Performing at Le Poisson Rouge, NYC in 2019
photo credit: Kat Georges, Three Rooms Press
Kathleen Florence has performed poetry with such notable luminaries as Canadian legend bill bissett at the Poet's House, NYC in 2019, and has shared the stage with New York City Maintenant poets Steve Dalanchinsky, Yuko Otomo, David Lawton, Bibbe Hansen, George Wallace, Kat Georges, Peter Carlaftes and Kofi Fosu Forson at Le Poisson Rouge (Three Rooms Press Launch, NYC, 2017, 2018, 2019 and virtually 2020). Her first feature was hosted by Great Weather for Media, NYC in July 2021. The poet collaborates with California Beat Poet Laureate Rich Ferguson as Wave Up. Kathleen has performed with Wes Rickert as Burning Iceberg, following bill bissett and Adeena Karasick at Versefest (Ottawa, 2019), opened for Canada's Poet Laureate George Elliot Clarke and legendary sound poet Paul Dutton at The Secret Handshake Gallery (Toronto 2018, 2019) and performed in the Montreal’s longest running spoken word poetry show Words & Music (Casa del Popolo, Montreal, 2018) and Kingston's Artfest Poetry Reading Series curated by Bruce Kaufman, 2017. Kathleen Florence (Reichelt)'s poems appear in Suitcase of Chrysanthemums (great weather for Media, NYC, 2018), Otoliths (Australia, 2018, 2019), Arteidolia's swifts+slows (Brooklyn, 2018) and forthcoming in Poemdemic! published by The Secret Handshake Gallery.
summer night in brooklyn was first published as high jinks in issue 52 of Otoliths, February 2019
summer night in brooklyn
rattling tin can collects echoes
on a narrow street of buildings
three stories high face to face
she is counting beats
between each kick
distracting her heavy pause reply
fingers suspended over keyboard
eyes scanning moonless night
wind too tired to pass through this room
the small window
propped open with last night's tomato can
metal rings of jupiter
bouncing back the street light spell
summer buzzing
metal boxes dripping on the sidewalk below
she counts kicks for ten blocks at least
makes a wish
hears a dog bark
woof
waits for it to break
the thing about alice was first published in Suitcase of Chrysanthemums, great weather for Media, NYC, 2018
the thing about alice
the thing about alice
other than her name is the way
she stays out of it
at the table
flying potatoes green beans apple pie
hot sauce for uncle michael who might be a liberal
in some circles but not here
alice is the only name that doesn't come from
the big book
where cousin rachel john peter got theirs
it couldn't be why she isn't like us
thinks her mother before pushing back
her chair pouring gravy quietly
fidgeting fingers under the maple
incapable of saying the things she does
when she is with her friends
about them
how they don't understand
could never see how unfair it is to be
outside
unwanted
dismissed
as if
rachel john peter michael were not -
hold that -
table swinging old man up to bat
he's gonna say something to send it through the window
rushing blood love this game made simple
two teams and only one can win
history is war, pass the gin!
alice looks down
carpet patterns peace her eyes
in lines colour weaving
her teeth tight with being right
mother returns with baked bird in its own juice
everyone eats but alice
someone refrains from asking what is wrong with you?
this is so delicious
neighbours was first published in Arteidolia's swifts+slows, Brooklyn, 2018
neighbours
our likeness
ability to reply
say we’re fine
say lots of things in language we understand
from habit demand repetitions
beliefs conditions conditional
signed on invisible lines
gravity stringed around our necks
pulling through the porthole of agreement
attracting what we know
what we grow up in
grow sideways lean into
the likeness next door
covering extremities, our costumes test weather patterns
in case it rains, in case it snows
repeat what someone else said what someone else knows
rearranging words into delicate holders of flowers
asking why they were picked what is fair who are we to care
for those who disagree
who want to change me rearrange me govern me reject me
connect relate debate rename
explain me hand me over pass me under
adjust pose sit stand
order me demand obey?
obey formula for sadists to advantage their fortunes
fortressing pacifist opposition
applications congregations any position on the spectrum
ordering bodies that don’t belong to anyone
bodies that are not free
and who is to say what we should be, like?
insert computer chip into upper lip
speak the future language of repeat?
forget the past with delete?
is there autonomy? do we challenge what is free?
abandoned books written by dead lull in the conversation
while digitalization squeezes softness from our necks
pulls our eyes into spies censoring quietly
hush hush ushering in new masters we slaved hours to buy
water boils slow we can’t know resistance
unless we insist ourselves out of uniform
reject rulers fascists who have multiplied
moving under our hidden lines
right here in our hands right next door
bluebird was first performed at sound one two, Modern Fuel Artist Run Centre, Kingston, 2017
blue bird
minus 30 is deep diving first kiss territory
what will happen next
is this going to last?
