Monday Poem

Darkroom, 6:44 AM

.
sun’s not up but imminent,
trees in the window are emerging
shades in a darkroom bath

three boys sleep in a room downstairs
near mother; in another a girl sleeps
with another mother—
all still new as if just born
on this darkroom raft

I look up again,
sun trumps umbra
as light is cast

two window-worlds:

an outside one in its frame
urged to deciduous existence,
forms of leaves and limbs
distending the borders
of impossible, billowing
from indistinct shadow,
pressing itself into being
upon the glass

the other, inner world (instead)
a lamp’s reflection in a pane,
a wall, a door, a backlit head
.

Jim Culleny
10/20/19, 6:44 am