A Goodbye Letter - Kiara Nicole Letcher

I wield stories in my body

like so many knives on a

butcher’s block

I am chilly and distant

but also lush and abundant

mercurial watermelon heart

somewhere inside my body

is hot summer asphalt

to burn the soles or

melt soft serve ice cream

I release your clothes into warm water

the dye bleeds making murky circles

distorted vision of violet

This golden failure

spoken viciousness

Shhh…

I lay in bed thinking indigo thoughts

the ocean doesn’t feel shame for being cold

the desert doesn’t feel shame for being scolding

I take a hot shower

wipe the mirror of fog

smear my reflection into

something abstract and bleary

maybe even

corrected.

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Kiara Nicole Letcher is the author of Scream Queen (The Orchard Street Press, 2019). Spinning lush imagery with magic and horror, she explores shame, want, and growth. Her first full length collection, Oxblood, is forthcoming, (Agape Editions, 2024). Her work has appeared in Green Mountains Review, Plainsongs Magazine, Adelaide Magazine, Alice Says Go Fuck Yourself, Quiet Diamonds and Sad Girls Club and is forthcoming in South Dakota Review. She resides in Omaha, Nebraska. She received her MFA from The University of Nebraska at Omaha in 2014.