Piker Press Banner
December 02, 2024

Roanoke Summer Midnight

By Eric Robert Nolan

Roanoke Summer Midnight

Its midnight moon is newly minted coin --
a white-hot silver obol
forged in burning phosphorus.
The crisping clouds around it blacken.
Its silhouetted mountains
are great blue gods at slumber
the faded-haze azure horizon's
giants in the dim.

Those slopes have known a billion bones of hares
that raced upon them other midnights, then,
pausing, one by one,
and drawing up their downy legs at last to final sleep.

Where the Shenandoahs' driving
beryl falls to black,
ultramarine to onyx,
lay legions of hares -- generations resting.
There are the hills where ivory
rabbits sleep among gods.

Ahead and under moonlight
the curving rural road obscures its end.
At right, an intersecting well-lit modern block
confuses the curling topography.
The fresh and symmetrical asphalt's angle
mars the winding thoroughfare with order --
a ninety-degree anachronism.

That new and perfect subdivision
affronts the corner's antebellum chimney,
broken down to stones and overrun in lavender
-- its lilac colors driven plum by sunset.
That last century's smokestack
was itself effrontery once
to the formless places where natives stayed,
their only edifice the stars,
their only currency the blinding coin of moon.

Eyeing, then, the summits' crowning cobalt
driving down in royal blue to coal,
I hope to one day take my rest
there, in the darkening indigo,
alongside giants,
among white rabbits in myriad easy stillness,

to pause myself at last and sleep beneath
what meadows stretch in cerulean dark,
where hares will race like moon-kissed silver,
or comets of darting pearl.






Article © Eric Robert Nolan. All rights reserved.
Published on 2019-02-18
Image(s) are public domain.
2 Reader Comments
Harris
12/25/2019
10:42:22 PM
Vivid imagery. I find some of the lyricism quite original and striking. It's quite Thoreau like in theme.
Eric Robert Nolan
12/29/2019
11:32:57 PM
Thank you yet again, Harris. You are unusually kind to so habitually encourage other creative people. It makes me want to improve my work. I hope that you are enjoying a lovely holiday season.
Your Comments






The Piker Press moderates all comments.
Click here for the commenting policy.