Poetry

My Lover's Ear

Debbie Lim

Lying down after a swim
my lover’s ear holds seawater
in its folded rim
like a rock pool.
Cartilage gullies plateau
into a neat damp lobe,
faintly furred
as a baby fern. Concentration
brings capillaries into view:
a river system aerial
of the most delicate tributaries.
Drawn to the warm dark
hole endlessly generating
wax, I excavate
the sticky sunlight
with a careful fingernail.

Debbie Lim