Poetry By Sheila E. Murphy

Aurélien Adoue CC




Parting Such Orderly Sweet

We keep a good long melody in the glove compartment to preserve the apartment from littery things lacking any semblance of orderliness. He was just an orderly you decried for someone's not being a doctor. I protested out of ignorance, starting at the top with the name middled on parchment with thin signature beneath. I have believed in him despite your relieving me of the duty of love. And about that enclosure: it's as unrosy as compost and just that hopeful. Hope lies upon the staff where whiffs of notes momentarily reside. I'm listening as the call-in shrink would say to the air full of audience that sustained his paycheck, reruns yielding royalties. Speaking of which, keep singing unaccompanied, for I have always loved your voice. Reminds of eastern screech owl from the oak trees at night in the woods where we lived. Nostalgia lacks facthood in the neighborhood of wooden fences punched together to deflect intrusion. Meanwhile, I small to the task of brushing away unlikely forays into repair work best performed by solo acts claiming to love their work alongside a lack of tact.

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Sheila E. Murphy. A Pushcart-nominated poet, recent appearances include Gargoyle, Poetry Bay, Poetry, Lana Turner, Poetose, Volta, and others. Most recent book publications are I Want to Be Your Radio (Unlikely Books, 2025), Escritoire (Lavender Ink, 2025), and Permission to Relax (BlazeVOX Books, 2023). Recently performed at the New Orleans Poetry Festival. Won the Gertrude Stein Poetry Award for Letters to Unfinished J. (Green Integer Press, 2003) and the Hay(ha)ku Book Prize for Reporting Live From You Know Where (Meritage Press, 2018). She lives in Phoenix, Arizona.
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Her Wikipedia page can be found at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sheila_Murphy_(poet)