Sunrise or Sunset?
A poem by Joan Leotta

Sunrise or Sunset?

Staring into the sky as sun makes its appearance or slips away, I often imagine I can see beyond our atmosphere, beyond space, into the paradise that once was. Sunrise, sunset, two breaches of the wall of separation between this world and the next,  shifts between darkness and light. I’ve watched sun rising up from water and, later, sinking down into it.
Over history, dawn is called the way to life, and sunset named as the passing out of it.
For me, both are times to celebrate that same shift, that brief moment that opens a narrow path between this world and the next.
I sometimes wonder why we claim one a start and the other a finish when the true beauty lies in that moment of transience, a movement between earth and paradise, dark and light that defies science, a movement only artists of brush and pen can define.
Red gold sun spreads
across the horizon line
in both dawn and dusk.

About the Author:

Joan Leotta plays with words on page and stage telling of food, family, and strong women. She’s internationally published with essays, poems, short stories,  including in, One Art, Silver Birch, Poetry SuperHighway, Red Eft,and more. She’s been nominated twice for Pushcart Awards and Best of the Net. She currently portrays Louisa May Alcott as well as offering international folklore and fairy tale programs and readings from her latest poetry book, Feathers on Stone available at https://mainstreetragbookstore.com/product/feathers-on-stone-joan-leotta/

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