They make realistic nipple tattoos now,
the doctor reassures me. Almost 3-D in appearance,
though no rise, no ridge, except for the slash of scar.
The nurse hands me a bouquet of brochures, pamphlets
offering information on reconstructive options. I imagine flowers,
a burst of cherry blossoms, a swallow taking flight
off the gnarled branch that will cross my chest
where now there was a river of red. Years before,
a river of milk. My nipple had become a febrile sun
cresting a pale, cold hill. I can let it go, I tell myself.
I will come to own the absence. Some things become,
like the eclipse, more beautiful because they can’t be seen.
Amy Ash is the author of The Open Mouth of the Vase, winner of the Cider Press Review Book Award and the Etchings Press Whirling Prize post-publication award for poetry. Recent work can be found or is forthcoming in Rogue Agent, Tipton Poetry Journal, Shō Poetry Journal, SWWIM, and Ninth Letter. She is an Associate Professor and Director of Creative Writing at Indiana State University.