sheila murphy

 

Looking

Moment’s temporary latch
To moment next
And then the future
Had already passed

Index this day
Our daily lace along the shore
I ride the text
Of rain again

And docents
Modifying grace
Small sequel to
These blustery

Contiguous young
Incidents reported
On a spawned
Lithe sort of winter

 

Across

Viaducts give way
Until a slipshod thunder
Vacuous if not
Serene as trills

As rapidly as thought
Slips free the thin
Stains in toward
Repertoire

Some tensile folded
Pastures
Antithetical to
Relaxation anyway

Soprano exercise
Lacked proximate
Reach as twilled riffs
Stark wheat toying

 

At Her Desk

Afternoon goes by unnoticed
The very slim immobile
Lathering nets grape stones
What was filed remains

And on the square of screen
She watches voice turn
Treble and the matching face
Accustom to her

Pacing and her ruminative
Luster unalloyed by
Dreamed imposters
Praying to have met

Paved daytime laving
Slipsong near a craft
Then salting pasture
Generally soft

 

A Moment

Strain leaves and then my breath equals its softness. Fractions nearly tepid space themselves between one piece of punctuation and the left side of canary streets. Is Africa within your saying how the worth goes dry? A guessed form of hesitation passes, and the surface case, a glass beside the sofa. Pause stretched out examining the face of radio while lying on the carpet. The secret of applause is being severed from anticipation and most thought.

One parcel beyond exorbitantly priced other still in tune

 

And When She Breaks

It is her voice only
Not my mimicry
Not my surface say-so
It is how I am appearing
To replace what there is
To do at last
One mingles and one casts
A line one says
That line one reminisces
Its effect one trains
Least sum of squadron
Toward penultimate vacation
Trapped between the lines
Of code and captivation

 

Trade

One fears the hated job will go away
On-edge behavior touches
And what is passes
Mouth to mouth
During a meeting various
Proclaimed slices of apprehension
Mostly virtual détente
Grow true by virtue of
Intensity the wave of viaduct
Welcomes the state of grace
Where hinges malt along
Caprice to merge with
Reverence

 



 

Sheila Murphy
Sheila E. Murphy's book manuscript Letters to Unfinished J. was selected in this year's open poetry competition sponsored by Sun & Moon Press, and will be published by Sun & Moon. Dennis Phillips was the judge. Falling in Love Falling in Love With You Syntax: Selected and New Poems has just been released by Potes & Poets Press. Recent works include A Clove of Gender (Stride Press, 1995). Murphy's work has been widely anthologized, most recently in Fever Dreams: Contemp orary Arizona Poetry (The University of Arizona Press, 1997) and The Gertrude Stein Awards in Contemporary Poetry (Sun & Moon Press, 1994, 1995). The Contemporary Authors Autobiography Series recently brought out an autobiography of Sheila E. Murphy, including photographs of Murphy with family and friends.

Sheila Murphy co-founded with Beverly Carver and continues to coordinate the Scottsdale Center for the Arts Poetry Series, now in its eleventh season. Murphy is President of the management consulting firm Sheila Murphy Associates. Since 1976, she has made Phoenix, Arizona, her home.



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