Twilight II

Once upon a time, I was occasionally a poet.  As the years have gone by, I've lost the habit, but I'd love to start again.  The hardest part of writing is "killing your darlings" - well, it is at the time you're writing it.  Going back seven years later, it's easy to delete everything you've ever written with a keystroke because you're embarrassed by it.  But I still like this one, so I'll post it.  I don't remember what Twilight I was, but I do remember I submitted this to my poetry class with a disclaimer that it had nothing in common with the then-presently-popular trilogy.  Has it been long enough yet that we can say a time of day without invoking sparkly vampires?



Twilight II

Now there might be

a wedge of moon; a silver pin

in dark hair. It is before the stars,

and after all the sun’s gold drains

to liquid blue. Each thing with breath,

each tree and humming stone,

sheds its own cold little glow. The sun

was made a gift for men, but the first ones,

the ones who knew the secret

shapes and ways of things,

they lived in this hour’s light.


Now she is a woman

who blooms for an hour; an inky depth

of cobalt soaking up sky. She lights each thing

a globe of sight, tinged a muted moonstone

with dark fluid edges rising.

Strange shapes and hidden faces blink

briefly into view.


Now the unadorned sister

retires her soft colors,

and black Night assumes

the wearing of the moon,

centered on a circlet of white stars.