About the Author
Karissa Knox Sorrell is a poet, writer, and ESL educator. She is the author of Evening Body, a poetry chapbook published by Finishing Line Press. Her poems and essays can be seen in a variety of literary journals, including Flycatcher, Cactus Heart, San Pedro River Review, St. Katherine Review, Relief Journal, and Gravel Mag. She earned her MFA in Creative Writing from Murray State University in 2010.
Karissa earned her teaching degree from Trevecca and has fifteen years of experience in public education, thirteen of which have been in the ESL field. After eleven years of teaching in grades K-5 and 9-12, she moved into an instructional coaching position. She currently works with teachers of English Learners. She earned her Master of Education with a focus on Teaching English to Non-English Language Background Learners from Tennessee State University in 2003.
She was raised as a preacher’s kid and missionary kid and partially grew up in Bangkok, Thailand. Karissa lives in Nashville, Tennessee with husband Steven Sorrell and two children.
Twitter: https://twitter.com/KKSorrell
When I got my MFA in Creative Writing, I had to write a creative thesis, and some of these poems come from that. Others are newer poems. The title poem ("Evening Body") is about winter trees and how fragile they seem, but on another level it is metaphoric for the human condition. There are times when all our leaves are gone and we are left bare and seemingly broken, and yet we keep standing. In the book, nature is metaphoric for the human experience over and over again. Read more...
From the author's blog
This little book is a collection of 22 poems that I’ve birthed and refined.
Today I want to share the title poem of the book, “Evening Body.” Fun fact: I wrote the first draft of this poem on the back of a receipt. I was in the car, and it was winter, and we were passing bare trees at dusk, and the first few lines just came to me. I still remember workshopping this poem with my poet group in my MFA program. I will forever be grateful to my fellow poets and professors who inspired me, guided me along, and have encouraged me on my writing journey. I also want to thank you, my blog readers, for your love, encouragement, and support. This poem was originally published by Parable Press Magazine in 2013.
Evening Body
This is the way the trees
look at winter dusk: dark
capillaries poking the sky, mere
silhouette, the violet texture
of bark dissolved to black
skeletons of ash, ready to collapse
with the slightest breath.
This is when limbs suspend, hold
still in a moment of weakness.
Who doesn’t wish for such
obscurity, the pink horizon bearing
the fragile body?
