Storyteller of the Week

 Carolynn Kingyens

  

 Carolyn Kingyens and her daughters.

Carolynn Kingyens was born and raised in Northeast Philadelphia, a community enclave called Parkwood, a predominately blue collar Catholic neighborhood consisting of mid-1950's style brick row houses in domino-like configurations that were prone to chronic leaks. Back then, Disney World had nothing on Saint Anselm's carnivals.

Carolynn's path to writing was a winding one rather than linear. It was music that first drew her to writing poetry as it was more accessible at the time than literature. Some of Carolynn's early "teachers" of poetry include Tori Amos, Counting Crows, Bruce Springston, Bob Dylan, Tom Waits, Ani DiFranco, Notorious B.I.G., and Radiohead. She can remember going to Sam Goody to buy Amos' debut Little Earthquakes in 1992. Afterwards she'd go straight home to her daybed, where she read every single poetic line in time to the music. The strong lyric-filled music taught her the importance of wordplay, poetic structure, duality and dimension, irony, forward movement, beat and rhythm. She would discover the joy of reading in 1995, after a mentor-friend had given her his copy of John Irving's A Prayer for Owen Meany, only saying two words—Read it. From that point on, she began to devour books at a rapid pace, making up for lost time.

Although some of Carolynn's early poems got published in the late nineties, she'd end up taking a hiatus from writing poetry for almost a decade before picking it up again in 2008,  and haven't stopped since. Carolynn would write after her two daughters were born in 2010 and 2011 respectively, writing around their sleep schedules and playdates. She often wrote in isolation.

In 2018, Carolynn had the realization that she wanted to put out a debut book of poetry after a decade of writing and publishing poems. In 2019, she'd receive a contract from Kelsay Books, and cried tears of joy.  It was the first time in her life when she felt heard and empowered. The poems in both her debut Before the Big Bang Makes a Sound and follow up Coupling were written between 2008 - 2021.  Barnes & Noble (Brooklyn) wrote a February 2020 Instagram post: "Contemporary, urban, and impassioned, Carolynn Kingyens’ poetry resonates with a darkening echo still felt long after the first read."  She was also nominated for Best New Poets by Silent Press.

In the Spring 2020, at the start of the pandemic, Carolynn began to write short fiction after being encouraged by a novelist-friend. Ten short stories would get published within a span of three years. Carolynn is currently working on the completion of a short fiction manuscript with the working title Attachment Theory.  She values the connections she's making with fellow poets and writers along this mutual writing journey. The human connection helps to bear the burden of the human condition. And what a burden that is.


Comments by Editor Sharon Waller Knutson

I have been a fan of Carolynn Kingyens poetry for many years since we both published in Corey Cook’s two journals Orange Room Review and Red Eft Review but we didn’t meet until Carolyn posted a comment on one of my poems in 2020 and I read the comment and I commented on her poem the next day. The instant we started emailing we formed a deep connection, partly because we are both Aries and our birthdays are a few days apart. We bonded over our passion for family, animals, writing fiction, poetry and book reviews, watching movies and following true crime trials. She is one of my biggest cheerleaders and I am hers. She has written blurbs on two of my books and we both wrote reviews for each other’s books.

https://acrossthemargin.com/carolynn-kingyens-coupling-a-review/

https://acrossthemargin.com/book-review-what-the-clairvoyant-doesnt-say/

We also consoled each other on the deaths of my son in 2021 and her mother this summer. Carolyn recently published this powerful poignant tribute to her mother.

http://redeftreview.blogspot.com/2023/07/orbit-obit-by-carolynn-kingyens.html

Carolynn says her poetry contains true experiences but is hidden inside the fiction. “I feel safer that way,” she says. Her poems read like mini novels you don’t want to put down until you’ve read the last word. I have chosen five of Carolyn’s poems that impacted me so much I still remember them.

Desperado

Two women, no relation,
both exited a Whole Foods
in somewhat succession,
walked past my Audi Q5,
idling in front.

The first woman wore
jeans, the color of a sand
dollar, and a lemon
meringue-colored sweater
that highlighted her dewy
skin as she sashayed.

‘Yale Law’ emblazoned
in bold text on both sides
of her canvas bag,
in case I missed it,
filled, I imagined,
with delicacies
for a backyard boil –
corn on the cob,
red bliss potatoes;
shrimp — crawfish — 
sausage; a bottle
of chilled Riesling.

A man, around the same
age as my father, also sat
idling across from me
inside his Silverado
when the sashayed-one,
a perfect vision,
walked between the chasm
our cars made in the
Whole Foods’ parking lot.

