August Sunset: Taking It In
But the feeling of being imperiled is constant now.
– Kathleen Jamie
Even now, evening’s ever-dependable volunteers
darken a wide stand of uncut barley, one beard,
one kernel, stem by stem,
while diligent others deepen shade in the orchard rows,
and the guild of pastel operators works efficiently
in vermillion and plum, up high and far away.
All of this, even as elsewhere the perpetual rain makers
angle for overtime, or quarrel with the ever more common
gale warnings—weather so nasty terrible
the last-second green-light flashers just give up
and go home. Truth is, no sunset can be taken in: even slow,
it’s too quick, and nothing repeats, this gorgeous light
which next August will look just as it is—wildfire-infused,
uncertain, garish, and new.
No Good All Day Indoors
Though week after week each shorter day looks
ancient, a repeat, mumbling gray and drooling,
even so, don the waterproofs, gloves, the silly hat,
talk yourself to the threshold, the opened door—see,
you’re going out now, into air damp with smells.
Choose a circular route. Imagine Marie Curie
vexed by radium, the x-ray mysteries, or Charles Darwin
at Down House, on his mind a species of bird, or
the reproductive or regenerative mechanisms of earthworms.
Think James Baldwin in Paris, considering how
with tolerance and curiosity we might embrace.
Around, around, and arrive where you began,
wet everywhere, or only your shoes,
or not wet at all.
And in post-summer solstice, sun like forever,
92 Fahrenheit shade a just endurable
lazy generosity amidst all work and distraction,
find a maple, sit under it
for dappled green, as chickadees at the feeder take
and retreat to a near branch where between their feet
they hold a seed and hammer at it.
In stifling heat think snow, if you must,
rainy hours, dim mornings… but not now
as you doze outside in a chair, and when you wake,
you squint. Let indoor news stay where it is.
It’s no good all day indoors.
Lex Runciman has published seven collections of poems, most recently Unlooked For (2022) from Salmon Poetry, Ireland. His poem “Green” leads off the Willamette Valley section of Cascadia Field Guide (Mountaineers Books, 2023). A new collection, Light in the Evergreens, is due in 2026 from Cornerstone Press. He lives in Portland, Oregon.
Read more poetry by Lex Runciman appearing in Terrain.org: two poems (finalists in the Terrain.org 10th Annual Contest in Poetry), three poems, and three poems—plus his essay “The Place and the Photograph.”
