"waking lights" 

The room sits in its late-hour weight,
charcoal settling where the boards dip.
A latch sticks; the cold has worked at it
through weeks of short days.

The radio mutters through the same reports.
Outside, the yard is a sheet of dull metal,
the shed roof taking the last scraps of light
without giving anything back.

Vermeer knew this hour -
how a wall keeps its colour
until a single line of brightness
slips across it from nowhere expected.

A jug on the sill brightens by degrees.
Dust shifts.
The room changes shape
without announcing why.