calla lillies by Kathleen Hellen

calla lilies 
—with line from Hepburn

liver-colored flowers
unfurling 
from freckled leaves
from stems
in glass
like convex lens
the fact 
in water clouding 
… something that has died.

Kathleen Hellen’s debut collection Umberto’s Night won the poetry prize from Washington Writers’ Publishing House. She is the author of The Only Country Was the Color of My Skin, Meet Me at the Bottom, and two chapbooks. Hellen’s awards include prizes from the H.O.W. Journal and Washington Square Review.