Reflections on a Community Church

"For where two or three are gathered

in my name, I am there among them."

Matthew 18.20

Reflections of Cascade Church

There are two symbols that will always be meaningful elements in my life... the continuous-forever-flow of our Thornapple River and the shape of our historic white steeple framed against the layers of trees. They represent answers for me. It is appropriate on the 125th Anniversary of Cascade Christian Church that we look to them as simply symbols of continuity and innovation.

On the occasion that I attend the Sunday 8:15 A.M. worship service here in Cascade, I listen to the various voices singing and reading. I find myself wondering about all the different people who came before me to worship in the chapel... about who might have sat in the pews 50 or 100 years ago... about their life journeys... about how we change and grow through our struggles... about how we keep coming back.... Just as it is now, 125 years ago, Cascade was a growing village of newcomers settling in the Thornapple River valley. They were raising families, making a livelihood, experiencing the birth of technology and exploring the new ways of living. Although our daily activities have changed, we have many of the same challenges as those pioneers.

  

The Victorian Age... A Rural Period

Imagine for a moment a worship gathering on October 8th, 1864. It's likely that it was one of the homes of the Stows, the Browns, or the Richardsons. These 16 people gathered simply to pray together, to share their concerns, worship God, and remember Christ. For fifteen years the faithful people of Cascade Christian Church brought their new neighbors to their weekly gatherings. They baptized people in the river and took turns preaching. The villagers met in homes or the school house or in the Red Ribbon Hall which later became the home of Mr. & Mrs. Fred Carr. As it remains today, it was a community effort.

In 1876, in commemoration of the 100th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, George Steward Richardson planted 100 oak, maple and elm trees at the heart of Cascade Village. In the late1870's, Mr. Richardson, often called "a public-spirited individual," gave a building site on Orange Street for a new church to the congregation. Being that the new "church house" would be used for community gatherings as well as for worship, everyone in the village and community helped with the project. I'm sure many prayers went up for the structure. In October of 1880, the new chapel's bell called the villagers to worship. I wonder if the builders and founders had an idea that their little chapel would still be in service 125 years later.

For about 60 years the village maintained 58 people, and the township totaled 1200.  Newcomers could travel to Grand Rapids or to Ada by train. In Cascade, just down [the] river, magnetic springs were discovered, thought to have the "power of healing all known diseases." It was truly a rural community. Horses parked in the shed across the way. Everyone knew everyone.

Cascade Christian Church was, and still is, what we might call a networking group. A farmer could call upon the congregation for help bringing in a crop or raising a barn, or whatever need there might be. In all the personal testimonies written about Cascade and about Cascade Church, there always seems to be mention of community outreach and an interest beyond the church membership.

The community outreach programs can be traced as far back as our first full-time minister - Elias Sias. In the 1890's, the Christian Endearment Group formed with "the young people" for the purpose of community projects and charities. As it was the only one of its kind, the group drew youth from many denominations. Although the gathering and activities were religious in nature, many young men and women met their spouses this way.

The Age of Automation

Cascade felt the nudge of technology with the introduction of the Model T Ford. By 1920, the horse shed where the horses parked during church was pulled down. It was the beginning of the Roaring Twenties. The chapel was freshly painted inside and the monthly bulletin said that, "the church building will gladly be opened to the community for any righteous purpose."  The church had competition then. People could get in their cars and really "go somewhere." The carbide lights were replaced with electric ones. People concentrated on what was new. Rev. Lester Doerr gave much of his time to the youth in the church.

The depression of the Thirties was truly a challenging time for Cascade Christian Church. Mr. Doerr, like other minsters at Cascade, who always returned much of their salaries back to the church, served several years without stipend. Yet, there were almost twice as many new members as in the Twenties. Many of Mr. Doerr's youth became, and possibly still are, leaders here in the community.

Mr. Doerr resigned to enter the army in 1939, turning the church over to Frank Green who served until 1945. In spite of the war, during the Forties people gradually moved into the area. A social room was added on over the church kitchen. Attendance fluctuated. Harold Chambers, a superintendent of the Forest Hills Schools District served for a year, remembered for stressing Christianity in our everyday living and daily responsibilities. He sponsored various programs for returning servicemen.

