Featured Poet: Kyle Potvin, Derry

Kyle Potvin’s poetry has appeared in print and online publications including The Lyric, Iambs & Trochees, JAMA (Journal of the American Medical Association), Literary Mama, The Barefoot Muse, The New York Times’ “Well” blog and The 2008/2010 Poets’ Guide to New Hampshire.  She was named a finalist for the 2008 Howard Nemerov Sonnet Award.  In 2008, she and Tammi Truax founded the “Prickly Pear Poetry Project:  Processing the Cancer Experience Through Poetry,” a workshop for survivors and caregivers.  Kyle is a student of poet Robert W. Crawford and is a member of the Frost Farm’s Hyla Brook Poets.  She is principal of a public relations firm. 

When writing Love Note, I was intrigued by this idea:  What would happen if an entire relationship hinged on the receipt of a single love note?   Similar to the premise in the movie Sliding Doors, there would be one outcome if the note was read and an entirely different one if not.  As often happens, I started writing Love Note in free verse before deciding form, in this case, a sonnet, would enhance the meaning.

Love Note
Unseen, she tucked it in her lover’s coat
while he was busy packing up his clothes
and laptop for a week away.  The note
might be discovered on the plane. Who knows?
Or still much later in a hotel room
before he settles into bed alone.
Alone.  She feels a sudden sense of doom
about things left undone and things unknown.
What if the letter falls out like a glove,
lost in a crowded airport ticket line,
then stamped by ruthless heels that can’t feel love?
She wishes she had sent a clearer sign -
concealed her words where only he could see,
tattooed beneath his skin, indelibly.

(Finalist, 2008 Howard Nemerov Sonnet Award; originally published in Measure, 2009)