Sheila E. Murphy


Monsoon Pantoum

So soft so safe to be within this home.
Humidity begins to empty onto rooftops. 
I whisper over tea too hot to drink.
The shelf life of affection fades with breath.

Humidity begins to empty onto rooftops.
Dots of rain reach pavement.
The shelf life of affection fades with breath.
I look for photographs of moments I've deemed real.

Dots of rain reach pavement.
A wavy wind pushes across the span of lives.
I look for photographs of moments I've deemed real.
You are leaving and not coming back.

A wavy wind pushes across the span of lives.
Mourning brings no sweetness.
You are leaving and not coming back.
I age a little while then hold.

Mourning brings no sweetness.
Grief remains unpainted.
I age a little while then hold.
Memory reaches back to find vibrato.

Grief remains unpainted.
You appear in peace to all my senses.
Memory reaches back to find vibrato, 
As storm approaches my pale heart.

You appear in peace to all my senses.
A minuet of daylight thins beneath this gray.
As storm approaches my pale heart,
Here within these rooms I finger melody.

A minuet of daylight thins beneath this gray.
I whisper over tea too hot to drink.
Here within these rooms I finger melody.
So soft so safe to be within this home.

Sheila E. Murphy is the recipient of the Gertrude Stein Award for her book Letters to Unfinished J. (Green Integer Press, 2003). Murphy's book titled Reporting Live from You Know Where (2018) won the Hay(na)Ku Poetry Book Prize Competition from Meritage Press (U.S.A.) and xPress(ed) (Finland). Broken Sleep Books brought out the book As If To Tempt the Diatonic Marvel from the Ivory (2018). In 2020, Luna Bisonte Prods released Golden Milk. Murphy's forthcoming book Permission to Relax will appear from BlazeVOX. Murphy earns her living as a management consultant and researcher and holds the PhD degree.

 
 

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