Poem by Arya F. Jenkins & Art by Larissa Boni

NOTES TO THE GHOST OF A SUICIDE NOW NAMELESS

I think you are finally done
Done heading into the moors
To catch traces of your lost selves
No more peeking into the hearts
Of gloomy poets on the edge
To whisper your three-word warning
Don’t do it

A ghost’s job is not easy
Abandoned by the body
You try and try to ensnare a
Curlicue of passion even remembered
But there is none
You’re done now
No more making up
For the tragic mischief of ages

It is time to wander off into the night
Once held you captive in woods
In whose arms a fox
Tried to eat you
Can you say I’m done to it?
Will the animal understand?
Out of his body too
Will it bother him at all
He can no longer catch up
To your trilling heart?

Arya F. Jenkins is a Colombian-American poet and writer whose poems have appeared in many journals and zines, most recently Hawaii Pacific Review. Her poetry has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize. Poetry is forthcoming in Luna Luna Magazine. In 2021, her poem “Ruin” was selected as a finalist for the Derick Burleson Poetry Prize by Choeofpleirn Press. She is the author of three poetry chapbooks, a short story collection, Blue Songs in an Open Key (Fomite Press, 2018), and a novel, Punk Disco Bohemian (NineStar Press, 2021). A collection of short stories is due out in 2022.

Larissa Boni is a queer female, independent artist based in Hartford, CT. She digitally manipulates and disarranges familiar landscapes into whimsical photographic art. The Disarranged in the City photo series was taken in Seattle, WA.