Both Mr. Green and Mr. Doerr returned for a few years; Doerr paving the way for the postwar exodus from the city and the mushrooming suburbs. This period in the late 40's and 50's was the time when the church was concentrating on opening minds and doors. Youth groups rallied for various community projects. The Tri-Cees (Cascade Christian Crusaders) formed to promote "Christian fellowship and recreation for the community, and to undertake projects which would help the growth of the church and community." The scout troops formed in the church as did youth groups and ladies guilds. It was a time of zest and vigorous growth. With Sunday School classes overflowing into the town hall our Christian Education Building took priority. The building was dedicated in 1957, again to the church and community.

As written in the Centennial Issue and in Rev. Gaylord's beautiful story of his three decades here at Cascade, the development of this church is truly fascinating. Again it is not just a history of a growing church; it is a story of people and of how we change and grow through and because of our struggles.

Growing up in Cascade Church

When the chapel services were overflowing - 125 people - past the fire safety code, the congregation built the sanctuary. Most likely I came, still in my first year, with my parents and brothers to the dedication service. Probably my brothers participated in some part of the service. Like my brothers, I went to nursery school, Sunday school and choir. I went to Camp Crystal for several summers for youth camp, family camp, and CYRO camp. Truly, my first spiritual awakening happened at camp. Rev. Gaylord baptized me there in chilly Crystal Lake. 

I spent many learning hours in youth groups, church awards and Tags... stuffing envelopes... visiting area community projects and churches... working all day... and falling in the creek... at camp Gaylon... sending Valentines to Kent county jail inmates... anonymously delivering baskets of food to the poor... [and] traveling with the youth choirs. We learned, not necessarily by words, rather by doing, and by following the examples set by our teachers.  Although I didn't realize it at the time, these experiences were formative. I was learning ways in which to take Christ as my personal [role] model.

With a history of conflict and criticism between the various "Christian" denominations, I now find it truly a "Christian" concept to put aside the grievances and invite a Catholic priest into our church every Thanksgiving. This is what setting a "Christian" example is all about.  I will always have fond memories of the Christmas season at Cascade Church... of the Christmas Eve Worship service... of my Dad dressing up as a Santa with black eye-brows poking out from underneath a white wig... "What a sight!" All for Operation Santa Claus! I will always remember him standing in our kitchen talking about the faces of the under-privileged children to whom he was distributing gifts. Operation Santa Claus has expanded into various other non-seasonal pro­grams. The people at Cascade Christian Church give to literally thousands every year. Ultimately, I learned that "Christmas giving" is meant to go on through out the year.

There were other examples... My mom [was] always baking pies or bread for supper at church or sewing choir robes or bringing a meal to someone... or she was off on a "Save the Tree Mission". Perhaps I too that effort for granted when I was growing up. But these last few years, I have developed a great respect for the countless hours of work women like my mom quietly contributed to the Christmas Workshop, and church meals, and all of the behind-the-scenes charities. Whether they know it or not, there are so many women here in the community who have taught me important lessons just by giving their time... in all of those little things! It's the effort that counts!

The interpretive choir will always be dear to my heart. It was one of those things that touched me deeply the very first time I saw the group. like the other choirs, and special music, I found it to be another mode of worship and spiritual expression. It is important to find these creative, spiritual avenues. As things come around [during the annual church calendar], here I am working [again] with the interpretive choir.

The social element was a strong pull. Like many youth before me, I too met my first love one Sunday after church, eating cookies over in the East Parlor. I remember noticing him in the Christmas programs, and in the older TAGS classes. He became a camp counselor, a junior deacon, and an Eagle Scout. Yes, he was, and still is, a beautiful person, and had we lived 100 years ago we might have been one of those pioneering couples in Cascade. But, like our river, we change, grow and continue to move on, following out little niches here and there [even as the Thornapple River rolls itself through our community].

