Watercolor Story for the Phlegmatic

An Earthschooling member asked last month if there was a watercolor verse for the Phlegmatic temperament. In the Waldorf Watercolor Stories for the Year there are stories for the Sanguine, Choleric and Melancholic but not for the Phlegmatic. We have added the fourth story here. The first watercolor verse for the phlegmatic is a verse about ice in winter which represents the steadfast nature of the phlegmatic. They can be very flowing like a river (as in the second watercolor story). However, they can also be as rigid as ice. Just like the water the Phlegmatic has a dual nature.

Poem for the Phlegmatic

Ice is Winter Moss
Copyright Kristie Burns

Shadows slinking slowly
Across the icy creek
Did their mother also tell them
To be cautious as they cross?
Or are their toes simply frosty
When they touch the winter moss?

The Phlegmatic Blue

There once was a phlegmatic mermaid child of blue who usually loved to go with the flow. Her name was Ripple. When the river was flowing smoothly under the shining sun she would flow smoothly and float along with the ripples (have students paint ripples of the stream across their page – back and forth and back and forth). When the river was iced over she would stand firm in the stream, but rather than become completely still she would spin around in one place make crackling patterns on the top of the ice (paint blue swirls on the paper in various locations). But one day there was a great storm. It started out with tiny raindrops (paint rain falling down on the paper). Then the rain got heavier and the drops turned to sheets of water that fell from the sky (paint longer drops falling on the paper. At this point the entire paper is probably covered with blue. That is the way it should be. We are just painting this entire paper blue in a creative way and will have some patterns within the blue when we are done). Soon after the lightning started and the stream started raging. Ripple was scared. She didn’t like chaos and loud noises and being exposed to so many elements. Especially all at one time. So ripple decided to hide. She dove under the crashing waves on the stream (paint blue waves on the paper), went below the churning waters (paint spinning and churning blue) and almost towards the bottom of the stream she found a peaceful place of flowing blue water. There were no sheets of rain, no lightning bolts, no churning water and no chaos. Ripple was able to flow, in peace under the churning stream and was carried along by the blue water.

But Papa Sky missed her (paint a blue sky) and said, “Ripple, where are you?”

And Mother Earth and her trees missed her and said, “Ripple, where are you?”

But they could not see her. She was gone.

So Papa Sky blew all the rain clouds away with a breath of wind. And Mother Earth bent down her trees to shelter the stream from the storm. And sure enough! Ripple saw that the chaos, noise and churning had stopped in the world so she slowly swam towards the top of the stream and peeked out. Mother Earth didn’t want to scare her so she kept the trees swaying gently. Papa Sky didn’t want to scare her so he stopped blowing his wind and turned it to a gentle breeze. Ripple emerged and was happy. She was so happy she started giggling and skipping through the stream just like the ripples she was named after.