we were, for a time,
each other’s clocks –
the tick-ticking of
our fingers apart,
counting the breaths
before between until –
until
2 AM yearning strikes,
hungry as bells on Sunday –
and we unwind, reset,
sweep the seconds
from our faces,
cheeks to shoulders
for a minute
how I swallowed
every moment,
even the ones
empty
of
you,
and sired a void
within the void
© Sarah Whiteley
this is where I begin to feel
the pull of other roads
and if I lose you in the unwinding –
still, it is better than
the knots of not leaving
there is a necessity now
to disentanglement
and that yellow blaze
down the middle is not
the regret we expect –
but only the way forward
© Sarah Whiteley
to one who waited
quiet as dust
hidden and pale
as peonies biding time
beneath March rains
I heard the scuttle
of your yearning
crossing the grass
beneath pale water skies
our unutterances
have left us
without bearing
and meager
as hungry
for one another
as spring buds
for a nearer sun
© Sarah Whiteley
I drink you in kisses
as long as the shadows
the spired pines relinquish
to earth at day’s descent
and still am unquenched –
as unmannered and uncontained
as the scattered scramble
of brambles over the things
they do not but yearn
to call their own –
how is it I consume
and am consumed?
© Sarah Whiteley
when I am thus,
limbs laid out
at length
long after lights
have languished low,
the stray stayings
of you –
mere murmurs
of moments –
linger long
in evening’s teasings
of my curtains,
though they (I),
remain (not) tangled
in yearnings
of you
© Sarah Whiteley
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