The sky blushes
its last light
a faerie dusk
before Halloween night.
Without the children
I've been left with just myself
and what to do today. I've chosen
to hide away
out of the house
for when the monster hordes come
and go guising myself
with camera, binoculars
and the treat
of a car loaned from my dad.
I've been playing
the stay-at-home
far too long,
just me and the bathroom reflection.
I go out
travel back into the scenery of
when I was a boy. Down along the shoreline
and then up and over the hills
towards the Port.
At the high point
in the climb I see
the sky flushing
and am caught between that
and being hurried
by car headlights
right at my back
I feel reddening
embarrassment at myself:
for slowing down
to look,
making a point of stopping to look.
I try not see myself as others see me:
as this lonely man out in the hills at gloaming.
But I pull over
(they don't know me: I could be anyone)
I get out
and see what
captures the day in a way
that clicks into place.
I am not
just someone out with a camera.
The trick
that click of recognition
comes from not just
being in the right place
at the right time. No.
You must stop. You must look. You must see what lights your spirits.
This is the magic hour. When the unseen
sprites and daemons charge the fields.
I was there. I stopped. I saw it.
That was me.
