This Dusk

A serious face pocked with square pores,

The forked sideburns, cheeks candied with rouge:

My neighbor runs from her car to unlock the door.

Dusk after rush‑hour making headway,

Lapping the porch, its long shades merging

As a rough column of black oak enters

Design of mulberry, fir and deepening apple.

For a moment she leaves behind her daughter

Straining forward in the backseat harness,

Bundled in shadow, white raincoat flashing.

Sometimes like slaves we sing against our wills.

They return this time every night, but now

I am guessing what strength is needed,

Which muscles do the bearing, which give way,

As she returns for the stiff child almost her size,

And lifts her easily over her shoulder anyway.

Cropping the lamplight on the hedges, this dusk

Colors each moment of the daughter's delivery.

The mother's lips move mountains as she walks.

She might be saying the same ordinary words,

But their sound rings above the ritual like strange music

Unresolved, as if of two minds. The singular weight

She supports is also solidness she rests against,

She keeps firmly on the sidewalk to gain

That growing heaviness, to want to carry it.

My shape in the window across the street,

My shadow pacing all over general darkness.

Another fading day has stared me down.

Easy forms disentangle from the branches,

And slip down into asphalt.

Most birds sit out,

But the mockingbird makes one more noise,

And so routs the road of last light.

Pale face looming over her mother’s shoulder,

I can see her through this dusk, how steadily

Her features sharpen like the old moon

Shrinking into more and more sky.