ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo o o o WHAT FOLLOWS EVENING o o o o by BARBARA EINZIG o o o ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo Night suspends color in its turning away, in its bringing up of whiteness in darkness. Daisies are iridescent in moonlight. This heightening is not rising of blood or an expression to a face. This is the way dream people become sensible. Sleep suspends a daytime body, giving the weightless weight, by stealing from a daytime body its daytime gravity. This is not the enlivening of ghosts. A shadow moves this way with a hand over paper, with a body over pavement. This is a dream house with clear wide windows. If these windows are opened, they open into bright day. A dreamer becomes a sensation of falling, and having entered day by mistake, awakes suddenly. Now I remember the Memling portraits -- face of a woman or a man close up, study in steady character occurring as a flower in the face -- and, framed by a window without glass, in a space equal, or existing equally through proportion, fields roads hills beyond. This is not a memory going backwards. This is a painting you may or may not know. Night paints the face of a dreamer the way a loved one sleeping looks. Night turns away from that which the sleeper turns, as she turns her head on a pillow. This is the way dream people become sensible. In busy streets, noticing, they brush past each other, and may or may not recognize each other. A dreamer becomes a sensation of falling, and having entered day by accident, awakes suddenly. In one stroke, spell or die is cast and broken. This is a painting you may or may not know. ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo o o o Copyright (C) 1979 and 1994 by Barbara Einzig o o o ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo