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Martine Bellen is the author of seven poetry collections, including Ghosts!; The Vulnerability of Order; Tales of Murasaki and Other Poems, winner of the National Poetry Series Award; and Places People Dare Not Enter. Her poetry has been included in several anthologies, among them This Art: A Copper Canyon Ars Poetica Anthology, and she has received an American Academy of Poets Award. Among her other works are a novella, 2X(Squared), and the libretto for Ovidiana, an opera based on Ovid’s Metamorphoses, performed in New York City and Philadelphia.

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White Butterfly

by Martine Bellen
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If every butterfly were smoke, would all perception
Fall to smell? If every wing were paper-white, would

All perception end in sight?
Stitch of Michelin lace or brood of Phoebus Parnassian.
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