Morning makes clear
what night implies:
knowledge inferred by touch
words lost in shadow, mute as fear
the dawn and past evenings scattered
like stars across the sky.
Our truce, struck in darkness,
dissolves with the coming light.
Two opposing forces, exposed
by the sunrise, we take sides
again and wait: oblivion
is nearer than the curve of your arm,
my tangled hair. No compromise
can be drawn from the pure lines
of our bodies that day reveals.
Yet some impulse, faint as
starlight
at daybreak keeps me here
when I should go. I wish to make an end
of conflict. But peace is not possible.
Driven by forces defined by
day
we two obey its commands.
Defeated, I leave, the last
shape of night
burned away by the sun. You lie alone
lost on some field, prisoner of morning.
-- Argentina Daley
