Tag / light

by ebbtide

my dog tells me

my dog tells me
that she is dying –
subtly, as dogs do

that this is the first
of our many lasts

that we should
go slowly now

and savor this truth,
this pained heart,
with worthy tenderness

I owe her as much,
and everything else
at least once more

we take the first
of our last walks

between the light and
lengthening shadows

wheeling toward
the end of the year
good girl!

by ebbtide

procrastination

sometimes the light is perfect
in the way it drapes itself
across the day – as it is now,
this morning in late October

and you find that you must pause
in getting up to go in
to a waiting chorus of chores
though the front step is cold
and has grown harder than remembered

you try to delay the mundane –
the rinsing out of the favorite mug,
the sweeping up of the dust
that returns so doggedly to old corners,

and you wait for the light to shift
into something more ordinary,
more suitable for the junk drawer
calling out for a straightening –
to be set somehow aright

© Sarah Whiteley

by ebbtide

early morning hike

I wake well before dawn
so that I might walk
with the mist and the fog,
each of us finding
our own path up the peak

yet loving the damp bark
of the lofty cypress
in precisely the same way –
like light suddenly unbound,
eagerly embracing all
it can and cannot name

those who would say
a mountain does not breathe
have never placed their feet
where feet have not yet been –
have never found the river
that flows into the mountain
and does not come out again

© Sarah Whiteley

My newest chapbook Wandering Wonderful is now available for pre-order from Finishing Line Press. Pre-orders through March 22nd will have an opportunity to win a canvas print of the cover art. Click for details!

by ebbtide

let light come slowly

light is sparse this morning
so let it come slowly,

a sifting upwards
of gold, diffuse
through wind-bent trees

let morning be hesitant –
with time, nothing
will be left out in darkness

© Sarah Whiteley

My newest chapbook Wandering Wonderful is now available for pre-order from Finishing Line Press. Pre-orders through March 22nd will have an opportunity to win a canvas print of the cover art. Click for details!

by ebbtide

akin to grace

I stop in the cold where the elk have rubbed
their considerable selves against the trees –
signatures in russet worn by the river birch

there is a tangible rising when standing beside
evidence of what is wilder than us –
a furtive blessing, a lift akin to grace

I would spend my life on this – on branch,
on root, on hoof prints sliced into the snow

I would stop and stand with my solitude –
with my own snowy indentations –
and be simply crowded with light

© Sarah Whiteley

My newest chapbook Wandering Wonderful is now available for pre-order from Finishing Line Press. Pre-orders through March 22nd will have an opportunity to win a canvas print of the cover art. Click for details!

by ebbtide

winter sunset on Puget Sound

restless, and not quite,
I walked out across the ice
in search of the last
of the evening’s light

found it draped upon the trees
all long and golden –
so sweet and splendid
the shadows followed it,

chasing it down the hill
until I, still standing,
lost sight of them slipping
into the clear, cold Sound

© Sarah Whiteley

My newest chapbook Wandering Wonderful is now available for pre-order from Finishing Line Press.

by ebbtide

luminosity

lately, I have not been so adept
at creating my own

but have become better at least
in the search for it

in hunting out the straggling streams
ushering along the broken light of winter –

streamfronts and lakesides,
and damp on long-dropped leaves,

and everywhere the subtle, persistent gleam
of cedar beneath the rain –

these have become my candle
against the winter’s dark –

there is peace in found luminosity,
and joy in unveiled light

© Sarah Whiteley