a jerk.

 The fourth dress was a short one, too, with an empire waist. I wore it with combat boots.  I wrote poetry in it and felt powerful. I sang in a band. The blues were my favorite. Robert Johnson's guitar cut through me like beautiful glass. Or Billie Holiday. I love my man. I'm a liar if I say I don't.

Singing always brought me a feeling like I'd met the right Jesus, the one who liked everyone. Still ... I was unsatisfied. The voice is more, you know, than just its first sound. I must forever remain an ignorant fool. I can never really know.  

Black is the color of death, said the little Goth girl in my class. In the back of the class, another girl said, but the black dress is sexy! Everyone laughed. I waited. Then, another said, death is sexy! Everyone groaned. I mentioned that real death is much less so. I thought about buttons. The boy in front said, I am black. That's not symbolic. Yes. I said. It is not. Or at least, there are ways that it shouldn't be. I am white, I said. That isn't symbolic either. He grinned at me. We both knew. I put on "Strange Fruit." The class listened. I talked about symbolism. I straightened the little back jacket of my little black suit. I was serious today. I dressed seriously. There was much to discuss. I touched a button. We talked about death. It was another day. I said all the wrong things, but what else could I do but keep trying?

 These thoughts remain unfinished ... fixed somewhere.

In the darkness of space ...