Inhaling the Salish Sea: Poems from Whidbey Island

by Sheryl Clough

Sheryl Clough

Eighteen years living on beautiful Whidbey Island laid the groundwork for Inhaling the Salish Sea: Poems from Whidbey Island, Sheryl Clough’s third chapbook. Sheryl has worked as a paralegal, whitewater river guide, Upward Bound teacher, and college instructor. She finished her MFA in Creative Writing from the University of Alaska Fairbanks, where she also taught composition and environmental literature to undergraduates. After several solo sea kayak trips in Alaska and Canada, she moved back to Washington State, to a bluff overlooking an arm of the Salish Sea, where eagles fly overhead daily. Sheryl edited and published the anthologies Surrounded: Living With Islands and Through A Distant Lens: Travel Poems. Her first chapbook, Ring of Fire, Sea of Stone won first prize from the San Gabriel Valley Literary Festival. Her second chapbook, Poul na Brone: In the Hollow of the Millstone, is based on travels in Ireland and was published by Flutter Press. Her interests include environmental issues, duplicate bridge, and travel. Sheryl and her husband support the Whidbey Camano Land Trust and the Whatcom Land Trust. Contact Sheryl at: Scatchetpoet@gmail.com.

praise for Inhaling the Salish Sea: Poems from Whidbey Island

This newest collection by Sheryl Clough, Inhaling the Salish Sea, describes, with fond detail and sometimes sly humor, her life on Whidbey Island. Each poem is a paean to the rich life that surrounds her, from the motionless stance of blue herons to luminous fireweed. As she says in “Why I Love June,” “Is there gratitude enough / to balance all this beauty?”

- Diane Stone, author of Small Favors

Sheryl Clough’s time on Whidbey Island taught her what could be gained by getting lost far from the mainland. Haunted by the ghosts of early settlers, Inhaling the Salish Sea examines the value of community, the lessons and vicissitudes of daily life, and gratitude for the miracles that disrupt our routines and open up unforeseen possibilities. Nothing escapes the poet’s attention: bumper stickers, street signs, church reader boards, eagles, even the vernacular overheard in the small-town grocery store. The quiet wisdom found in these poems allows us to “lay our burdens down on cedared ground, / fragrant nourishment for the weary.” 

- Christopher Luna, Inaugural Poet Laureate of Clark County, WA (2013-2017) and founder of Ghost Town Poetry Open Mic