Pearson embraces the night with poetry

After hearing a T.S. Eliot poem read aloud in his high school English class, Las Cruces resident John Pearson’s love of poetry began.

Pearson started writing creatively in the years after and hasn’t stopped since, he told the Bulletin. His latest book, “Embrace of Night,” is a collection of his original poetry from 1985-2023, and “covers the magic and mysteries of sexual attraction, the pain and anguish of heartbreak and the crushing grief of loss through death,” Pearson said. “The beauty and subtle serenity of the world around us is also explored, as is humor that jumps out of everyday situations.”

Pearson said he employed a variety of poetic styles to address this range of subjects in his book.

“Readers who have never been interested in poetry may be pleasantly surprised by this collection,” Pearson said.

Here is an excerpt from his poem “She Was,” expressing the emotions Pearson said he felt “during a chance encounter one night long ago”:

“While waiting for Life to happen,
you spoke to me from the darkness,
making me want to pick
the sunflowers of your heart.

In the warm, velvet air of that night,
I showed you the moon on the water,
and you responded with honey-warm breath,
slipping shackles on my free will.

The darkness took you back
before I could dispel your myth.
And, I have loved you forever since,
having never heard your name.”

This is from Pearson’s poem “Black Ants”:

“If you stand on the mound
of the large black ants,
they will swarm up your pants,
you will scream and dance,
and if you planned to have children,
they will lessen that chance.”

The cover image of Pearson’s book was provided by Las Cruces photographer Wayne Suggs, Pearson said, showing “the desolation of a deserted ranch house under the magnificent southwestern night sky.” “Sometimes we are that ruined house in bleak surroundings, cloaked in darkness, and other times we are embraced by the sparkling beauty and richness of our shared humanity,” Pearson said.

“Embrace of Night” is available on Amazon and at Moonbow’s Book Nook, 225 E. Idaho Ave.