Of course, when I went off to college I thought that I would find a different church, maybe a new way of worship. I thought that somehow if I didn't go to the same church as my parents then I would be truly grown-up. In fact, I visited many different churches - I even stopped going for a while. And although I have met some delightful people, when I came home, I suddenly appreciated Cascade Church for what it [was and] is. It struck me that church was never just church or self contained. It always managed to integrate with the community. That is the essence of the outreach. After I graduated, I went off to Oxford, Ohio (Cincinnati), to work and just grow. [But years later], once again, I live along the river in the Fredrick Wykes' home in Alaska, [Michigan].

It touched me when I returned... in so many ways things haven't changed here at Cascade Church. Like always there are lots of new faces on Sunday... new programs... and struggling issues. That's what makes it the same Cascade Church.

New Faces... New Programs... New Issues...

but it is still Cascade Church

by Dianne VanStrien

date of writing unknown

*1989 would marked the

church's 125 year anniversary

 

 

ORIGINAL DOCUMENT

ADDITIONAL REFERENCES

Cascade Christian Church will celebrate its 150 years all year long

November 19, 2014

Cascade Christian Church website

CHURCH PICTURES

2021-2022

 

THE GOOD OL' BOYS

CASCADE CHRISTIAN CHURCH

 

 

R.E. Slater - The Colors of Symbolism

  

Days of Awe and Wonder

by R.E. Slater

Sunlight streams through the window pane

Onto a pile of laundry I play upon, summer

Breezes lift the billowing chiffon curtains

Upwards as morning wakes o'er my head.

I lay thinking how wonderful this is

Contently playing within the piled wash, 

Vacant thoughts cross my blonde head

Feeling life happily bounding about me.

Undone beds are soon fitted by momma

Who makes up each bed within the house

Each room holding tantalizing mysteries

Of amazing adventures promised ahead.

Soon we're outside upon a green lawn

Watching the bedsheets blustering about

Whipping, flapping, snapping in the breeze

As curious as I to test our fey bounds.

A few wooden clothespins arrest attention

The snappy ones too hard to open, I spy

My collie puppy wondering about and

totter to catch him but am too slow.

Sitting down, resting, puppy comes to

Snuggle me, nosing about then wandering

Away like the many gay hours filling my

Senses with light and love, smells and rhythm.

Fed and changed I'm soon to bed, napping

Across brightly colored dreams feeling, a

Lightness of being hugs my soul, unformed

Yet forming, of being into becoming.

R.E. Slater

May 10, 2022;

edited September 21, 2022

@copyright R.E. Slater Publications

all rights reserved

First Love

by R.E. Slater

Love is linked

As day to night

As joy to sorrow

One estate cannot be

Without the other alongside.

Love too bears a type

Of soulful pain,

Yielding, longing,

Yearning; unrequited

It aches the more.

The wilding of love

Goes where it will;

Senseless, agonizing

Too trusting its

Tender shoots.

In love's domains

Souls may find fulness

Like no other; or

Madness beyond sense

Slipped its anchor lines

But where every fellowship

Protects its loves by love's

Same self, here too love

Bears toil and hardship

Till love breathes no more.

R.E. Slater

May 10, 2022

@copyright R.E. Slater Publications

all rights reserved

When We Were, by Sarah Bianco

When We Were

by R.E. Slater

Day is done,

evening has set,

when the colors of life,

now run together,

no longer separate,

turned mottled and grey,

too soon replacing the

carefree pastel lands 

when we were young

and all was gay and each

waking day was full.

Yet there are some refusing

greying sumpter days,

labor on till morning light,

against gathering threads

of soulless structured living,

as we grew old, and all

had darkened, who gather

to dawn's kinder lights

across sumptuous lands,

hearing the siren songs

When we were young.

R.E. Slater

May 10, 2022

@copyright R.E. Slater Publications

all rights reserved

Looking

by R.E. Slater

I see in my mind's distant eye

A faraway land filled with color

Shimmering 'neath hot summer's heats

Rippling in undulating waves that

Bend heavy golden wheat heads

Dried and ready for harvest.

My grandpa, dad and uncles

Bring out Farmall and McCormick

Tractor, combine and grain wagons

Working together as a seasoned team 

Well-acquainted with one another.

Myself, I sit high in the cab watching all

Or bounce in the back of the filling wagons

Alive with grasshoppers and field bugs

Swooped in through the combine's innards.

