Kathleen Hellen
Winter 2024 | Poetry
Two Poems
iron man
everything we brushed from skyfall
in pigment ground in caves in darkness
— early elk. bison
everything from earth fleshed red, yellow
bled with bundled reeds
into magic we abandoned piled up
in a million skulls without circumference trophies
making way for iron horse that terrorized
the grasslands image of the sacred
smelted. forged. rendered into glue and ash
everything we plundered from dying stars
victoria’s dirty little secrets
one by one they jump into self-immolating fires
silky pink pajamas sick
of their attachment to the body
camisoles, baring guilt
with push-up bras that push
landfills to the top
intimate of volatiles
intimates of lead
having flirted with disasters
the thing the thong’s strung out
traumatized by bleach and dust
its string of consequences
the pretty slip-dress’s hung itself on wire
Kathleen Hellen is the recipient of the James Still Award, the Thomas Merton Prize for Poetry of the Sacred, and prizes from the H.O.W. Journal and Washington Square Review. Her debut collection Umberto’s Night won the poetry prize from Washington Writers’ Publishing House. She is the author of The Only Country Was the Color of My Skin, Meet Me at the Bottom, and two chapbooks. She lives in Baltimore.