WEBVTT

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Again, getting back to
California, as I said,

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we were in somewhat
of a rural area,

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I'm sure it's all
concrete now, but there

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was the remnants at
least of a farm where

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some people kept their horses.

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And I used to hang around
there every once in a while.

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And there was a woman there, a
transplant from Texas, an older

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woman, and I used to get her to
tell me some tales about what

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Texas was like when
she was a little girl,

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very interesting lady.

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And she told me once that her
brother was out in the field

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with her daddy, his foot
went through the ground

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into a rattlesnake
den and of course, he

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got bit rather badly.

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Well, they brought the--

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his daddy put the
boy in the wagon

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and they drove like mad
back to the ranch house

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and they put the boy's leg
in a bucket of kerosene.

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And she said you could
see the green venom coming

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out and floating in the pail.

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I don't know if
this is true or not.

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But anyway, then the father
went back with a shovel

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to the rattlesnake den
and found this large hole

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filled full of rattlesnakes.

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Well, again, this story boiled
around in my head for a while

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and out came the poem
called "Incident."

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Dragged from the wagon
before the mules had stopped,

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the father now a quick Jack
and the boy cortex dead

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slumped in his arms,
3 blinks to the house

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where they waited, having heard
his rattle, the lash of rains

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thrown against the sun.

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They put his leg in kerosene,
watch the green leg curl where

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the tooth was, a scum twisting
to the top of the pail,

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still watch the leg,
the slumped boy.

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Its runners spreading across
the floor testing the cracks,

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climbed the walls until turning
filled the room with itself.

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Meanwhile, the young
doctor arrived at this,

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his first case of nature.

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Outside, stood amazed at
foliage bulging the windows.

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And the father having
gone back with a foot

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lurched through, dug
the molds burrow,

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heard fangs against
the shovel, struck,

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found another and another,
and probing the cavern

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saw how it extended, how
it was full of them twined

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in the tunnels, feeders, rooms,
spreading spreading, palmately

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under the ground.

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