Crapuscular

I sat upon an old stump, Nautical twilight swelling like dark cotton, As brown leaves swirl'd in an autumn breeze, Piling around my leeward boots, A sound, good memory from childhood, The sound only autumn leaves can make, As they blow down a dusky street, I take all that in, distracted, As winter geese pass by overhead, Long necked, vee formed, Honking like commuters on the pike, And my thoughts return like sparrows, Winter chilled as always, Like standing in the doorway of summer’s icehouse, And stare into the windows of my home, In the shadows of the yard like some midnight stranger, Drawn to the light and noise as some wayward moth, Made frantic by chemistry and discord, Amaranthine bafflement of the love sheltered there, My diamond geode, Formed not from heat and pressure, But plasma love, My fluttered heart sandblasted, Tortured by the juxtaposition of Creating something to watch it die or, Watching it become more than it was before, While wishing to be one thing, Unsure of who I’d need to be, Unsettled by who I really am, (Whoever that is), And realizing that for all my self-immolation, We’re all just playing at being grown up, And this stump, Just put a splinter in my ass.