After Neruda
The glare that stains
the chapel walls
and gossip’s bench,
is not my light.
Piped ballads that rasp,
and drown the songs
of summer birds in trees
and cages are too bright.
I like the splutter
of the dark grills
pushing wood smoke
through the cut flowers,
fresh up from the valley
this morning.
Under the eves,
away from the stall holders
and swinging children,
I look for the shadows.
All the possibilities of shade.
To see the soft light
splitting like the grains
of an an old photograph,
violet not silver.
On the cobbles
of the market square,
zebra husks
of sunflower seeds,
blown into corners.
I look,
and tell the hours
by the turning hands
of the shadows.
Shadow on shadow.
