we have moved on from the equinox.
light crowds against the window
well into the hour of twilight.
darkness is reserved for dreams, falling in
a slow sparkle in midnight's halcyon hush
of mild ripples on a haunted ocean.

sometimes solitude is gratifying
in its loneliness, allowing time for noticing
the presence of life separate from myself,
the edges of the clouds etched in a vivid
sharpness, the sky color-washed blue
right down to the stark edge of distance.

spring is a land of sunlit green or
gray rain where dreams meet the shore
of resigned and self-contained exile.  the wind
shakes the leaves by their shrubby shoulders,
stirring me to longing.  once upon a time
i loved you in a dying gray-green light

that outgrew the dream
from which it was born