Kelly Egan’s poetry investigates the phenomena of experience. She grew up in a small neighborhood with a small woods at the edge, and then a larger neighborhood with a smaller woods at the edge, bordering a creek and a park. Her work inevitably betrays these original dynamics of coziness, the unknown, and expanse. She now lives in San Francisco and has an MFA from St Mary’s College of CA. Find her at kellyjeanegan.com.
A murder of Octobers
You walk to the edge of a map,
extract a primrose
to de-state me
Life breaks into a symphony
Soon as it peaks
it starts to denoue
I just wanted to be over there
deeply in the dimension
of the picnic table outside our hotel
What can I say about this need
to swim to the uninhabited island
the tinier the better in a big black lake—
It seems you are drifting back
to the realm of your rockstar
we are strangers makeup, today
we are supposedly in the holy city
but I see the same streets as always
How I’d wanted it to be a regal zone—
Nonetheless we split,
make a plan
to meet for food