Author’s Note: Today’s Octpowrimo prompt was to write about a place as if it’s a character in a story. I sort of already did that with my post Dusk Ode but I decided to try it as a poem this time. It’s about my home, Sunderland, Massachusetts.

the street

lays a straight path into

the night; on

one side, tobacco

curls in on itself,

folding under a purple-

black evening.

on the other,

dusk pauses over swampy

fallow fields as remnants of

sunset’s breath

cling to a road and climb

a quiet mountain.

 

houses break the

black horizon,

solar lights blossom and

wilt, leading visitors to

a fairy garden party;

back – lit windows blink

sleepily as street lights

cast their orange souls into the

congealing fog.

 

fields bend around

asphalt curves,

disappearing into night’s

languid heartbeat – peepers

invisibly chant, their gregorian

tones the evening’s symphony.

dusk transforms –

nature’s nocturne sounds.

the countryside lives.