Dear—

a ghazal, after Agha Shahid Ali

By: Chloe Cordasco

Art by: Raegan Boettcher

when you’re joy-blue and empty on your book tour years,

come down and please, give me our ghosts from the sore years— 

A living saint in mesh and white conducting water and

wind, ringing in our blush-ears, marking these poor years. 

Put me back in the dark, I dare you. Red, orange, 

sunlight fire. My beau will be revenge for years. 

Drown myself in the blue bottle of her perfume 

so I might live forever, wearing jade, ore, years. 

Color us in the grass—blood and paint are lovely 

but so are we. Nothing can replace our bored years. 

Beat her down to her core self and see if it sticks

see how long she’ll last—apocryphal—weeks—or, years. 

There’s a candle on my soul—pink, like her hair.

From the glittering bottle, we—violet—pour years. 

Who is it that I claim to be—Ishmael? a child? 

A fraud. No more than she was—we were—in more years.