Anne Coray
Ivory

Look: it’s this easy

A ripe plum in the pit
of your belly
is love—

before you eat
you run that plum
down the length
of your soft cheek

and feel it new,
sleek: a glove
that you pull
over your elegant hand,
smooth with the other

and all the
articles around you
—the pillow, the ceramic cup—
blossom
into this knowledge:
the paper so eager
for the fingers.

*

Anne Coray is a lifelong Alaskan, living on the north shore of remote Qizhjeh Vena (Lake Clark), her place of birth. She holds a B.A. in Art from the University of Washington and an M.F.A. in Creative Writing from the University of Alaska, Anchorage. Her poems have appeared in dozens of literary journals including Nimrod, Sulfur, Hawaii Review, The Bitter Oleander, Poet Lore, The Dry Creek Review, Green Mountains Review, and Rhino. Her chapbook, Undated Passages, was published through a grant from the Alaska State Council on the Arts. Anne and her husband built their own home, where they live in comfort without telephone, email, or electricity. She is dedicated to low–impact living and to furthering an environmental consciousness.

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