white a flash of teeth smiling
through slow dancing
my chest a freezer
delivering a letter
twenty 5 years later
stepping into snow holes
made bigger by boots before mine
my eyes flood with marriage
sigh of horses
highway 2 curving
rounding repeating confusing
love songs with a blue bird's wing
what it means to be forty, fifty, seventy 9
i take your hand
swallow your fingers in mine
understand better these bare trees
this salted road our chosen place
where sonnets grow
while sleeping bulbs turn to light
where brooms gather up corners
where longing passes unnoticed under bridges
currents travel below ice you dare to tread
all the while holding steady
always arriving always returning
the shape of your face against my lips
i can retrieve it on the coldest day
in winter, here
summer night in brooklyn was first published as high jinks in issue 52 of Otoliths, February 2019
summer night in brooklyn
rattling tin can collects echoes
on a narrow street of buildings
three stories high face to face
she is counting beats
between each kick
distracting her heavy pause reply
fingers suspended over keyboard
eyes scanning moonless night
wind too tired to pass through this room
the small window
propped open with last night's tomato can
metal rings of jupiter
bouncing back the street light spell
summer buzzing
metal boxes dripping on the sidewalk below
she counts kicks for ten blocks at least
makes a wish
hears a dog bark
woof
waits for it to break
the thing about alice was first published in Suitcase of Chrysanthemums, great weather for Media, NYC, 2018
the thing about alice
the thing about alice
other than her name is the way
she stays out of it
at the table
flying potatoes green beans apple pie
hot sauce for uncle michael who might be a liberal
in some circles but not here
alice is the only name that doesn't come from
the big book
where cousin rachel john peter got theirs
it couldn't be why she isn't like us
thinks her mother before pushing back
her chair pouring gravy quietly
fidgeting fingers under the maple
incapable of saying the things she does
when she is with her friends
about them
how they don't understand
could never see how unfair it is to be
outside
unwanted
dismissed
as if
rachel john peter michael were not -
hold that -
table swinging old man up to bat
he's gonna say something to send it through the window
rushing blood love this game made simple
two teams and only one can win
history is war, pass the gin!
alice looks down
carpet patterns peace her eyes
in lines colour weaving
her teeth tight with being right
mother returns with baked bird in its own juice
everyone eats but alice
someone refrains from asking what is wrong with you?
this is so delicious
neighbours was first published in Arteidolia's swifts+slows, Brooklyn, 2018
neighbours
our likeness
ability to reply
say we’re fine
say lots of things in language we understand
from habit demand repetitions
beliefs conditions conditional
signed on invisible lines
gravity stringed around our necks
pulling through the porthole of agreement
attracting what we know
what we grow up in
grow sideways lean into
the likeness next door
covering extremities, our costumes test weather patterns
in case it rains, in case it snows
repeat what someone else said what someone else knows
rearranging words into delicate holders of flowers
asking why they were picked what is fair who are we to care
for those who disagree
who want to change me rearrange me govern me reject me
connect relate debate rename
explain me hand me over pass me under
adjust pose sit stand
order me demand obey?
obey formula for sadists to advantage their fortunes
fortressing pacifist opposition
applications congregations any position on the spectrum
ordering bodies that don’t belong to anyone
bodies that are not free
and who is to say what we should be, like?
insert computer chip into upper lip
speak the future language of repeat?
forget the past with delete?
is there autonomy? do we challenge what is free?
abandoned books written by dead lull in the conversation
while digitalization squeezes softness from our necks
pulls our eyes into spies censoring quietly
hush hush ushering in new masters we slaved hours to buy
water boils slow we can’t know resistance
unless we insist ourselves out of uniform
reject rulers fascists who have multiplied
moving under our hidden lines
right here in our hands right next door
bluebird was first performed at sound one two, Modern Fuel Artist Run Centre, Kingston, 2017
blue bird
minus 30 is deep diving first kiss territory
what will happen next
is this going to last?
white a flash of teeth smiling
through slow dancing
my chest a freezer
delivering a letter
twenty 5 years later
stepping into snow holes
made bigger by boots before mine
my eyes flood with marriage
sigh of horses
highway 2 curving
rounding repeating confusing
love songs with a blue bird's wing
what it means to be forty, fifty, seventy 9
i take your hand
swallow your fingers in mine
understand better these bare trees
this salted road our chosen place
where sonnets grow
while sleeping bulbs turn to light
where brooms gather up corners
where longing passes unnoticed under bridges
currents travel below ice you dare to tread
all the while holding steady
always arriving always returning
the shape of your face against my lips
i can retrieve it on the coldest day
in winter, here