Poetry
Kathy Connolly has been writing poetry for many years and has recently begun to submit it for publication and contests. Here are a few examples of published work:
Rise
(Published in Fall 2004, Connecticut Woodlands)I rise to vistas on
Streamside trails
Breathing the humid air
Beloved of ferns
I rise to rock that
Denies trees their root holds
Closer to red-tail hawk
Sustained on stationary thermals
I rise to vistas on
Mountains called
Totoket
Talcott
Tom
Stepping stones
Along the processional path
Of monarchs
On their long aerial stride south
I rise
to Connecticut vistas
Where waves of air
Splash my comprehension with
Cities, farms, highways, schools
Finally to the dry air of power
And humility
Where
Wind wicks away the
Damp warmth of a body exerted
By a good climb.Timeless
(Honorable Mention, Brodine Poetry Contest, Connecticut Poetry Society, 2003)The heart lives timeless at her open doors,
heedless of the weather.
Like a young one waiting for a mother,
who’s absent long past dinnertime.
Like a child occupying a front doorstep,
the important step that softly signals,
“Father’s home.”
Time’s linear path rolls past the open door,
The young one transported
Its undeniable way
As she lives her vigil.
Her inner eye is perfectly young.
She sees only an endless lane where
Her expected miracle
Has yet to be sighted.Color Within The Lines
(Fall 2004, Long River Run II Anthology, Connecticut Poetry Society)They didn't tell me
I'd be stuck at the grocery store
On my way to greatness.
They didn't tell me
The search for Rice Krispies
Would compete with life's major deadlines.
They didn't tell me
I'd have to experience transcendence
Waiting for take-out
No one mentioned:
The deepest expressions
Must take place
While pretending to color within the lines.Where is that hidden weak point
In the bubble wrap around my life?
It's not at the grocery
I've scoured the shelves
It's not at the dry cleaner
I've made the man
Spin the plastic bags
a hundred times.
It's not at the take-out counter.
I can't find it in the bag.
It's not at the traffic light.Where is it,
the hidden flaw in the space-time continuum?
Keyhole to the universal mind,
Where the big thoughts are unlatched,
Where I soar at escape velocity?
Outdistancing that which makes me
Color within the lines.
Comments about Kathy's Creative Writing:
"Kathy's poems sound like a zingly monologue about the wasteful and absurd aspects of modern life. At the root of them is her respect for Nature's order and beauty."
Christine Woodside, editor, Connecticut Woodlands Magazine and AMC Outdoors
“Kathy’s writing has strong narrative drive and excellent use of detail and description. The reader is quickly engaged by her voice and is eager to stay with it to the conclusion of the piece.”
Sharon Charde, director of the Block Island Womens’ Writing Retreats, also author of the award-winning Bad Girl At The Altar Rail, Flume Press
Awards and publications:
"That's How Mr. Rodale Says to Do It" Living, 2008
"Dear Madeleine," essay, in South Carolina Review, 2008
"Pray," poem, Inspirit, Summer 2007
"E-mail to God," essay, RiverSedge, Spring 2007
"Bossy the Cow," essay, Living Magazine, spring 2007
"The Next Step" won first place in the Labyrinth Society essay contest, October 2005
"Grocery Games" received 2nd place in the "Save Our Earth" contest of the National Federation of State Poetry Societies, May 2005
"Light" received an Honorable Mention in the Winchell Contest of the Connecticut Poetry Society, 2005
Residency at Dorset Writer's Colony, Dorset, Vermont, May 2005
"Timeless" received an Honorable Mention, Brodine Poetry Contest, Connecticut Poetry Society, 2003
"I Used To Be a Lawn" appears in the Fall, 2005 edition of Connecticut Woodlands
"Fragile Love" appeared in Connecticut Woodlands, January 2005
"Social Experiment" was read on National Public Radio's Themes & Variations, November, 2004
"Color Within the Lines," Long River Run II Anthology, Fall 2004, Connecticut Poetry Society
"Walls in Woods" appeared in Connecticut Woodlands, July 2001