The Colors of Youth
Like the sky clearing after rain, those colorful ribbons far above, the newborn sunlight radiates with color. At the starting point of life that is youth, who dyes us in different colors? We ourselves.
Youth is crimson, like the morning sun emerging from a sky where the black chaos has just been torn apart, wanton passion, scattering infinite golden light upon the vast world. We still possess vivid dreams, we still have poetry and distant places, and we still have the arrogance to change everything.
Possessed of soaring spirits and thoughts that take flight, we yearn to ascend the azure heavens and embrace the bright moon.
Burying ourselves deep within mountains of books, roaming through seas of exam questions.
A time will come to ride the wind and cleave the waves; I shall hoist my cloud-white sail to cross the vast blue sea.
Even if giant waves surge to the heavens, the small boat carrying dreams and hope shall not perish; the sky filled with grey clouds and inky rain cannot blind our burning crimson eyes, believing that miracles will surely appear again from afar.
The crimson flame within our warm hearts allows us to be fearless of the freezing ice and flying snow at five in the morning, leaping up from our bed covers, thus beginning a day of study.
The sound of reading in the classroom awakens the world before the lazy sun does; amidst the darkness, we seem to carry light. Running on the playground, we fear not the sweat and soil staining our cheeks; strings of flying sweat beads are the symbols of vitality.
Youth is also a warm tangerine orange.
That old, yellowed lamp keeping watch by the roadside in the long night, as if it has stayed alone in the dark for so long specifically awaiting your arrival. This is that warm friendship. When a frail body trembles in the cold wind, when powerless hands go numb in the ice and snow, when a vacant gaze blurs in the white storm, friendship is that tangerine warm lamp waiting for you from afar, standing steady and unmoving amidst the flying snow. That lamp gets closer, closer, and closer still; treading upon the pure white snow, she comes to your side. The pale rain and snow melt within the warm lamplight and warm hearts; embracing friendship, our hearts are refueled, gaining temperature, and the blossoming flowers of the heart can once again bloom proudly within the sky full of wind and snow. And all of this is given to us by the tangerine, warm friendship beside us. We embrace our friendship so fervently; the world is merely her soft and gentle body.
Youth is a tranquil deep blue.
Astonished by the rich knowledge of mathematics, physics, and chemistry in our minds, intoxicated by the cultivation of poetry and lyrics in our souls, tranquilized by the irrigation of dew from books ancient and modern, Chinese and foreign. We begin to outline our preliminary views of the world in our hearts, begin to determine the yardstick of value, and begin to look toward and plan for a life that may exist in the future. To oppose dark terror with blue serenity. Our confidence is a portion of deep blue composure amidst the crimson passion.
However, youth also holds that bewildered, depressive fog-grey, and deep black.
Alone in the pitch-black night, inside a cold and stiff duvet, tasting the sliding teardrops one by one; the sensitive soul feeling a deep throbbing pain due to the unintentional words and actions of others; a momentary stern look from teachers or parents strikes terror into our souls, leaving us fearful, tears bursting the dam in an instant; in anxiety, we look through the brick walls of the dormitory, counting imaginary stars and sheep, attaching wings to them so they can wander freely in the sea of stars, while before our eyes there is only a dilapidated grey brick wall, and outside the window only a solitary tree, standing stiffly like a night watchman; we might go without a meal, a day without food, three days without food due to unease of mind, until at some point we faint and the fact of our fasting is discovered; we sit in a dim classroom, driven by a gloomy mood, using a pen to pierce through book pages, morbidly listening to the sound of tearing with joy; we might suddenly pick up a small knife, amidst somewhat startled gazes, and carve chaotic patterns on our arms—perhaps they are beautiful, who says only what they say is beautiful can be beautiful?—then quietly watch the fresh blood flow, flow upon the textbook; we might fly into a rage, and in anger destroy the doll we have loved most for years, or kick away the poor little cat that has accompanied us for years, the one we used to hold in our arms and nuzzle affectionately, staring with dull eyes at their corpses; we fear social interaction, fear the flowing crowds, fear standing up in class, fear answering questions, fear standing at the back of the classroom, fear the teacher standing beside us, fear the teacher looking down to see what I am writing…; we might still fear the dark like when we were young, planting countless grotesque monsters from our imagination around the unlit night roads, all of them thinking of how to harm me; we will also eventually fear the height of buildings, gazing for a long time at the concrete bricks below regardless of whether we climb over the railing or not, confirming if anyone is passing by. Can the bright colors of youth truly outnumber those dark hues?
Youth is colorful and diverse; we compose it into the colors we like. But the paintbrush is sometimes in our own hands, yet sometimes snatched away, stolen, or snapped by others. The dark colors upon us can then only come from the smearing of others.
This is an exam essay from last year. To cope with the exam, the original text was much more positive and uplifting than this, but the overall outline remains unchanged, only many phrases have been modified. As a result, it is slightly longer than the original text.
2021.6.4 First Revision