Coupled by Tom Sheehan

The long rope of evening
tightens its soft noose.
Slack falls away from the barn
and sits down in goldenrod field
like a Guernsey waiting for hands,
tired of heavy suspension.

By the window your eyes
catch neither star nor firefly,
nothing shaken to superlatives,
just a small scar of light stolen
from the art of darkness itself,
just the thinned edge of dream

working out of a dim retreat.
We always separate this way,
as if night is a wedge or wall,
final hard divider of the day,
a bolt thrown home by pale hand
sounding ultimate punctuation;

you, dashing into tomorrow
before it takes a first breath;
me, at our history’s lectern,
a professor of yesterdays,
calipers in hand, measuring
littered wayside and foot paths

bringing us to schismatic twilight.
We stand apart, form and matter
of arguments, apt deliberations,
one part silk and one part burlap.
Oh, how we love differences,
and shadows’ falling threats.

Tom Sheehan, MA, USA