WEBVTT

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OK.

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Just to prove that my total
concern isn't about death,

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this poem--

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I also have a poem about
fold-out girls in Playboy,

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along with the rabbi
from Albuquerque.

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This is an Albuquerque
poem though.

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And it happened in June when
I was out watering flowers

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in a terrible dust storm.

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I don't know if you have dust
storms around here the way

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that we do in Albuquerque.

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Well all of a sudden,
out of the Sandias,

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come this fantastic
tornado-like thing.

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And the dust is swirling,
so thick like clouds,

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and it's difficult to see.

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But I decided I would
just stay there and just

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keep watering the flowers.

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And all of a sudden,
along came this

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the spiraling piece of paper.

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And all of a sudden,
this Miss July

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just unfolded herself before me.

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And I knew that this
was a poetic moment.

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And so I rallied to
the occasion and wrote

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a poem, which I call Miss July.

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Hot sun, dust storm,
heaviest clouds, the dust,

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suddenly a full page nude
floats end over end to my feet.

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I continue watering
the fire wheels.

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The dust is like smoke.

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The girl has seen hard use.

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She has come from the Arroyo.

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Her thighs are welted by
Earth and fine stones, animals

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perhaps.

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She smiles from a face above
large gourd-like breasts.

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Her body, except for
the pelvis, is tan.

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This has been her summer.

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Moving from an unclad
shelter to shelter,

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casting one large bright idea.

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Now, without
domestication, she comes

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to a strange man who has
no place for her, who

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must water the parched
Earth, keep the damn sand out

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of his eyes the only
way he knows how.

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