this poem contains a bird
– or perhaps two –
being circumspect things,
they perch first upon
the edge of the gutter
above my head
to survey the wood-slatted,
peeled-paint valley
of the porch below –
seed on the other side
and if I am still enough,
and if I do not move
from my hidden roost
of the door frame,
they will brave the gap
– landing in tandem –
and allow me to write them
© Sarah Whiteley
I cannot keep these days from sinking –
thirty-four years away, I awake
to the smell of lake water
and its soft slaps against the poles
of the dock, the wood on aluminum
of oars caught in oarlocks
three and more decades gone, and I know
with certainty that the lake bottom
is still sandy, and that at twilight,
two loons will arrive – carved from
a perfect summer night – to begin their calls
with rising chortles pulled into those
longer notes that seek out our edges,
indistinguishable from the edges of the sky
thirty-four years back, I might return
and instruct that wide-eyed summer self
to plant her heart in that space,
where it might quietly wait with the pines,
with the dry sighs of summer grasses,
and the smooth leaves of the wintergreen –
for some other sun-quivering July day,
when her feet can touch bottom again
© Sarah Whiteley
for everyone but the birds,
winter is about waiting
they must wonder why it is
we’ve seemingly stalled
piled on days of cold and rain
have made us slow and passive
and we miss seeing that
what is gray is also glistening
© Sarah Whiteley
Wandering Wonderful is available for pre-order from Finishing Line Press. For information on mail ordering (vs online ordering), details are provided under my Available Books page.
I cannot tell you, for example,
that I am resting against the ache
of not seeing you rise in the morning
to sip your coffee at the window
or that the prospect of you
is the hidden sun in my throat
that glows, that pulls roots, and yes,
I would joyfully plant myself beside you
and also, I cannot tell you
that you are my favorite kind of ‘yes,’
my affirmation that the mountain
will not fall from beneath me
and that the whole of my skin
sleeps until you are near enough
to wake it – that all of me resides
inside almost, maybe, not quite
© Sarah Whiteley
the waiting creeps up
from feet, passes hips,
submerges wrists
in slippery uncertainty
naturally, the ear
strains to catch
the subtle shift of air
that marks departure
no one ever sings
through the smoke
of staying –
love and smoke both
only ever go
sometimes you
get so caught up
in the leaving,
all kisses become
eventual goodbyes
another bottle
sits on the table,
waiting for me to
swallow myself again
with pretending,
for your feet
to recede down
the front steps
down other, more
diffident streets
© Sarah Whiteley
this is how things end then –
with dancing, and a ruined heart
unexpected and yet somehow not,
since this is you afterall
this is an emptiness that cannot
redeem itself with waiting
but I’ve grown used to thorns,
have almost forgotten the fireflies,
have known always that the flames
could be turned to strike me
and this is the way it goes-
trusting an incautious other with fire
and praying for something other than ash
© Sarah Whiteley
on a day when light is tired,
and creeps just barely
across the floor to nudge
a perhaps foot in recognition
of shared apathy
do not mistake sadness
for a sort of ingratitude –
I am thankful for the hooks
that wrench up the grief
from beneath the calm
it is a change at least
in latitude, a revision
of a current insufferable state
and an airing out of that
which has stagnated within
let light be tired then,
and just barely there –
let us be dim together
and somnolent at least until
some fresher air may rouse us
© Sarah Whiteley
if I needed a reason
to pace the floor,
pass by the door a fifth,
tenth, fourteenth time,
to check the gas,
to raise the windows,
to create just a little more
space for the dark
to slip into
if I needed a reason
to count the passing dogs
with impatient owners
hurrying them home,
to touch again the spines
of books whose pages
have kept their silences
firmly to themselves
and failed to distract me
if I needed a reason
to press my ear
nearer to the air
we shared,
to wait fruitlessly
on footfalls in the hallway
to pass, to pause,
to toe the crack
at the bottom of my door
if I needed a reason
to twist and spin
myself into a thread
thin and taut, fraught
with all the things
we wait to occur
while all our actions
compounded, amount to
a paralyzing passivity
if I needed a reason
to box up all these hours,
to cut these ties
and stop the gainless pacing,
to close my eyes,
and finally close then
the window blinds –
you didn’t stop by to ask it,
and that’s the reason why
© Sarah Whiteley
I would bury them,
my sorrows,
deep into the loam –
into the comfort
of earth, and dark,
and waiting
I would bury them,
these burdens,
beneath the roots
of the locust that
stood as witness
to their birth
I would bury them,
my troubles,
close by where I’ll see
come the spring
these troubles become
more beautiful things
© Sarah Whiteley
seems every corner these days,
yellow reluctance hangs from the trees
but can you maybe see the small promise
in the perchance-forgetfulness
of coming wintry rimes
where we might biding sleep
’til wakened by warmer times
© Sarah Whiteley
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