The worn wagons are  heaped and filled

To lumber back with their seedy contents

Then shoveled out into an ancient granary

Two sweaty men toiling in the heat outside

Two more inside filing the hot dusty bins

Stacking and racking ever higher mounds.

When evening sets we finish up to walk back

To family homestead built six generations

Ago when all was ruddy wilderness

Unbroken, untamed, knowing neither

The plow or cutter, harvester or bailer

Full of proud trees, ricks, rills, and birdsong.

R.E. Slater

May 10, 2022

@copyright R.E. Slater Publications

all rights reserved

Contentedness

by R.E. Slater

Today was a perfect day

As late spring sun shone

Across the greening leis

Beneath feathery sonnets

Warm and comforting

Fell the ear and smote

The earth to enliven its

Faerie lots with pinks and

Yellows, pale blue and white.

The blossomed bush scented

Nearby waking woods to

Harken its calls to stir awake

Let go cold spring's many

Inattentions, give ear the gay

Birdsong brightly sounding

And swelling marsh life 

'Whelming both day and night

Its rejoicings to warming days.

R.E. Slater

May 10, 2022

@copyright R.E. Slater Publications

all rights reserved

* * * * * * * * *

Color Symbolism and Use in Poetry

What Do the Colors Mean?

https://medium.com/the-pom/color-symbolism-and-use-in-poetry-what-do-the-colors-mean-dcb3e11324ae

A brief overview of color, color

symbolism, and how it can be used

in poetry and creative writing

A word of introduction

Colors are the dream-wake state of poetry and creative writing. They link the subconscious intentions of a poem, its heartbeat or breathing, as I like to call it, to the surface of the poem for the reader to experience. Perhaps this is why so many poets prefer to call their poetic writing process a trance-like state. That creative space is somewhere between your waking mind, with thoughts, analyses, and interrupting cognitive functions, and the almost spiritual flow of poetry through one’s heart and onto paper. The colors of a poem, whether they be precisely named or implied, will filter through you, just like the actual poem does, as if you, yourself, are a prism.

Light cannot pass through a prism without creating color. A poem cannot pass from your mind into the world without picking up on the colors of you, the colors you envision, and also, a lot of other “baggage” that colors carry with them. Each hue has its own story to tell and you, dear writer, must choose wisely which colors will function well, support, and uphold your poem or send the reader racing off in the wrong direction wielding a butterfly net.

Colors, or the lack of them, can make or break your poem.

If you aren’t intentional, you may find you are using color boldly, wildly, with abandon, and not knowing all the while what else you are incorporating into your work. The colors of your work may unleash a creativity in you and your reader, much like that dream-state releases a creative world one can only experience while sleeping.

Today, we’ll review the use of color in your poetry and creative writing, discuss the symbolism of color in writing, and three of the most common uses of color in creative writing.

Using color in your creative writing

Chances are, you are already incorporating color into your creative pieces and your poetry. And if you are, you are halfway there. Let me explain.

As poets and creative writers you paint pictures using words as your medium. But liken yourself to an actual painter. Imagine you paint a glorious scene, using all of the most masterful techniques, perfect blending, shading, lines, shapes, and dimension. Now imagine, you use all the wrong colors. Mixed them improperly. Muddy hues and greens where purples should be, silvery shine where a nice subdued glow should be. No doubt, your work would be a mess. Imagine, also, that you paint the same picture and only use one color.

Clearly, neither of these methods would work in art or in creative writing. Would your masterfully crafted work of art work as a finished piece?

No matter your gift as a writer, using the wrong colors in your work, using them improperly, or not using any at all, can dislodge the impact of your piece. Using color properly helps you to capture the essence of a poem; embellished in the right way using color helps build and develop the mood, scenery, and ambiance.

Furthermore, color can carry a deep symbolic meaning that adds layers to your work causing readers to return to it time and again.

What color are your poems & creative writing pieces?

Take a moment to think about your own work. Perhaps, read over a few of your own pieces, both creative writing and poetry. If you widen the lens and simply allow your own work to move through your mind, read them over and then close your eyes. What colors do you see? Is there a general hue to your own work?

