extended light–

an added glow gifted from a burning bulb 
acting as illusion fixed in midair
 
heat creeps between ticking seconds
bends clocks’ hands with sticky weight
pulls our joyous illumination along
for the year’s longest stretch 
 
then the evening’s breeze enters
not as relief
but as a pressured push
to unstick the sky’s seeming pause
to coax clouds to set sail again–
 
daytime star arcs and descends 
as is customary,
like a solitary raindrop kiss 
splashing, parting itself like lovers’ lips
to taste the horizon before 
darkness descends
slow at first, and growing
with each of the earth’s rotations