trick of light

Emily Sanford

 

 

simply think of illuminance as light
                going toward an object—explicitly  

the amount of light as it touches 
                                       a surface, unreflected.   

inspect the roadside in drizzle,
                             moon in a pool. no: artifice. 

streetlamp reflected in spilled oil 
                                     slick imposter—skip it. 

apparition-rippled meniscus,
                      topographically atypical shift— 

a squint in brilliance dims.
                              this trick of light afflictive: 

as when visiting versailles,
                                  boating on the false lake, 

holiday-making on credit—
                                 bliss glints conditionally.

 

 

 

 

Born in Nova Scotia, Emily Sanford is a queer writer and performer who holds an MA in Literature and Performance from the University of Guelph. She is the winner of the 2016 Eden Mills Writers' Festival Literary Award for Poetry and 2018 Janice Colbert Poetry Award, and her poetry was listed amongst The 10 Best Poems of 2016 by Vancouver Poetry House. Her work appears in Canthius, Grain Magazine, Minola Review, newpoetry.ca, and Plenitude Magazine, and a recent poem was set to music for four-part choir by composer EKR Hammell. Emily lives and works in Toronto, and co-curates the popular Brockton Writers Series.