Twilight III

Brian Henderson
From:   Light in Dark Objects. Ekstasis Editions, 2000.

Drifting out from the roots of things, reaching
across the beach, shadow steeps vermilion
of cardinal flowers in darkness, opens
depths, gaps in the world, like a language.
Trees crammed with failing light float
on it, so do Adrian and Kyra, running
along the slippery hem of water, shouting,
one side of them already eaten by darkness.
Could there have been different lives, ones
not so abrupt with beginnings and endings?
No. They are already who they are,
and always were, born in the bed
they were conceived in, these ones
and none other, and fragile beyond belief.

Down the beach, swallowed in night now,
their voices glitter like the stars
just coming to punctuate the sky.

Poem 1 | Poem 2 | Poem 3 | Poem 4 | Poem 5 | Poem 6

Brian Henderson's works copyright © to the author.