Where It Stops

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Everywhere’s sunny,
except at the field’s end

where shadows sharpen
the warp and shift of elms,

a thicket behind
that slub of quaking green

down to our pond.
A world slopes at the edge

where we both stand,
nipped between firm and the drowning.

Fading Out

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

That day bled into rain,
trees dripped with mist
in the morning,
our drapes gathered back
to a room thick with quiet,
light shallow as leaves
in this dimmed work.

It's on the wall still:
blued pagodas, muted
willows above the boat
stitched onto water.
There's no hurrying
over the grey bridge
where a man stands.

Hours picked threads
set stiff within frames,
layers lapped out
to unnatural flowers.
No one goes anywhere.
There is grey, slaked blue,
the gone tone of a gone sun.