Cool winds blew toward the Maine coast, speckling the endless water. The air hung gray and damp from the mute sun as the car approached signs promoting Acadia, the national park we were to explore. Passing through the gate and its necessary pleasantries, we ventured eastward, against the wind, toward Sand Beach and parked in an asphalt lot striped with bright paint and glowing with clean metal. The misty weather questioned our intent to ascend Gorham Mountain, but I insisted: the desire for discovery and exercise burned in my calves. We donned colorful balloons to shed possible rain from our bodies, and walked first to the beach, where children laughed as fantasy castles were constructed and deconstructed in an endless cycle. The pines guarding the sand hissed as the wind sliced the boughs.
Our feet ventured south, and further east, to the trodden path that climbed the red mountain. Water coalesced in the air around us and began to gently punch the ground. My mother and father often lingered at picturesque vistas, capturing stills of the coastline, while my brother Nathan and I circumnavigated burgundy cliffs and scampered over boulders along the trail. Wary travelers passed on their descents and shook their heads, glancing at the gray clouds. Before long, it was only I who led, traveling through verdure tunnels. Once, the rain increased, and I hid beneath a cliff, crouched, and peered at the glistening trees: green and lush and bursting with splendor. The ascent continued, and trickles of joy slid across my skin with the water.
The summit appeared, ghostlike, amid the gray mist and fog that covered all else; a series of markers, dashing around small pine groves and large puddles, pointed to the peak. The gray-green clouds hammered rains of ecstasy into my flesh. The green pines burst with glory to their Creator, and the red cliffs hummed with the vim of life; beyond lay the gray haze of the ocean—a green-blue horizon, unfocused. The vibrant green pines clung to red precipices, and red land and green sea salted the air. Jade and emerald growth splashed through the ravines and ruby dew scintillated from the rock outcrops.
Green and red. My thoughts drift: A green swath of grass awaits the arrival of my feet. My toes curl around the joyous green leaves, anxious for a chance to race across the lawn. I scan the horizons and see green forests laden with water from a fresh rain of peace and hope. The woods bubble from the ground, thick with the green of Nature. Trees drop green candy apples from the slopes; the fruit is filled with yet untasted splendor. A weather ball on the hill is lit with green; all will be fair tonight as I stare at the green light at the end of Daisy’s dock. The boats have green lights on their starboards, the right sides, and the right hand is the proper one. I politely stab broccoli trees with my fork and swallow green chloroplasts. Trees flicker along the highway, where a green stoplight says go. So I go, and land in a patch of four-leaf clovers with leprechauns dancing on their pots of green money. The clover waves peacefully in the breeze like a sea of green.
A red circle of sun lights the sky to magenta. It glows with red heat, warming the evening’s shadows. I stand at the base of my own shadow, and my thoughts drift to thoughts of red. The flames of the sun dance in the fireplace; red cinders heat marshmallows and transform my skin to rosy hues. Red balloons float above on Valentine’s Day; Cupid fires red love from a well-worn quiver in the ashen clouds. Lava bursts forth from a volcano, pounding the earth and sky with puddles of red. It stampedes down the mountain, red heat cascading and boiling across the rock. A bull, enraged by red, charges forward with the blood-wrath. The matador tenses, eyes reflecting the red passion of the bull, and swirls his cape into the air. Red blood rushes from his broken wounds; they spill his terror and agony to the sea. The screaming crowd stops for the red stream that flows past. And I, too, stop for the intense passion boiling red.
Warm red mingles with the soil; the green plants seep up the life given by the blood. The plants grow in red earth, soaring into the arc of sky above, where Santa rides his sleigh on Christmas morn. The children with rosy faces stare in awe at green Christmas trees decorated with red bows and ribbons, and red firelight dances among the green needles. Stockings are hung amid garland draped on the mantle, red pouring from a myriad of green.
Poinsettias and roses bloom green and red, but the colorblind are unaware. I close my eyes and feel red gurgling from its place opposite green on the color wheel while the art teacher says it is imperative to use red to darken green, and green to darken red. I brush a portrait of a red Mars battling itself over green and peace. The planet appears, and I lie in the grass. My heart beats its red pulse against the green Eden: both are life. Life shimmered on the hill like the faint light that refracted through the mist. I knew that green and red beauty grew in this place, this Acadia National Park.