Revelation

My blogger friend Olga has just returned from St. Martin where she got to experience carnival for the first time. The colors and the people in her photographs are so familiar and gorgeous and vibrantly alive to me, in scenes that play out up and down the emerald arc of Caribbean islands each year. Jamaica has recently finished its carnival. Trinidad's world-class celebration was the month before. Antigua is just gearing up for its carnival at the end of July. As I call back the body memory of dancing all night and road marching all day, as I daydream the sounds of steel pans and colorful costumes and the wildly festive atmosphere, I imagine playing mas at a carnival next year. Mas, by the way, is short for masquerade, the riotous displays of paint and feathers and glitter and beads and baubles that capture the jubilation of the road march. I hope Olga will forgive my reposting one of her pictures because I just can't get over the intensity, the explosive joy of the red in this picture. I think I've never truly seen the color red before.