The Shadow Dance

The shadowy pair dances
about a burning arc.
Wheeling into the night
shouldered this way… that
by the flames’ brutal whimsy.
Holding one to the other,
pushing through the hour’s heavy, hanging shroud,
‘til dawn pads sleepily through her parlour door,
face aflame with overruling promise.
Night scurries under rock and ridge,
fire ducks beneath his ashen blanket,
morning's beaming fingers
claim for their own,
redefine, the pair
drawn anew,
by the brilliance
of this embrace.
Reshaped…