Night lights
That summer night we sat on the balcony
and lads on the lash hollered in the street.
Candles burned steady yellow on the table.
We drank wine, watched a window opposite
flash bright and dark as a strip light sparked
on and off. Another window glowed dim grey
and we talked about biorhythms and sleep.
Distant traffic hushed like waves at low tide;
gulls mewed and circled above streetlights,
their bodies copper in the sodium glare,
their call eerie, we said, not like the rough
heckle of gulls on rubbish dump or beach.
By the light of the chip shop down the street,
they landed to scavenge the city’s waste.
Sharon Phillips retired from a career in education in 2015. Since then, she has been learning to write poems again, after a break of 40 years. Her poems have most recently appeared on The Open Mouse, Bluepepper, The Poetry Shed and previously on Ink Sweat and Tears.