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I avoided the place
with the dahlias this year

unwilling to stand
bland among the bursts

of petals last seen
through a cheerier hue

© Sarah Whiteley

1.10.2015

This damp January morning has drained the color from the sky and all it touches – everything is a shade of sidewalk. All but the unexpected pink of the sand cherry, which bursts out to laugh at the gray as I walk by. It seems that even trees can tease.

color study – sky

let this be be the color of the sky –

shades of rain and chicory
and cloud shadow slants
on broken-stalked plain
weathered white porch eaves
where the speckle-winged moths
flit on evening’s brim
with the last long curls
of the iris slowly fading
from its porcelain vase

© Sarah Whiteley

a few dried blooms

I have reconciled myself to much lately
perhaps too much so
and now the hydrangeas
have lost their azure
bleached to bone-papered petals
kissed too closely by the sun
come fall I would have picked
bloom by bloom the dusky blues
and purples from their globes
as they dried for a bit of color
to scatter across the table
but today the possibility
vanished into dry disappointment
if I could just instead pluck
a few small pieces from the sky
of that certain blue with the gold-tinged
hue of days’ slow slide into early autumn
I would not so mind the loss
of a few dried blooms

© Sarah Whiteley