Karen Quickley: Poems & Publications

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Karen Quickley: Poems & Publications *

One of Karen Quickley’s first-ever published poems is titled “Sunflowers in August

Read it in its entirety below!

(First featured in Adelaide Literary Magazine)

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She walks the gravel one-lane road

to the gardens at the farm. Where

are the goats? she wonders as she passes

their quarters. She saw the donkey

as she drove in to the farm—all alone

as usual, meandering around.

The horse couple, in their usual field,

doing their horse thing.

As usual, the geese made a lot of noise.

In the gardens, she remembered the quick, black snake

that slid between her feet there the other day.

No peacocks today.

Just one sunflower stalk down

from yesterday’s heavy rains.

She staked it back up with a piece of wood

cleared from her plot

in the beginning.

How she admired the sunflower plant

with the thickest stalk. Some redness to it,

hairy. How she appreciated that so many

had withstood the rain and the wind.

A small lustrous crop of zinnias coming up

in the late August light, not yet in bloom.

The road to the gardens is shady.

Today the ground beneath the gravel

was very dark and damp.

How she enjoys gravel now

and prefers it.

No jet skis in the background today.

No motor boats.

Just a little bit of noise from a small group

of cattle nearby, most of them lying around

enjoying the weather.

The cattle take interest in her

as she approaches their fence

to toss her weeds.

She speaks sweetly to them, but obviously

no one else speaks to them.

A day like many others,

yet different. The light has changed.

It is cooler. One can feel the fall

sweeping in on its reliable schedule.

She is tired, and sick of missing

a man she loves. She wonders

if there will ever come a time

when she will introduce him

to her small but thriving garden,

the sweet goats, the somber donkey,

the gorgeous peacocks—the glory

of the whole farm.

She wonders if she will write a poem

when she goes home—will the universe

speak to her then as it does as she is gazing

upon sunflowers about to bloom?

Will she remember her own grandeur?

She grows restless with each day

as she waits for love, but is grateful

for the black and brown cattle, the pigs clunking

at their metal food station, the overcrowded

tomato plants in someone else’s plot…

She is grateful for the coffee she drank

with breakfast. For the dramatic clouds

passing by. The push and tug of the wind today.

In the August of her life now,

she wonders what’s to come.

Substack Spotlight!

A Poet in Love (A Poet’s Journey)- A Literary Diary

Follow the literary path of emerging

American poet and writer Karen Quickley.

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Mostly a Woman

“I’m coming out again in my online life, as bisexual

as well as trigender. Life is too short to do

otherwise.”

Additional Writing & Information

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ILet’s Begin

“After college, I stopped writing poetry until I

was inspired to do so again by my

membership at Lake Village Homestead, an

organic cooperative farm in Kalamazoo,

Michigan.”

The Comfort of Cats

“Primary witnesses, best friends and family.”