Illustration by Tim Robinson.
It’s like asking what the true sunset is.We’ve seen a few together—
all peach, a gathering of golds. Or geese
gliding down from three directions,first above the dimming branches, then mirrored in water,
as if to make themselves truer—and we, having found each otheramong the myriad things,
point at the details as if they’re strokesof a pictograph—the mercurial shore,the lone duck,
the little houses across the reservoirnot yet lit save one or two porch lights,
and the bright hole the sun bores in the far trees,in the unending time where we find ourselves,and the truth we try to tell.
Ye Chun