We're going to read a poem about ducks because we
talked about ducks at supper.
Some animal, we were talking about an animal, a dog that
is trained to kill ducks.
That's really depraved.
I didn't want to say anything to Susan.
But anybody can kill a duck.
There used to be a comedian that probably
no more than three people in this room
remember by the name of Joey Penner.
And he used to say what about a duck?
Do you remember him?
And the poem is called Your Animal.
It's an attack on gnosticism except that I love gnosticism
in many ways and I beg forgiveness
of all gnostics in the crowd.
I won't say any more about it.
The final end of all but purified souls
is to be swallowed up by Leviathan
or to be bound with fiery chains and flogged
with 70 stripes of fire.
I walk along the mule path dreaming of my weaknesses
and praying to the ducks for forgiveness.
Oh, there is so much shit in the universe.
And my walks like yours are more and more slippery
and dangerous.
I love a duck for being almost like a vegetable.
I love him because his whole body
can be consumed because there is no distance between him
and his watery offal.
Your animal is almost human distant from his waist,
struggling to overcome the hated matter looking up
with horrified white eyes eternally hunting for space
in the little islands of Riverside Drive and the fenced
in parks of the village.
I love duck and potatoes, duck and red beets, duck
and orange juice.
I love the head of duck dipped in sugar.
I love chocolate duck with chipolata sausages,
fragrant crisp duck mixed with shrimp and pork.
I love the webs and the heart.
I love the eggs preserved in lime and potash,
completely boned duck filled with ham and chestnuts,
fried duck with pineapple with canned red cherries
or sections of tangerine.
This is a poem against gnosticism.
It is a poem against the hatred of the flesh and all
the vicious twists and turns we take
to calm our frightened souls.
It is a poem celebrating the eating of duck
and all that goes with it.
It is a poem I'm able to write after walking
every day through the flocks and loving the babies
and watching them slip down the mud sides
and float into the currents.
It is a poem about shooting galleries and cardboard
heads about hunters in their checkered hats
and frozen fingers about snow white claws
and steaming laced up birds and waiters standing
in little regiments getting ready to run in
among the tables and start carving.
It is my poem against the starving heart.
It is my victory over meanness.
[APPLAUSE]