the old snow settles in,
becomes crotchety
stubborn in its insistence
on retaining territories
but the new is coming –
eight inches forecast
to whisper its cloak
over the dogged old
for now, I step gently –
cautious of sheen
and crunch, only at intervals
glancing up at the stars
© Sarah Whiteley
My newest chapbook Wandering Wonderful is now available for pre-order from Finishing Line Press.
no stars have come for us
no birds align in coded message
there is only us and all the ways
I say without saying
that I am both broken
and blooming, and uncertain
how to welcome hope and despair
on such unequal footing
© Sarah Whiteley
love remaining half-asked,
with an exile’s hunger,
what have you lost?
smoke never stops moving,
alters nothing, and
leaves irretrievably
when exactly does time
distill us down to fire?
down to accumulated passion?
at what point have we traded
the marked directions
of known constellations
for the possible light
of far, unseen stars?
I carry with me every touch,
each quiet sigh released
beside you, and have lost
precisely nothing
© Sarah Whiteley
craving stars, I crept
down the crouching hallway,
disturbing only moths
seeking their own small
allowance of light
trees sleep, lowering
their limbs by fractions
as the day subsides,
leaving only the incremental
gestures of slumber
I have had to explain often
the peculiar edicts of insomnia,
and how it does no good
to seek why in the high
corners of the night
how it is better then
to slip into ready shoes,
and out into the expectant dark
where pivot the city’s
token of stars
© Sarah Whiteley
© Sarah Whiteley
This is from a little project with tanka that I’ve been having fun with. Stay tuned for more!
turtles are the only traffic here –
moving slowly landward with
the June-shadowed moon under palely
trailing feet and a torrent of stars
all day, the sea bloomed –
bursting brilliant in
white florets against the sand
but at night, the upsurge eased
and sun-brushed curves containing
all the day’s heat submerged
into cooler divulgences
© Sarah Whiteley
I have a very unofficial sort of bucket list. It changes all the time, but there are a few things that have remained constant and one of them was skinny dipping in the Caribbean. And Tulum last June was the perfect place to fulfill that particular wish – amazing experience! I’m heading back in October and am trying very hard to convince the beautiful person I call boyfriend to come along with me.
In other news, I think I’ve decided to combine Ebbtide and Tied to Sky into a single blog. Things may become a bit messy here while I play around and decide how I want to revamp the site in order to better accommodate both poetry and photography/art. My apologies in advance for the chaos.
Be well!
what matters is this –
that there are cranes strolling in the shallows –
a silhouetted grace against the sky’s dying bloom
that the waters of the sound cradle the brilliance
that pinkens the hills and wash the dusklight onto shore
that chilled feet are soaked in sandy shoes
and blue jeans are wet up to the knees
that cold hands find each other in the dark
and that beauty remains long after the day has gone
© Sarah Whiteley
A rough couple of days punctuated by the absolute perfection of a stroll along the Puget Sound at dusk on Saturday evening. I am so very lucky to have special friends who know just how to help me put things in perspective.
the moon has captured me
by the ankles, is
crawling through me
and I must burst
into new surfaces
this morning my hands
awoke, and for the first
time in years, ached
to find something other
than air beside them
but even without
the solid press of
your arm on mine, I
have found wonder in this
upended cup of stars
© Sarah Whiteley
I imagine sometimes
how it must be between you
and when it comes down to it
I am more than half-certain
that her spark, being
the nearer glow, is far
brighter than any feeble light
that now reaches you
from our own obscured
constellation
though I think perhaps
there are still moments
as when chill winter spurs
the stars to shine
with greater radiance
and for the briefest of beats
your eyes might rise
in sudden remembrance
as the ghost of my lips thieves
the breath from yours,
when you recall how once
the night contained
us both together
and that we were by bounds
the more brilliant gleam
© Sarah Whiteley
this morning,
before morning really,
before the light had begun
to line the eastern sky,
I walked – feet testing
the crispness of those
first fallen leaves
(someone must, after all,
be the first to fall)
while Orion hung
so impossibly bright,
so brilliant even from beneath
the glare of the streetlight,
that I had to (truly had to)
walk along with head tilted back
ridiculously celestially absorbed
in that darned belt
everyone’s always pointing out
why? I was just wondering,
does no one point out the bow
so perfectly poised
that any arrow loosed
would pierce the heaving flesh
of the great bull before him?
when I wandered face-first
into the very earthy wonder
of a spider web
take heed, my friend –
there are dangers even
in stargazing
© Sarah Whiteley
I absolutely did do this rather recently and after I’d pulled the spider web off my face, couldn’t help but laugh at myself and wonder if this was the Universe’s ever-so-subtle way of reminding me to find ways to be more grounded.
ebbtide 