KIMBERLY KLING

SPRING/SUMMER 2022 ISSUE #04 POET

KIMBERLY KLING’s first poem was published when it was selected for an award in 7th grade, and she didn’t start writing poetry again until 2017. Ever since, poems have been flowing out and taken on a life of their own. Kling lives in the high desert of Arizona where she explores homesteading with her family, adventures within the rivers and mountains, and creates herbal magic with the plants she grows and tends. The Earth is her informant of life’s lessons, and it is through the alchemy of observing the world around her and studying herself that her poems take life.

RIVERS

Rivers run through her—
torrents of muddy water
fiercely pummeling rock and silt,
beaten up,
battered,
eroded over time—
clearing the channels
for calmer weather.

When moved,
it settles
into crystal clear pools of reflection,
sparkling with wonder
and hope
and passion again.

There is beauty in all of it—
the storm and the calm.
Raging waters.
Serene sanctum.

Rivers know these things
just as wild women do.