“A Box of Pastels”
by Ted Kooser
I once held on my knees a simple wooden box
in which a rainbow lay dusty and broken.
It was a set of pastels that had years before
belonged to the painter Mary Cassatt
and all of the colors she’d used in her work
lay open before me.
Read the rest of the poem here.
![Mary Cassatt [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons](https://readingtothecore.files.wordpress.com/2015/07/cassatt_mary_sara_holding_a_cat_1908.jpg)
Reading to the Core 
This is such a sweet poem of tribute, and what a sweet, sweet picture of Cassatt’s to accompany it! Thanks for sharing these.
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I wonder if it’s true, that he did have that box? What a nice sentiment, to contemplate Cassatt’s work by gazing at the pastels. I love that end: “and left there with light on the tips of my fingers”. Thanks, Catherine!
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I agree; that last line is gorgeous! If you click on the arrow at the top of the page with the whole poem, Kooser describes how he came to hold Cassatt’s box of pastels.
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What a gorgeous final line–and how interesting to think what you can tell about a person from the colors they set aside.
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