Sunset on Ocean Drive

Underneath a darkening blue sky
Clouds draw curtains over the acts of the day
My metal car scatters sunlight
Rolls forward towards home,
Away from home,
You are inside me glowing,
Fading light the color of roses
Healing, but you lay nowhere near
I drive closer to you, further still
My hopes slowly fall
Like drops of summer rain
Let loose to lighten clouds
For them to roll less ponderously
Across the sky

Walkers a frame behind, flicker by
Some coming, some going
Each to his own end (of the boardwalk)
Almost all gazing westward mechanically
Still walking as if the sky
Were some film remembered
But never understood

I gaze where they are gazing
Still rolling, driving forward
I will come here again I know
But today, tonight, at this twilight hour,
I watch clouds as they gather
From all ends of the sky
Blending wispy whiteness and the blue
Sun shining through it all so brightly
We forget it’s even there
How do we forget?

And at this twilight hour
With the sun waning in its power
How like you, or I, a rose drooping
And night plucking the petals
Pulling up its screen
I see the struggles of my soul
Played out above for all to see
Then fading, the curtain falling

I watch the white clouds gather
I know how their edges steel
(And how to myself)
Against the darkness coming
(Always coming, never going)
I watch them gather into a hard, dark gray
Some still glow like swords on a forge
With a rose-tinged inner-light
While their sharp edges
Scatter sunlight everywhere
Then quickly, quietly without a final scene
Nightshade pulls down its silent screen
Did the clouds glow till they melted away?
Do they end the day that way?

And the walkers darker now,
Like shadows on the screen,
Flicker past, then fade away
How does it seem to them,
The ending of their day?
Does it end like their endless, mechanical walking
As their gray clouds like metal rust,
Then slowly wear away the remainder of the day?
To which end of the sky did their sun fall today?
And at which end of the boardwalk
Did their walking finally cease?
And to them, to them what peace?
Do their joints forget, then like metal rust,
Then, understanding, fall into dust?

11/11/98