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Kelli Stevens Kane

Website
Years: 2011, 2014, 2015

Biography

Kelli Stevens Kane is a poet, playwright, and oral historian based in Pittsburgh, PA. She's a Cave Canem Fellow and an August Wilson Center Fellow, and has received Advancing Black Arts in Pittsburgh grants from The Pittsburgh Foundation. She's studied at VONA, Hurston/Wright, and Callaloo. She's read her poetry and oral history, and performed her one woman show, BIG GEORGE, nationally. Her work is published in North American Review, Little Patuxent Review, Split This Rock, Under a Warm Green Linden, Painted Bride Quarterly, and African Voices.

Poem

(59)

 

She is risen.

No one will fly higher

no one will enjoy more the loud shouts of angels

or the reverse ocean of the sky.

I got a fever yesterday

because I held too many spirits in me.

They got too crowded and started to sweat me out.

My mama anointed me with Vicks VapoRub

and she put the humidifier on

like a constant genie coming out of the bottle.

And two wooden birds watched me with their right eyes

and a wooden man beat his drum beside me

and a wooden cat kept watch on the other side

and I was held in place by wooden floors

and I was tucked in by wooden doors

and daylight was framed by the wooden window

and if I could see a bit of glory I would

and if I could talk about it any more I would.

-from “Hallelujah Science”