Most writers develop a style of writing that carries the reader along into an aura of experience, and yes, colors. This baseline is where to begin the relationship between your work and the abundance of colors available to you as a creative writer. It’s time to go to the shelf and pick out brushes and colors you normally overlook when you merely write from your own perspective and experience. It’s time to allow the light to flow through your prism mind and enhance all of your work with intention, well-placed color that expands the readers’ experience with your work.

Color is for more than description

Most of your work likely uses color in a two-dimensional way, meaning, color is used to form the lines, shapes, and form of your pictures. It is the descriptive language used to tell the reader what something looks like.

Color is not simply a decorative element in a poem. Color creates an expanse; a field, a shared formal field, with which to plant more shared components of the material imagination, a poem. Color makes this space bigger, this imaginative space more specific and bigger, gives it weight, makes it solid. - PROSE FROM POETRY MAGAZINE, What Is Color in Poetry, Or Is It the Wild Wind in the Space of the Word, BY DOROTHEA LASKY

As writers, we’ve been coached and nurtured into this descriptive behavior as a way of showing our readers what we want them to see rather than simply telling a flattened story and expecting them to create their own paintings with our work. To some degree, readers do this own their own, but when we burden them with building the entire picture for themselves, then what is the purpose of our art?

Color goes beyond the mere description of poetic view or the imaginative capabilities of the mind’s eye. Let’s talk about color from a literary point of view.

Color as symbolism in creative pieces

Ask anyone what the color red means. You will get varying answers based on cultural and religious background, personal experiences, media influences, and instinct. Without doubt, this color carries meaning. Literature often uses literary device to add depth and broaden the meaning of a passage, scene, or poem, and one such device is symbolism.

What is symbolism in literature, poetry, and creative writing?

Symbolism in literature extends to many forms such as objects, images, or shapes, and yes, to colors. Certain colors carry a symbolic weight to them that when used in a literary piece, intentionally evokes certain moods, thoughts, ideas, and concepts, merely by their presence.

Symbolism is a literary device that uses symbols, be they words, people, marks, locations, or abstract ideas to represent something beyond the literal meaning. - Writing 101: What Is Symbolism? Symbolism Definition and Examples in Literature, Written by MasterClass

Examples of color symbolism in poetry (with analysis)

As early as the 12th century, French poets were using color symbolism but held their use to seven colors: white, red, yellow, blue, green, black and brown. (Source.)

The Gothic poets and writers such as Mary Shelley, Edgar Allen Poe, and Nathaniel Hawthorne stuck largely to red and black color symbolism in their work, thereby shoring up their tales with darkness and mystery.

Fairy tales often used colorful imagery that carried symbolic meaning — like the red apple and other inclusions of red in the classic tale of Snow White.

The pastoral and modern nature poets employ a lot of greenery which both demonstrates scenery as it is, but also depicts a relaxing and calming effect on the reader. The 20th century poet and nature writer Robert Frost depicted white serenity in much of his work, symbolizing a memorable connection between nature and the peace of one’s soul, combining the purity of white with the encroaching death we all must face, giving his poetry a depth we still discuss to this day.

It is important to note that while the gothic and classic writers often intentionally used symbolism in their work, modern writers may write symbolism and interpretation into their work without meaning to do so; which is why learning about color symbolism is so important.

Imagine you wrote a beautiful poem with one meaning in mind and due to the symbolism of the colors you used, your poem could be interpreted in a way you did not intend, and a way you do not want your poem to be read.

For example, early in my college years and my experience with formal literary training, I wrote a poem-from-prompt exercise for a class I was taking using “color” as a kick-start for poetry. The result was a poem I am rather fond of. In The Moon and Daffodils, clearly the moon is unable to understand the concept of color and wants an explanation from the narrator. At surface level, this is a silly poem, listing out yellow things in a demonstrative way, but there is more, thanks to the symbolism of yellow in the poem. Read the poem once through and then we’ll discuss the layering through the symbolism of the color yellow.

The moon asked me, “What is yellow?”

