Contents | February 2001

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Also by Terese Svoboda:

Aubade (1998)

The Atlantic Monthly | February 2001
 
Belles Lettres

by Terese Svoboda
 
 .....
 
audioear pictureHear Terese Svoboda read this poem (in RealAudio)


 Slowly, slowly, so as not to awaken
himself, he scratches his ear.

The sun is out—that is, not.
Sheets and her rucked-up slip

line his back in canals (a misunderstood
Martian) where sprout and curl hairs

he grows as easily as he shrugs off
the phone-call assault,

the covers coming over in waves.
Does he growl, Nice night

in bed, or, sniffing, It could rain?
He's reading her instead.
Copyright © 2001 by The Atlantic Monthly Company. All rights reserved. The Atlantic Monthly; February 2001; Belles Lettres - 01.02; Volume 287, No. 2; page 84.