Looking the Other Way

I watch the sun rise
by looking west,
at the mountains,
being touched
so gently,
noiselessly,
by those reaching rays.
At first, the lightest contact
the way you’d caress
a shy lover; then,
with the press of sun,
pockets of the mountain
are lit, and further lit.
The valleys deepen,
the ridges are kissed
and burnished to a glow.
Still I’m looking west,
but what I witness
is the break of day.
And sometimes, too,
I watch the setting of the sun
by looking the other way—
at what the slanting rays
do to the eastern sky
when they reach their long fingers

across the waters of the lake,
telling their lover, the earth,
farewell ‘til morning.
Neither can I look direct
at the brightness of my lifetime.
I cannot see the whole
though I sometimes see
after-effects that stun me as much
as a scarlet purple sunset
that stops my breath.
At the trill of a tiny bird
this brand new morning,
my heart hears how beauty
is intricately joined
with fragility.
The face of a flower
shows me how beauty radiates,
precarious, from delicacy.
And my tiny capturings,
my squinting glimpses
called poems,
also always seem to look
in some indirect direction—
seeking the earthy beauty
for which I thirst.

©Susa Silvermarie 2022