Daffodils, I thought

too simple an answer

I remember yellow…

a ring with no promise

slinking down from glass box,

down the silver slide, spilling into

cupped hands

a sandy path between turtle and shrimp

such a vast expanse for tiny

loggerheads

who scrape and drag themselves home

a bucket without a handle,

too full to lift

a stuffed beagle with

saggy elephant ears

a braid falling to the floor

paint on the nose of the child

crying for something,

something…

I remember yellow.

“Daffodils,” I answered,

and the moon crept away

to whisper to the stars.

— The Moon and Daffodils,

Christina M. Ward

According to the color symbolism chart, a language arts teaching tool, yellow is described as symbolic of: joy, happiness, optimism, idealism, imagination, hope, sunshine, summer, gold, philosophy, dishonesty, cowardice, betrayal, jealousy, covetousness, deceit, illness, and hazard.

As you can see, the meanings are variable and one might use the context of the poem to determine symbolic meaning.

Re-read the poem with the idea that yellow symbolizes: joy, happiness, idealism, imagination, and optimism. This is likely the most widely accepted interpretation of the poem.

A second symbolic interpretation: consider the darker meanings such as jealousy, deceit or dishonesty. What does this say about the relationship between the narrator than the moon? What are either of them really hiding from the other, and why? This interpretation brings a bit of mystery to the otherwise imaginative and fantastical experience of having a conversation with the moon in the lighter, more optimistic analysis.

Now, consider a third interpretation. Yellow in literature can also represent mental illness. This interpretation further deepens the narrative. What of this narrator, walking around having conversations with a celestial being in the sky — and hearing it talk back? Could this all be a delusion?

Let’s look at one more poem, using the same color, to get a deeper understanding of the multiple layers this one color brings to the work. This is a poem about the narrator gathering flowers for a dying loved one.

Marked in bold are areas where the color yellow are either mentioned or implied, and as you can see, those areas also have symbolic contributions to the overall meaning of the poem as well as the deeper layers dealing with life, death, and compassion.

I have gathered church steeples,

racemes of yellow Agrimonia,

as many as I can carry

It is not enough, I think

The butterflies and sun

follow me. We leave a

tender trail,

thankfulness, our meditation

I slide the ends under

cool waters, nip the ends

stems clogging the drain

You stir in your sleep,

a gasp, a wheeze

I am filled with hope, for you

for these — may their radiance

inspire your lungs to lift

searching the air for oxygen

as your eyes search for yellow

thankful, one more day

— Agrimonia,

Christina M. Ward

The poem is not biographical, but does depict real people, one of whom is very ill, in a fictional scene that employs yellow intentionally as a literary device.

Clearly, the poem mentions hope directly, therefore one may interpret the lighter meanings of yellow here: hope, optimism, idealism. But what of other meanings? Is there some cowardice going on here? Perhaps the narrator was collecting flowers, rather than holding this dying woman’s hand? Or is there some jealousy, bitterness, or mental confusion going on for either the narrator or the dying woman, confined to her bed.

The reader is able to feel this one moment in multiple ways, building the relationship between the two subjects and defining it more fully by the inclusion of a color with a myriad of interpretations, visual and emotive influence, all which further deepen the poem’s meaning.

What do the colors symbolize?

Now, let’s delve into the symbolic meanings of specific colors with examples from literature and poetry, so you can incorporate this deeper level into your work.

Red

Passion, aggression, intensity, love, anger, excitement, energy, desire, speed, strength, power, heat, danger, fire, blood, war, violence, (and in Japan: happiness and sincerity)

Example: Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre

Black

Death, power, mystery, fear, depression, emptiness, mourning, evil, elegance and formality

Example: Edgar Allen Poe’s The Raven

Green

Nature, environment, refreshment, relaxation, calm, earthiness, healthy, good luck, renewal, youth, spring, peace, harmony, generosity, fertility, jealousy, service, inexperience, envy, misfortune, vigor, innocence, immaturity, guilt

Example: Sir Gawain and the Green Knight by anonymous Gawain poet

Pink

Romance, love, friendship, caring, tenderness, acceptance, calm, femininity, mischievous, playful, be yourself, breast cancer awareness

Example: In the Pink by Siegfried Sassoon

Orange

Lust, fire, energy, balance, enthusiasm, warmth, vibrancy, expansive, flamboyant, demanding of attention

Example: Oranges by Gary Soto

White

Reverence, purity, birth, simplicity, humility, precision, innocence, cleanliness, virginity, peace, youth, winter, snow, good, sterility, marriage, coldness, frigidity, supernatural or ghastly (in Eastern cultures: death)

Example: Shakespeare’s Othello

Gray

Security, reliability, intelligence, staid, modesty, dignity, maturity, solid, conservative, practical, old age, sadness, boring (Silver symbolizes calm.)

