putting the house in disorder

I’m scraping out a lump of paint from my watercolour tin.
Is it any real colour? You know, I think it’s not;
Grained now with age, that purply-brown
You get when washing out paint pots.
Into the bin with it; I’ll put some sepia in there instead.
Then every single section will be useful and good.

I’ve replaced like colour with like, as they wore out;
Rung a few changes too; ditched crimson for a warmer red.
Black lasts a lot longer these days, since I learned
Things were rarely black as I had painted them;
Indigo’s the perfect colour for pure still nights.

Then there’s warm ochres, indian yellow;
Two different whites; sap green, cerulean blue.
All hues I use to paint my map,
A land where there’s no footprints on the path;
This ringed compass, more true to my finger
Than the lost marriages along the way.

This was your best gift to me. No, not the paints here in my hand
But the love, belief in me that came with them. 
This day of days, I wish you were still here
To get drunk, maybe talk some shit about art,
I’m sorry, so sorry,  you aren’t.