This last poem, I want to read, and then I'd
like to ask Stephen Strom to come and say
a few words about the photographs.
This is called "Lay Me Down, Sweet Love."
"Lay me down, sweet love, as we struggle
to hold back the tick tock of night, the sun pushing us
in degrees toward early twilight dawn.
Lay me down, sweet love, in the broken core
of goodbyes, this raw land, you resting your arms
on my car window, me remembering you
that way just before we surrender the spent night.
Lay me down, sweet love, to lose myself in your eyes again,
and I pretend that I heard your every word.
Let us, this last tango--
this last blue song--
sustain our dreams and hold the stars above our sleeping heads
and unite our far away love in the hands of the ocean.
I'm with you, and you're with me.
Lay me down, sweet love."
Thank you.
[APPLAUSE]