WEBVTT

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I'd like to read an old love
poem from the book, and a very

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new one after that.

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Old one is called "His Body."

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"He doesn't like it, of course.

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Others, who don't wear
it, but see it, do.

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He's pale, like a big desert,
but you can find flowers.

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No, not entirely pale.

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Between shin and ankle,
the twin sun marks.

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And where his shirt, now
draped from a chair back, was,

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he contrasts with dark
hands and neck, face,

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like a rained-on street, where
a car has just been driven away.

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Don't picture a beer ponch.

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And he is a smooth animal, or
soft where he isn't smooth,

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down to his toad-skin testicles.

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He lies prone on
clean bed sheets.

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There is a single
light in the room.

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Now run your hand down his
back, its small and up, the hips

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and over.

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There are sheens like
that on blue, metal music

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boxes made to hold powder.

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But the rest of him is sprouted
with black, down-going hair,

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his whiskers in so many
foxholes, eager to out.

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Are they in any order?

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Age has so far
remained locked inside.

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I'm not a doctor, and glad not
to have a doctor's viewpoint.

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I'm glad I haven't the
petite, overwhelmed

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sight of an antibody.

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And yet, I'm not just
anybody perusing his body.

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I have a reason
to like it better

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than I like other bodies.

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Someone else can praise those,
each lonely and earthly,

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wanting to be celestial."

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