Twilight as They Used to Call It

When the day was half-lit,
Half-night, headed either
Way, unstable but soft.

Poets seemed to like it,
Whatever poetry
Was meant to be back then.

Twilight’s too limiting,
As everyone admits
Now, almost everyone.

Every hour has its own
Peculiarity
Of the light, and cities

And suburbs only add
To the variety.
Nothing ever subtracts

From the way waves cancel
Each other out to rise.
Long avenues at dawn,

Lines of lights changing, chained,
Noon in the desert when
Lizards sun on the wall,

The road through the big pines
That haven’t caught fire yet
On autumn afternoons

When their crossing shadows
Make the road seem lonesome
And almost meaningful.

All of it’s poetry,
No matter what you want
Poems to do for you, or

If you abhor the thought
Of being forced to read
Something like these lines on

Twilight, stop lights, sunlight,
Tree shadows in the road,
Or if you’re committed

To waste your life on poems,
Think poems can change the world,
Free your soul, name your truth,

Speak for your lost people,
Your lost family, your
Terrible fear of death.

It’s all poetry,
Poetic in all lights.
That’s poetry’s problem.