Dusk

Third Rackham-Barnes poem.

Dusk is the best time to see ghosts,

when the light in the streets is blue

and deepening, and the sinking sun

draws the pale light of golden dust motes

after it, leaving the sky raw and black,

speckled with fierce sparkling holes.

 

Dusk dims sight and sound, and only

cats prowl with impunity, cats and the

white-faced ghosts of dead dreams.

I hear them when the doors are closed

and faces are turned to dish or screen,

the silence turned up high to hide the tears.

 

Dusk light flutters with the wings of

might-have-beens and if-onlys, do-you-

remembers and I-would-give-anythings,

tip-tapping through the growing shadows

and dead butterfly wings with the

persistence of falling rain, sighing with

the inexorable rise and fall of the tides.