Rachel Sandle

So as not to invoke a thing’s name

I check my empty

mailbox, hoping

for the letter

I sent. I touch

my lover’s hair

as I would have

my own be

touched: tender as

a broken bone. I

call a canyon

beautiful and wait

for the echo. Mine

is a sound that springs

from a different well.

From a hidden part

of the body. I am not

allowed to take things,

so I give them away.

Rachel Sandle (she/her/hers) is a poet and visual artist whose writing has appeared in What Are Birds? Journal, Occulum Journal, Indicia Lit, and others. Rachel lives in Lawrence, Kansas, where she is pursuing an MFA in poetry.