Nicole Kimball is an emerging poet from SLC, UT. Her pieces are published in Sunspot Lit, Mom Egg Review, Sky Island Journal, 12 Mile Review, or are forthcoming. A four-time Best of the Net Nominee, her artwork is featured in downtown Salt Lake.
Burdens
I am the burden of life– the sound of night
breaking into two, beading into fine firelight.
My worry of things that will never happen stay transfixed in wax
where a listening ear once was connected to a head.
My body speaks like a mule. Hemoglobin
slowly heats before thawing past the point of excitement.
Is this when love is turned to grease?
On cold days, the roses of the garden drool in sugary scent
until frostbite enjoys the whole meal. It is sad, but yes–
the most beautiful things grow old and collapse into the hands that
gave them life.
Reunion
This very same light once flooded you–
the fluttering orb of child’s play. The light
of a dance above the sea, the tides lost in the sand’s milk.
You felt the peace of owning the right heart, ventricles
sewn thickly with human bone and human falter.
This very same child once flooded you–
The bareness of what you love and what you know
you shouldn’t.
