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Poetry by Cela Xie

Published by betweenthehighway

2.25” x 90”

Thermal printing on receipt paper

First printing of 300

2025

From the publisher’s website:

They greet you as a shade,
and leaves you as a mirror.

They eat plums, oh, they eat plums.
No, not those plums—no, the ones

whose color empties into you,
the ones into which you empty yourself.

These are “Letters From Now:”
words before we have spoken to ourselves.
Before? Words spoken before oneself.
Where else?

This is the ascent of a wound
breaking into brighter skin.

Now, assent and, rising,
bury yourself before
this desire.

Cela Xie is a person of twenty-five years who has accomplished nothing in particular, except writing for almost two decades. His favorite color is the blue just after the sun has been wheeled into the morgue. His favorite animal is the cloud leopard. His favorite number is six, the number of books he plans to write. His poetry has been published by The Pierian and he is currently pursuing an MFA at North Carolina State University, near the place where he was born.