The Fish Pond Cottage Book of Days

Where has Sarah been? Well to be honest, writing anything lately has been a bit of a challenge – and one that I’ve been a little too ready to avoid. That just didn’t feel right, so I’ve found a way to gently ease back into the writing waters. I’ve begun keeping a sort of “book of days” – 5 minutes of writing (strictly about the house, yard, garden, trees, etc.) and a 5 minute sketch with my watercolor pencils and ink. It’s just a simple way to mark the days in this new space of mine (and keep writing at least something) until I am ready to dive back into poetry.

I will share a few of my Fish Pond Cottage Book of Days entries here and there in between catching up with the many, many writing blogs I’ve neglected recently. I look forward to reading what I’ve missed!

Keep safe! ❤

expungence

this is not the first page,
nor have I reached the last

on days such as this,
what I most want to do

is fling them all upwards
for complete expungence
into the winds,

which in February burgeon
and whirl, thieving breath
and birds and leaves

and so why not these?

© Sarah Whiteley

the accordion

whether the accordion stays or goes
becomes a matter of friendship –
and of the necessity or needlessness
of tokens of attachment

a heavy load can make for a longer road,
and other favors await a verdict –
whether box or bin, either out or in,
feeling and hand both hesitate

though the heart of the gift remains whole
in spite of this inquest –
true affection demands no keepsakes,
and gathers no dust on its bellows

© Sarah Whiteley

I am in the midst of downsizing for the big move next month. I find the days sliding by at an alarming rate, with still so much to do. It will all get done, I am certain – after much hard work and lots of letting go of the things I truly do not need. Whether the accordion makes the move with me? I’ll be sure to let you know. 🙂

a lesson in breath

there is a pause
at the final turning
of November,

before the season
firmly closes,
that may be entered

if the juncture
between foot and path
is timed just so

there stillness rests
in cool absolute –
a mantle of calm,
a lesson in breath

© Sarah Whiteley

I have not named what it is I am grieving…

I have not named
what it is I am grieving –
letting go becomes
unfeasible in such a state

perhaps it is simply
for a space which carries
both the gravity
and lightness of leaving

a place where inhaling
and exhaling
become something other
than separate acts –

disparate sides
of the same smooth stone,
palmed for the easy comfort
of its rounded weight

© Sarah Whiteley

resolution

lately I have been
preoccupied with ghosts –

with the dust that
follows me from old roads

without wind, three pines
lean hard on a sister and groan –

the sound finds me
even after they fall

© Sarah Whiteley

like home

you speak of grasshoppers,
and fireflies, that sharp scent
of hard and sudden rains –

all the things that do not
set their blessings here,
or rarely do anyway

the impossibility of elsewhere
is no longer a vague notion –
the truth of it rests on my chest –

the spiny, black hull
of a horse chestnut dropped
on a damp and chill morning

© Sarah Whiteley

a July night on the porch

all night, the rats scatter
from the ivy under the porch –
warm-furred realizations of words
like skitter, like dart

all but the one, who watches
from the narrow tract of light
between parked cars, as I wipe
the dampness from my beer
and speak again of leaving

© Sarah Whiteley

uncertainty

I am in that space between
staying and leaving,
everything between seasons –

as if without demarcation,
Summer must linger
uncertainly at the door

wondering whether she has
found the right place,
or if the threshold

is somewhere further
down the road

© Sarah Whiteley

A big congratulations to the Wandering Wonderful giveaway winners! Christine, Garrett, and Charles have each been selected to receive a copy of my newest poetry chapbook. I’ve sent off individual emails this morning and copies of the book should be in the mail shortly.

sleeping bears

sometimes, between the long span
of months in which I do not
think of you at all,
I briefly consider calling you up
to ask you along for a hike

for a moment, not thinking how
having you there would so alter
the trail, that what lies before
would amount to steadfast avoidance
of what should be left behind

sometimes I consider calling you,
but let’s leave it there –
leave it as we would a sleeping bear
without the thaw of spring to shake
the old frosts from her fur

© Sarah Whiteley