PROSE POETRY
TARA LABOVICH
SONNETLETTER TO ONE I HAVE NOT LOVED YET
“she” is a too tight shirt on me, with uncut seams and a cheugy logo; instead, call me honeybundles or beezwax or stevia: something sweet but a little off— or don’t call me at all, don’t dare to learn my name, just show up at my doorstep unannounced with vine ripened tomatoes from your backyard and fresh, green’d olive oil and hip check me to the side so you can make dinner; let me stir, while you chop the basil fine. let the august heat sift into silence, raining like gumdrops from the overworked ceiling fan til it gurgles inside and that summer’d blaze must burst out of us, timed, while the sauce burbles near burning—and hold me so tight to your face that there is no need for a name for a body like mine, as you whisper, so soft, like an unfurling leaf. i am always burning, love. i am not sure how i will let it out of my body for you.
Tara Labovich currently resides in Ames, Iowa while pursing their MFA. Their work circles around issues of ancestry, queerness, and survivorship. Tara was awarded the first place prize in the Adelaide Bender Reville Prize, was a semi-finalist in Black Lawrence's chapbook competition, and their work has been published in journals such as Salt Hill, After the Pause, Ink in Thirds, and more.