This selection, chosen by guest editor Amber Alexander, is from Naming the Ghost by Emily Hockaday, released by Cornerstone Press in 2022.
The Sound Of The Ghost
On the highway, the tires make the sound of the dead over the cement panels like a chorus of cellos. I feel it in my body. The baby is lulled to sleep by the vibrations. Does this visit her there? Or is it only me who wakes in the night, out of someone else’s dream? A place I have never been, figures who almost coalesce, conversation too quiet to hear. My husband, in the morning, says: I know where you went, last night. Who you were with. I dip stale munchkins in my tea, and the oil floats on the surface. Remember, he says, it isn’t always easier to disappear.
Emily Hockaday’s second collection, In a Body, is forthcoming with Harbor Editions October 2023. Her first full-length, Naming the Ghost, debuted with Cornerstone Press in September 2022. She is the author of six poetry chapbooks, and her poems have appeared in print and online journals, as well as with the Poets of Queens and Parks & Points’ Wayfinding anthologies. Emily writes about ecology, parenthood, chronic illness, grief, and the urban environment.
Amber Alexander, who publishes creative work as e. holloway, is a poet based in Ohio. They currently work in higher education and as an Assistant Editor for Best Of The Net within Sundress Publications. Alexander is a former Editorial Intern for Sundress Publications, former Editorial Board Member for Cornfield Review, and was a Sundress Academy for The Arts Writing Resident in 2023. Their work has been published by Cornfield Review and earned multiple awards during undergrad at The Ohio State University.
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