Poems

Latest News

from Writers Resist's special "No Kings" issue

https://www.writersresist.com/2025/09/24/divertissement-2/

featured in ONE ART: a journal of poetry -- (Write it!)

https://oneartpoetry.com/2025/07/13/the-history-of-emotional-ambush-by-candice-m-kelsey/

from Poets Reading the News' special "Food as Invocation" call

https://www.poetsreadingthenews.com/2025/06/hunger/?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email

The Nature of Our Times: Poems on America's Lands, Waters, Wildlife, and Other Natural Wonders 

https://natureofourtimes.poetsforscience.org/the-way-of-the-world/

Candice is joined by poet Matthew E. Henry for their paired poems, each titled
“The Most Dangerous Game.” [Candice's poem] - Watch Video (Begins at Time Stamp of 1:45)

Listen to Candice read her poem "We Didn't Bother with the Rose Garden," an ode to her favorite place, The Huntington Library, Art Museum, and Botanical Gardens in Pasadena, CA

Read three of Candice's recent poems, Ode to a Dead Lover, Daughter's Math
and This Tender Dwelling .

Cover of the Winter 2022 issue of Spellbinder magazine, featuring an illustration of a colorful town with various houses, roads, and hills under a dark, cloudy sky.
Close-up portrait of a woman with glasses, wearing a purple top, resting her chin on her hand, looking directly at the camera.

Reflexology 

 Two cardinals perched outside the window

are taunting me like the masseuse who worked

my body and afterward answered my question—

how often should I see you?

by responding with brazen celerity—

every day, as if I too could plume carmine

beneath the sun’s fingers.

Promotional graphic for a poem titled 'Meditation on the Pinky Toe' by Candice Kelsey, featured on Stone Circle Review, including a subtitle and a hashtag.
Five tall palm trees silhouetted against a sunset sky over the ocean, with a few people sitting on the beach.

She Calls

In other rooms of years ago

She sometimes calls to me

This small girl dancing on tip-toe—

The child I used to be.

And how she beams so beautifully

Once she has climbed within

I think perhaps she wants to be

The woman I could have been.

Colorful tropical flower with orange and purple petals against blurred green background.
Contact Candice
A peaceful canal with clear water reflects the sky and surrounding trees, with hilltops visible in the background, and fall-colored trees on the right side.
A brightly lit Ferris wheel on a pier at sunset with purple and orange sky and a crescent moon visible.