Purple was there first

Purple was there first
in the thudding darkness
before her eyelids flickered open
and received all the world
I'd made in me.
It coloured the placenta
where she found root,
floating in a galaxy filled with
darting fish and glowing leaves,
the branches of my womb
made magenta by the light outside.

Before that, even, there was
the bubbling potion, the witch's cloak,
the magician's hat, the dragon's scales.
In the marrow of the bone,
in the kernel of the universe,
at the very first spell,
it was there.

Maya giggles. I look down.
She is writing her name for the first time. 
She chooses purple. I ask her why. 

"It's dark and it's bright. And, Mummy,
it smells like farts."

Flecks of purple shimmer around her.