Grace Notes
Sheryl White

Bent and young-backed, we turned                           
seaweed-baked stones on their heads.
The water breathed. What we desired
 
hid in shards of fog blue and aqua, miming  
tide pool mosaics. Silent, knees
biting the rocks, we grasped
 
sea glass. A boy came on foot,
sat by the road, his lips cupped
over the silvery mouth
 
of a flute. Its clean voice washed                                           
the air, not more than birdsong, but liquid
in the wind, like winged fins
 
above our bowed heads. We were muted,
and he played. Something stirred
in the beach roses. Suns circled,

quiet and whole. We clung
to the salt air, turned and fisted
​our sharp find in our hands.


After Life

Oranges crowd a basket, fresh,
untouched. Last week’s gone out
to loam, finished, blackened,
 
discarded. Inside a small fan blurs,
a freezer sweats, in another room
someone dials the phone, and a clock--
 
electric, clicking, wheezing—stops
at each second. Unused, the kettle shines.
The last, week-scarred lily, left
 
like a last kiss, releases a sigh
of petals. One door opens, closes,      
close. Shoes whisper across                           
 
polished floors. Still air silts
into the corner, under a chair
a small knot of dust settles.
 
 
 
 
 

 
 

About the Author:  Sheryl White is an artist and writer living in Boston. Her writing has been published in Ibbetson Street Press, Blast Furnace, Solstice Literary Journal, Poetry Quarterly, Halfway Down the Stairs, and The Boston Globe, and is upcoming in Split Rock Review. In 2016, she received a Massachusetts Cultural Council Poetry Finalist Grant and was selected for a Mayor of Boston Poetry Program award.

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