chiaroscuro

of footsteps
imprinted in soil
or faint traces where
the green grass bends

we are the shadow
we are the light

we are not sunshine
nor the shade we throw
in passing

we are the shaft of brightness
that breaks a sky in two

we are the cloud that gathers
when daylight thickens in the air

shadow and light
the contours of landscape
the outlines of a face
its image and its truth

we are not the spring
from which life flows
but we are the water
running from it
the mutable reality
of all things

our souls
like feathers
our wings of effort
the dawn and dusk of which we are born
the rising of stars and heaven occulted
the blood of heart and vein
coursing from ebb to flow
air breathed in and out
our ash our spark
all our colours

we are both the shadow and the light

© BH, 2022

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Shadow and light. From Joni Mitchell to Carravaggio. The interplay. On so many levels. I was drawn to that in ourselves, our duality - as manifested in contradiction or complexity. All of this is about what we are - or what we are not.