Red edit 0.000001 leanne, river grudgingly:)

[tectak]

What I want to say 
is not as important
as the colour of a rose
that cannot see itself, 
yet is red each year
it blooms...but I find -- consider moving it up to this line, and leaving difficult by itself, which would give you the ambiguous reading of I find it which then shifts for more impact
it difficult.

If the rose was aware of its colour, would it make a difference to the rose?  It's just the colour it's always been.  The self-referential rose and its metanarrative becomes irrelevant from within, but may impact heavily on others who ascribe meaning to it according to their own experience.  We are a series of symbols interpreted and written upon by others -- and often we find that we are more concerned with commenting upon and to those others than we are on examining and interpreting ourselves.  

Therefore, what is red?  It is the colour of a rose whose meaning is lost in a thousand various implications.  No wonder it's difficult.

...I didn't say I was surprised...