The
neighbors’ lights were lit
To entertain
the shadows
As you
washed your hands in the dark
A cool,
uncertain cleanliness
Reflecting the
dark spaces
In the
thoughts of summers past
Your child
woke
To an empty
black
A wanting
anger leapt from your inner fire
A disturbance
of the enforced reflective peace
Where you
ordered your mind
Past the
first pass of sleep
The august
dusk
Where once
your future was told
In red-dressed
anger
Lit the
hallway
Beckoning you
sooth your Son
You gathered
your thoughts, your things
And shut the
lights
The only
shadows left guided by your inner flame
The scenes
most true to you
Displayed in
errant dreams
Your Son
lost you in His sleep
Wandering the
pattern of your mind
And woke to
find you again
Your presence
His only light
Drifting through
the grass
Like a wind
It seeks the setting sun
The vast stretch
of things beyond the sky
Daylit moons
sunken behind joyous white
clouds
Somehow stifling
and hollow
As a stale
breath
From yawning
of futility
Come on the
subtle chills
And rhythmic
cricketing of lovely night
Chasing in
your head
The fireflies
Brief moments
And long
shadows
And sleep
forevermore
Jason Greendyk
