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The high color
The sunset put a rose-colored patch high on Suri's wall.
She stretched one wing toward it.
The patch stayed just beyond her feathers.
It looked like a place for a tiny window.
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A piece of paper
Suri held a sheet of white paper in the light.
The rose color came with it.
She lowered the paper.
Now she could hold a piece of evening at table height.
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The paper drawer
In her drawer were thin scraps that let light through.
Amber. Violet. A green almost like a young leaf.
Suri held one up.
The room looked different through it.
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An uneven shape
She tore a small round shape from the amber paper.
It was round on one side and rather mountainous on the other.
Suri turned the mountain downward.
Now it looked like a moon with a ruffled chin.
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The frame
She pasted thin scraps around the edge of a plain paper frame.
The amber moon found a place among the other scraps.
One corner curled up.
Suri pressed it gently with a clean feather.
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A borrowed window
She held her little frame against the real window.
Light came through the thin paper.
The scraps shone as if someone had lit them from inside.
Suri looked at the wall.
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Down here
Colored shapes lay on the pale wall.
The amber moon had softened into a warm, blurry glow.
Suri brought her white sheet beneath it.
The glow came down to meet her.
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A feather mountain
Her wing crossed the light.
A great feather mountain rose across the paper.
Suri moved it slowly.
The amber glow vanished behind the mountain, then came out again.
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The evening moved
While she played, the sun slipped lower.
The colored shapes crept toward the edge of the table.
Suri slid her white sheet after them.
This window liked to wander.
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Too far to follow
At last the color left the table altogether.
The amber paper became only amber paper.
Suri held it to the window once more.
Beyond it, the first blue of evening filled the sky.
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What stayed
She laid the frame flat to dry.
Its corners were crooked. One scrap had a thumb-sized wrinkle.
Suri remembered the feather mountain.
She smoothed the wrinkle, then decided to leave it.
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Beside tomorrow
The little window rested on the sill all night.
It did not shine by itself.
Suri knew that now.
She left her white sheet beside it, ready for whatever light arrived next.
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