I was drawn to the word swarthy (“obstacles of swarthy gold”). Although it’s simply an adjective, I felt that it heightened the emotional response to the poem. The s sound, through alliteration and consonance is held throughout the poem (sunset, screens, see, obstacles, swarthy, and mystery). You’re constantly engaging in a gentle hiss, or perhaps whisper, as hiss comes across as too aggressive. Maintaining this sss sound could mimic the gentle lull of night and sunset, when the world goes quiet and perhaps all you hear is the gentle lull of the ocean or of crickets or even just breathing. Swarthy also encapsulates the e sound that we hear in words such as see and screens. It ties in the main phonetic components of the poem, which is why it grabbed my attention. On the page it also sits just above the crease, and although this could’ve been accidental, it almost demonstrates that this is where the poem transitions. The first top of the page talks about screens and retarding what we see, the physicality of what’s going on. But then the second part dives into colors and more abstract ideas (as suggested by mystery). “Of swarthy” got its own line when she definitely could’ve fit gold onto that line, so she places heightened importance on both swarthy and gold, drawing it out perhaps to mimic the process of the sun setting, the colors slowly changing. Furthermore, swarthy means dark, but when I think of gold I think of something shiny or even bright. This contrast highlights how the world becomes drenched in a final glow of light, but slowly descends into darkness. In other words, the gold has a dark undertone, suggesting what is to come.