Punchy Ishtar Hibiscus

A modern adjectival form of punch, to strike sharply. Used as a color word since the early twentieth century for hues that read as highly contrasting and visually loud. Punchy red, punchy yellow: the implication is full saturation combined with optical impact. Sits across the bold and bright buckets, near vivid and striking.

Akkadian Ištar, Babylonian-goddess-of-love-and-war. As a color modifier, ishtar implies a Babylonian-Venus-and-eight-pointed-star quality, the visual register of Babylonian-Ishtar-Gate-and-Mesopotamian-temple hand-Babylonian-Venus-and-eight-pointed-star Babylonian-Ishtar-Gate-and-Mesopotamian-temple-and-Akkadian-cylinder-seal ishtar-and-Babylonian-Venus-and-eight-pointed-star surfaces under Babylonian-Ishtar-Gate-and-Mesopotamian-temple-and-Akkadian-cylinder-seal Babylon-and-Nineveh-and-Mari blue-glazed-brick-light. Sits at the modifier-and-myth end of the grid, parallel to isis and hera in usage.

Hibiscus rosa-sinensis — the showy mallow of Pacific gardens, the Hawaiian state flower, the source of the deep red sorrel tea sold across West Africa as bissap. The color refers to a fully open hibiscus petal at midday: a hot, slightly magenta red with the velvet texture of a single-day bloom. By evening the same flower has wilted; by morning it's gone.