If you’re lucky you get to witness Autumn capturing the last heat of the summer’s sun in its deep yellow leaves, like a cat with gamboge eyes.
Gamboge canopy.
Powdery like saffron, spicy like mustard.
Dressed-up in her best sepia, with eyes of mustard gamboge, the cat thought of herself as one of Autumn’s leaves as she purred among amber and crimson.
Now… the bird will come.
Gamboge fills up my mouth when I say it. So fitting to describe autumn’s vivid yellows!
Gamboge arrived to us from Latin gambogium. It most probably has ties with the gum resin extracted from trees and used as a yellow pigment in art, trees of southeast Asia. Initially, the resin is orange-brown, but it becomes bright yellow when turned to powder.
Yes, gamboge, also spelled camboge, is family with the noun cambugium, most probably deriving from Camboja, the word Portuguese seafarers used for Cambodia in 1600. Cambodia is one of the countries where the trees producing gamboge are indigenous.
Masterful use of gamboge in art: Rembrandt’s portrait of his beloved wife Saskia van Uylenburgh as Goddess Flora, 1634.
Find more colorful thoughts here.
Or in my book of Christmas Haiku:
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