Royal poinciana flower color

My childhood was closely associated with the color of royal poinciana flowers. My sister said that the bright red color of the flowers is the color of school age, the color of love and longing that anyone who has gone through school years cannot forget. When my sister was still wearing the traditional dress, riding her bike to the school gate early in the morning, I sometimes saw her picking up fallen royal poinciana petals and arranging them into a butterfly shape on a white piece of paper. I thought it was a waste of time, but I also had days like that.

When the royal poinciana trees above began to bloom with their brilliant petals, I felt an indescribable emotion. Because it was also the exam season, the season of separation. Royal poinciana still bloomed as a rule of nature, decorating the schoolyard in the last days of the old school year, like a color to say goodbye to the old students leaving the school with unforgettable memories. One afternoon passing by the old schoolyard, the old guard with white hair and a hunched back could no longer recognize the mischievous student who had climbed over the fence because he was late. I stood in a daze under the royal poinciana trees that were also in full bloom and the schoolyard was also quiet with laughter, only the sound of cicadas chirping on the rustling trees. I looked at the old classrooms, the mossy walls, and suddenly heard the echo of my old teacher reading a poem in the silence: “I want to say so much, I want to cry so much/ I would like to sing the first verse about the old school/ A classroom with a wistful drooping green color/ The schoolyard at night sheds the night-time banyan fruit…” (poem by Hoang Nhuan Cam).

Illustration: Tra My

The verses that my generation has engraved in our hearts, so that every time I think of my old school, those verses echo in my ears, resounding in my deep nostalgia. I walk through the corridors that have now been upgraded, sturdy and no longer collapsing like before, under the splendid wall of roses. Every familiar corner of the yard, every moss-covered wall evokes unforgettable memories in me.

Royal poinciana season in me. The bright red color is like the color of a passionate heart. I don’t understand why but it makes sense when people compare royal poinciana flowers to the flower of student life, the flower of exam season, the season of separation. That year, when we were sitting under the school roof during the last days of our student life, mixed with joy and sadness, royal poinciana flowers bloomed red on the branches as a signal to soothe the hearts of students before the moment of separation. The passionate royal poinciana season, the last royal poinciana season of student life, and no matter how many more royal poinciana seasons come after, they still cannot evoke as much nostalgia and love as the last royal poinciana season.

The sound of the school drum echoed in my imagination, and I suddenly saw myself lingering in the schoolyard from the last class until there was only the student left with many memories in his heart. I don’t remember clearly what I said to the royal poinciana flowers at that time, but many years later, every time I passed by my old school when the royal poinciana flowers were in full bloom, my heart would flutter. At that moment, I said to myself: Time! Youth! Please keep for me the beautiful memories of a long-ago student time…

Source: https://baodaklak.vn/van-hoa-du-lich-van-hoc-nghe-thuat/202506/mau-hoa-phuong-vi-51c016f/