Katherine Wilkinson

Katherine Wilkinson is a Brooklyn-based director, writer, and theatremaker creating reimagined classics and new performance work. She is a faculty member at Columbia University, the 2024–2026 Leader of the WP Directors Lab, and a recipient of the Opera America Tobin Director-Designer Prize. Her writing and performance projects have been developed nationally at theaters and festivals across the U.S. www.katherinewilkinson.com 

Death Dream (POEM)

God forbid I open my mouth too wide,

smile like I mean it

and become fearless to death.

I peel the stickers off every apple in sight,

each one keeping a different doctor at bay. 

Despite it all:

I know I’m going to die.

I will rot under the earth

or burn in a fatty fire

but please please please

let’s focus on another topic:

How about ophthalmology?

Houdini’s congressional testimony? 

Abortion aftercare? 

lift, thud, shrug

lift, thud, shrug

lift, thud, shrug

lift, thud, shrug

lift, thud, shrug

We pretend moving forward is the only way to use time. 

I disagree

over and over and over and over and over and over

but everyone has already left for the parade. 

I cover myself in sunshine lotion, 

and head to the roast.

Beat the drum! 

She’s dead upon arrival! 

Buried with her love

Buried under pressure

Buried alive 

In my dead of night dream, we turn the car down a new seventy mile highway, silver sky and golden hay, for 34 more miles. 

I can’t help but wonder why

graveyards are the only 

landmarks I notice

remember

and clock away

in the spine and chest of my brain. 

Are the dead always talking?

They hover like ravens over Yosemite and rock me closer to the edge.

Are the dead always talking to me?

Gripping tiny shards of God in the potted plant’s dead of winter resistance. 

Are the dead always talking to us?

They make our art and wait for the perfect moment to place the brush in our hands.