I think it’d be impossible for me to put this poem up here without first explaining that I heard music in my head while writing this. I don’t even know what it was, I THINK I made it up just now. This has happened with some other poems of mine, and it doesn’t always positively affect the quality, but I think it did this time.

This shares themes with some of my other poems—my first boyfriend and I met at an amusement park, and the sun set as we rode home on the bus with the rest of the group. When I met my second boyfriend, it was in the basement of a college student center, at night, so I never got to see the sun set with him until our first actual date. ‘Venus’ is a good one to read for background here, and ‘Redwood’ probably is too.

Sun Over Bricks

I don’t see the sun disappearing as it falls into the trees

blending pinks and purples into a faded blue

I never saw them in those weeks when we first met

because I was always inside and never breathing them in

but when we came together that night

sailing west over the highway

there the colours were again welcoming me back

welcoming me to new life

and now when I gaze upon them

I don’t see the broken promises I used to see

when the autumn winds confused me even more

instead I see only that evening

when I finally was at peace

in my own new way.