Charles Kell: "Felon"

Felon

My wife says I am cold.
That my heart
is made from burnt blue steel.
 
Back in Warren, I would drive
a black Pontiac down a long
dirt road past a grey falling
 
house. I would wonder who
lived there, if he was happy.
In a field behind the house
 
are trees. Hidden in the trees
is a shed. I creep into this shed,
sit down on the ground
 
and become someone else. ​

Charles Kell is a PhD student at The University of Rhode Island and editor of The Ocean State Review. His poetry and fiction have appeared in The New Orleans Review, The Saint Ann’s Review, IthacaLit, and elsewhere. New poems are forthcoming in The Pinch, American Journal of Poetry, and Kestrel. He teaches in Rhode Island and Connecticut.