Poet.
Kimberly Johnson is the autor of three poetry collections, most recently “Uncommon Prayer” (Persea Books, 2014). She is also the translator of a number of works of Classical poetry, including Virgil's Georgics (Penguin Classics, 2009) and the long poems of Hesiod (forthcoming from Northwestern University Press). As a scholar of Renaissance English literature, she published in 2014 a monograph on the relationship between religion and poetry in the post-Reformation era.
Recipient of grants and fellowships from the United States National Endowment for the Arts and the Guggenheim Foundation, she lives in Salt Lake City, Utah. Kimberly Johnson’s participation in Tbilisi International Literature Festival is supported by U.S. Embassy in Georgia.
Wreckingball
With what stern determination I love
That wall!—: its red height so certain I must
Fling myself at it, an erratic
Embarrassment of a fling, chain-wobbling
Through my drunk parabola to kiss
The brick. Can I help it that I kiss
With all my force? Nuzzled
To dust, all my beloveds must wish
To have gone unregarded. What do
I wish for? The end of love.