AMELIA K.

Ghost girls are easy to raise. They do not change shape like 2 liters of store brand cola left too long in the fridge, for nights when there is no water. They do not attract crumbs like a licked finger along a baseboard, for days when there is no food. Benign, docile, they neither burn nor blister in the sun; or the moon, for that matter.

The moon speaks simply, like a child, with all the patient frustration of a Monday morning quarterback. The moon wants liquid and hushed, like a new god, sweet and sly and approachable.

On the topic at hand, if you listen carefully enough: a ceaseless canticle of mothers say things like Ghost girls are better off this way. Ghost girls are happier this way. The mendacity!

Ghost girls could have been antibiotics. They could have been eraser shavings or treasured craquelure or beach towels or bugs squished accidentally, then purposely. A frostbitten nose, eaten during famine. A steering wheel, a stone in Tyro’s pocket, a voice, a restful valley. The last $20 you ever owe. The vulture that ate the cat that ate the canary that ate the worm in your apple. A realized, rosy baby, in someone else’s arms. Why not? The amount of matter in the world remains constant; this is known. Go out looking for ghost girls and you’ll find one, sure as shit on your Sunday shoes.

Ghost girls move out of the hands of angels and into the hands of sorrow, who loves to drop them like eggs into batter, any batter, and mush and mush and mush them until her arm hurts. Good to the last drop, they are forgotten as quickly as they are eaten. They never make it to rot.

AMELIA K. lives in Georgia. She won Best of the Net (Nonfiction, 2024) and has appeared in Dirt, Smashing Times, Hobart, and others. Her chapbook Amouroboros (KERNPUNKT, 2024) was longlisted for The Kari Flickinger Memorial Prize. Her website is bio.site/ameliak.