Poem of the Week | May 04, 2026

Tyler Kline is a high school teacher from Pennsylvania. His work has appeared or is forthcoming in The Believer, Best New Poets, Narrative, POETRY, and Poetry Daily. He earned his MFA at New York University, where he was a Jan Gabrial Fellow.

“Pennsylvania” by Tyler Kline is our Poem of the Week.

***

Pennsylvania

I left a toad in my top drawer & came back to forever.
I left & the dogwoods bloomed.
I left the light on.
I left my body, but it was stubborn as a hospital bracelet.
I left my wisdom teeth in & got so much smarter.
I left before the party was over.
I left a face flushed in the haymow.
I left it all on the field.
I left because I wanted to sing some Dolly.
Dance like a suitcase full of chopped-up body parts trying to break free.
I left the mountain empty.
I left chugging neon, teeth turned to butter.
I left to lick my wounds.
I left the scarecrow painting my nails.
(He wore your flannel, patched at the elbows.)
I left the pines a little taller.
I left a finger in the punch bowl.
I left the silo open & the story snuck in.
I left so the corn could practice fire alone.
I left more wasp nest than tumor, more lover than shadow box.
I left my lips on your nightstand.
The seconds hung like smoke rings.
I left between hemlock & sharp.
I left under a Buck Moon.
I left & all my dreams went to seed.

***

I’m not sure if this is an elegy or a love poem, and that might be enough context to explain my relationship with my home state—a landscape filled with contradictions. While it contains immense beauty and tenderness, there are also deep pockets of unbridled violence, radicalization, and hate in Pennsylvania. Using the anaphora of I left felt a bit ironic, since I’ve never left PA for an extended period, though at times I wished I had. I’m interested in the resonance of conflicting rural images (both sonically and emotionally), and the hallways they create for the reader to walk down while still existing inside the container of the poem.