Example: For this example, I’ll quote a favorite song:

Well, I’m gon’ paint my picture

Paint myself in blue and red and black and gray

All of the beautiful colors are very, very meaningful

Yeah, well, you know gray is my favorite color

I felt so symbolic yesterday

If I knew Picasso

I would buy myself a gray guitar and play

- Mr. Jones,

Song by Counting Crows,

lyricist Adam Duritz

(my favorite writing muse and bucket-list-to-meet celebrity)

Blue

Peace, unity, trust, truth, confidence, conservatism, security, tranquility, cold, calm, stability, harmony, cleanliness, order, water, technology, depression, loyalty, sky, appetite suppressant

Example: The Man with the Blue Guitar by WALLACE STEVENS

Purple

Royalty, nobility, ceremony, transformation, wisdom, enlightenment, mysterious, cruelty, honor, arrogance, spirituality, mourning, temperance

Example: One of my favorite books depicts one woman’s search for inner strength and yes, her own honor and nobility: Alice Walker’s The Color Purple.

Yellow

Imagination, hope, sunshine, summer, gold, joy, happiness, optimism, idealism, philosophy, dishonesty, cowardice, betrayal, jealousy, covetousness, deceit, illness, hazard, energy, metal stimulation and intellectualism

Example: Yellow symbolism in F. Scott Fitgerald’s The Great Gatsby

Brown

Poverty, earth, burial, potential for growth, stability, reliability, dependability, approachability, history, coziness

Example: Here’s an entire book of poetry dedicated to the color brown.

Three common uses of color in poetry & creative writing

Symbolism isn’t the only way that color enhances your poetry. Aside from using symbolism, a literary device many may feel outdated or too complex for their own writing, color is commonly used in the following ways in modern poetry and creative writing.

Using color to set the scene

Color is, at its surface, a component of descriptive writing, giving the reader a visual experience of your work. The trees are green and brown, the sky is blue with some white, the sea is a pearlescent green. All of these things are visual images your reader can use during the reading to flesh out the scenery of what is happening in your poem.

Color allows you to creatively write out your imaginings in a way that your reader has a shared experience with you when they read your work. In this way, color helps you to communicate with your reader.

Using color to evoke an emotive response

Poems exude energy that can be compounded by the use of color. Human emotion and variance of energy, emotive vibration and experience within reading a poem, can all be greatly affected by the color with which one paints a poem.

For example, it might be quite difficult to convey a tone and feeling of anger if one is writing about the color blue. No matter how well crafted, the reader may shift into a more subtle energy, and a more saddened response.

For those poets and writers who often write from experience or shift into storytelling, you may want to consider shifting the actual colors in your work to better support the emotional response you seek from the reader.

Using color to build ambiance or mood

Color also sets the stage for your work by building an aura of perception that creates tone, intensity, and a sense of speed or time. These are all helpful devices to move the reader through your work with the appropriate sensory experiences and reactions.

You can pull the reader through an experience by way of a color-infused ambiance that supports the piece and functions as a glue for the shifts of narrative, providing a whole-poem experience rather than a hop-scotching through the narrative.

In summation

The use of color in your work adds greater depth to your writing. Deliberate use of color can enrich the readers’ experiences with your work.

Colors allow us to:

• develop visual images within our work
• communicate with our readers via shared experiences
• add layers of depth with color symbolism
• evoke a mood or emotive response from our reader
• bring an otherwise boring narrative to life

Thank you for reading and I hope this piece has been helpful to you. You may follow the author for more poetry and creative writing educational pieces such as: Tips for Better Poetry on Blogging Platforms, Poetry is Not Your Therapist, Tips for Writing Traditional Japanese Haiku, and Creative Use of the Senses in Your Writing.