Comes the Night

Evening Hours An azure sky is being defeated by a shadow world where a persistent half-moon is already making its way up the silken expanses of blackest night A horse whinneys, spooked by the rattle of an old lawnmower on its way to the shed. Mosquitoes, agitated, smell blood in veins that evade their foray, then try to find egress through kitchen window screens A limousine glides through the dusk, empty, but proud A raggedy convertible pulls up The driver pets the fur of his small dog Both must stop at a traffic light while an old man with one leg gone is sweating to get his wheelchair across the street before the light changes A silver haze from too much heat, lasting too long, shivers over shadows in the park, where a street man has curled up on a wooden bench. The half-moon tips its crescent toward a statue of a soldier on horseback, saber raised, hat on straight A slip-slap of slippers sounds on the still-warm concrete as a young woman puts out a letter to be gathered by the mail man. The evening smells of roses attar burning the nose with musky beauty Murky pools of gathering night darken the corner the corner where daisies grow