Sarah White
Sarah White’s most recent poetry collection is “to one who bends my time” (Deerbrook Editions, 2017). Other recent publications include “The Unknowing Muse” (Dos Madres, 2015) and Wars Don’t Happen Anymore (Deerbrook Editions, 2015). She lives in New York City and divides her time between writing and painting.
My Love Speaks of Time and Light
saying Light travels at a constant speed,
but Time does not.
I ask him why. He answers:
Think of what Time is.
I say Time can be measured
like milk. He reminds me
that Time is not to be found in milk,
but in the souring of milk, not in a leaf,
but in the spread of early foliage,
and the cold wind
that blows dry leaves away.
Time has no absolute speed or weight:
A woman may live long enough
to feel curves and cavities
change along her spine.
Time in bone and cartilage
has a different weight
from Time in the year of a child
who only lives a year, and
Time for the child’s grieving mother.
Her days can’t be measured
with numbers like days
in the life of Earth
that circles the Sun,
never slowing, never
turning back, but traveling on
across the curvature of Space.
Sheila-Na-Gig online 