And I'll finish this poem--
this book.
And it's called-- well, it's a kind of analogy.
I mean, I was in the cottage that they
have photographs and little albums of past poets
who stayed there.
And I knew all of them.
And many of them were close friends.
And they're all dead, you know?
So it makes a fellow think.
"So early in the morning, it pains
me to see an old woman fret over a few small coins
outside the grocery store.
How swiftly I forget her as my own grief finds me again,
a friend at that store and the memory of the night
we spent together.
I had so much love in my heart afterward,
I could have run into the street naked, confident anyone
I met would understand my madness
and my need to tell them about life
being both cruel and beautiful.
But I did not, despite the overwhelming evidence--
a crow bent over a dead squirrel in the road,
the lilac bushes flowering in some yards,
and the sight of a dog, free from his chain,
searching through a neighbor's trash can."
Thank you.
[APPLAUSE]