Albert Starkey, Pogorelc Sanctuary

Albert Starkey’s poetry has appeared in several literary journals, magazines and two anthologies, nationally and internationally. He is a past winner of The Atlanta Review’s International poetry competition, a winner of the International Library of Poetry’s Open Poetry Contest and a winner of the Carriage House Poetry Prize of Tiferet Journal.  Locally, Al’s poetry has been exhibited in Cape Cod art galleries and museums, published in local newspapers and magazines, and aired several times on NPR radio. His latest book of poems is titled, Whistling Underwater, published in 2018. A former therapist and spiritual director, Al and his wife, Susan, have lived in Colorado and Ireland before settling in the village of Yarmouth Port, Massachusetts in 2015.

Sanctuary
By Albert Starkey

The air finds itself catching a breath  
as echoes flow from storied waters 
to bring an ease with is-ness where it is 
so life has a place to work itself out.  

It is still as you walk amid the trees 
thick as thieves, knowing who’s who 
while yet unruffled and welcoming. 
Everything that waits lives with them.  

This is the place to be when being calls 
when the birds begin to chant at dawn 
and what’s not yet lived readies to rise 
with you, out of you, into wildness. 

Listen

Visit

Located at the Pogerelc Sanctuary viewing deck, Barnstable Land Trust Conservation Center 1540 Main St., West Barnstable.