Lindsay Wilson
Listen, dark one, as the sun sets,
the boxelder beetles come down
from the west wall to fly back
to their nymph tree, and in this late light
the long ash leaves look like the points
of bronze spears, dark and bloody
with the busy blush of the beetles’ scarlet
wings. After the sun falls below
the Sierras, and the sundial becomes
useless under these lengthening shadows,
the fine-armed daughters of night
will sever your tether to this dim world,
then, dark one, you will no longer
be bound to this place. You will lay
down your spears. You will find
your red-black wings.
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