I watched him, watching
her as she walked toward
her Range Rover.

The second woman,
in contrast, wore black
yoga pants stained with
bronze streaks I recognized
from a mist of spray-bleach.

Hair, hurried-damp;
facial features, much fuller,
as she appeared to carry the
burdens of the world
inside her brown paper bag.

The older man kept
inching his Silverado
into the woman’s path,
his face showing
annoyance.

I have seen that look
before on my father’s face
the time he asked me
to skim the aftermath
of a summer storm
from atop the surface
of the pool.

And when my skim-job
didn’t meet the standard,
he would snatch the gigantic
butterfly net out
of my hand, turn his
whole body away from me,
and shake his big, square head — 
a head, I thought,
looked like the shape
of a thumb.


Regression at the Middle-age Soiree

You're surprised when
Blythe Monk,
your daughter's
soft-spoken preschool teacher
from years ago,
who always smells
of Chanel No.5,
pulls out a sandwich bag
full of neatly-wrapped joints
from her COACH purse.

For a brief moment,
you think she's holding
a bag full of Bang Snaps,
those white, twist-tie
wrapper explosives
you once threw
on the ground with glee
when you were a child,
decades ago.

You reach in and take two
Bang Snap-joints;
one for now,
one for later.

And you think —
This is middle-age
regression
while standing
in the midst
of middle-school parents
at the soiree,
where chardonnay
and sangria keep
flowing for hours.

Your thoughts ruminate:

My husband is sleeping
in the guest room; says
it's because of my snoring.

My daughter hates me.

I get side cramps
every time I bend over
to zip-up my favorite,
black suede boots.

I hate my life.

You can feel your defenses
fall as trees do —
loud and disastrous.

Next, you're flirting
with your widower neighbor
with the meticulous lawn —
the retired, tight-lipped
CIA agent, who jogs
every single day
at the crack of dawn,
no matter the weather.

His self-discipline shames
you.

His self-discipline shames
everyone at the party.

You drink sangria
until your mouth has a
port-wine stain mustache.

You twerk on the widower
with the nice lawn.

You twerk on the soft-spoken
Blythe Monk.

You twerk atop
the breakfast bar
until you fall down —
hard.

Small as a Mouse

I mistook tolerance as love
for so long, I grew small
and quiet, a mouse
making a home
inside a load-bearing wall,
content with a matchstick
bed and wedge of Swiss.
My high frequency
heartbeat tortured the cat,
but no one else
in that house.

Even now, I still apologize –
Sorry, you bumped into me;
Sorry, you got even
over a perceived slight;
Sorry, for your spreading
lies so convincingly,
I lost my past
and present at once.

 My friend, by contrast,
grew stoic and unmovable.

The last time we met
for drinks at the pub,
we were two shadows lost
in conversation –
one big as a brownstone,
the other small as a mouse.

Bathroom Crucifix

The first time I touched
a crucifix
I was five years old
in my grandmother's
powder-blue bathroom,
unaware of suffering
and sacrifice;
unaware of the million
and one ways
a sinner could torture
a saint and still get away
with it, when I felt
compelled to caress
Christ's hard, flexed veins
arched away
from his shin bones,
muscles, pretty feet.

The crucifix was nailed
to the floral pattern wall
above the light switch—
Christ's eyes forever
cast down
staring at my grandmother's
personal things;
her nighttime rituals—
boxes of Polident
rosary beads
little jars of beauty cream
and an old photo
of her only son
my father, forever a boy
dressed for Holy
Communion, mimicking
the face of innocence;
wedged securely
inside the edge
of the switch.


West 85th & West End

Every day a new page turns
above the beanstalk;
above the disco-ball-moon
and fog-machine clouds,
where an unamused angel
finger-flicks an arrow
affixed to a wheel
spinning indefinitely,
an eternity.

Down here, I knock
on my neighbor's door
in search of time—
not egg, flour, or a cup
of hourglass sugar
for my invisible cake.

It's no coincidence
we dash to markets,
clearing shelves
of bread first—
hunker down
when the storm comes;
when the storm
is christened a name—
Lilly, Olive, Coltrane—
the name of my daughter's
first grade friend,
whose father works
at the U.N.;
trilingual, plays chess
like an old man.

Trouble is a loose brick,
fifteen floors up, at the co-op
on West 85th & West End,
where an inviting bench awaits
impending doom.

All the poems are from her debut book, Before the Big Bang Makes a Sound  except for “Regression at the Middle-age Soiree” which was published in Red Eft Review.