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The Perseid meteor shower at Eleven Mile State Park in Colo. in 2024. Eleven Mile is among several state parks in Colorado working on becoming certified with DarkSky International. (Eric Schuette | Colorado Parks and Wildlife via Colorado Public Radio, September 1, 2025 |
Carefully crafted and robust public policy is crucial to fulfilling DarkSky’s mission to restore the nightime environment and protect communities from the harmful effects of light pollution. We are involved in various efforts to influence the decisions of various lawmaking and oversight bodies worldwide to formulate, adopt, implement, evaluate, or change public policies on outdoor lighting. We partner with various government entities to support policy priorities that reduce light pollution and promote quality outdoor lighting. —DarkSky
Northern New Mexico
My first night
living in Indian Country,
on the seemingly
boundless
high desert plains,
begins as I step
from my pickup,
to peer
into the blackest sky
of my life,
and not a light
anywhere near,
when out
of the far eastern
horizon,
you,
a shooting star,
burst,
to journey
one-hundred-
eighty degrees,
traversing
the entire
visible heavens,
to what,
to my eyes,
appears to be
the other side
of the universe.
I’m too spellbound,
to count how long
you take to make
this unimpeded,
rarest
of nocturnal
crossings.
Did Indigenous
spirits want
somehow
to further
approach me,
when at twilight,
a few nights later,
I walk up
a hilly road,
alone,
I thought,
as a Great
Horned Owl,
wings open,
glides
from the top
of a juniper,
straight for me?
I know your call,
and just as you’re
about to pass
overhead,
Hoo! Hoo! Hooo!
I chorus.
As if you abruptly
hit the brakes
in mid flight,
you circle twice,
above me,
no more than
two arms’ lengths
away,
before
your feathered bulk,
dissolves
into the fading light.
Instead of treating me
as an
outlier,
you spirits,
so it feels,
continue
to reach out to me.
I walk up
the owl hill,
only this time
a streak
of astral flame
races across
my view
at eye level,
just before dark.
I can’t tell
the distance
between us,
but I swear
I hear
an orchestra
of super-heated
gases billowing,
fluttering
like gale-driven
sails,
soaring
across night.
Dick Altman writes in the thin, magical air of Old West’s high desert plains, where, at 7,000 feet, reality and imagination often blur. He is published in the American Journal of Poetry, Santa Fe Literary Review, Fredericksburg Literary Review, Foliate Oak, Landing Zone, Cathexis Northwest Press, Humana Obscura, and others here and abroad. His work also appears in the first edition of The New Mexico Anthology of Poetry, published by the New Mexico Museum Press. Pushcart Prize nominee and poetry winner of Santa Fe New Mexican’s annual literary competition, he has authored over 250 poems, published on four continents.
