That would have been an amazing color were the sea cobalt blue the day Jeri Theriault and a friend drove by it. I only know because on my way to the origin of the word in Webster’s 2nd International, I happened on both pages of the Color Chart, where number 85 burns a cold richness. In addition to imagining this color, we’re urged to feel the stone, as she felt the word inside her mouth as it came out in both cool syllables, tactile, narrow, sharp.

I’ve a newfound fondness, if not downright love for this word thanks to what goes on here in this poem, let alone its origin from the German kobold, goblin, or underground spirit. Of course, too, it’s an element, reminding us of the poet’s basic appreciation for the simplicity of this thing as it once took form in an earring, since lost, thus the play on the word Blue. In her affection for what was once in hand, then gone, we feel the melancholy as the missing jewelry (all four earrings) turn into “small blue prayers/virgin saints” in Jeri’s memory.