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Valzhyna Mort was born in Minsk, Belarus. She is the author of the poetry collections Factory of Tears and Collected Body (both published by Copper Canyon Press). She is also the editor of the anthology Something Indecent: Poems Recommended by Eastern European Poets (2013). A recipient of the Lannan Foundation Fellowship, Mort is a visiting assistant professor at Cornell University.

Photograph by Doug Barber.

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Love

by Valzhyna Mort
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The most human sound a body can hear—
teeth being cleaned late at night across the hallway.
Even the locusts listen confused.
She too, on a bare mattress thrown on the floor,
is surprised how much of his body is in that sound,
as if she had just now noticed that he had arms.

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