venus, evening

venus held in the rose-coloured low west, eighteen forty-two local, before any star. she was the first thing the eye consented to see — bright enough to cast no faith, only fact. the horizon hedge took her in nine minutes. the porch was warm; the thermometer had not yet decided.

called the evening star, although it is not. it is one of the same planet seen one of two ways. the morning brother is also this, and is also the same, and the two never share a sky. the mistake itself is so old it has become almost true.

field-note · a planet does not twinkle. that is how you know. it stares back without flinching.

morning star · mars · dusk · window · vigil