WEBVTT

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I'll just read the poems and
make an occasional comment.

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I just learned that you're not
allowed to smoke when you read.

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So that's going to make
it more difficult for me.

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But I'll just pause a little
bit between each poem.

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I'll read first from the
first book, Early Rain.

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"The cougar has been shot.

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Something of the mountains,
something that wrinkled,

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muscle of sunlight in the
trees, crept like a slope,

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at evening, to a
stream, washed its paws,

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sticky with sunset, death,
something of the mountains.

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The cougar has been shot.

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Good, the weekend hunters say.

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When night hunched, anonymous,
snarling in the leaves,

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who could divide those eyes
from stars that trailed us,

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branch to branch, overhead?

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And, once, I heard the
gullies raging, underbrush,

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grow furious.

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Roots rock the air, rise up
to join the giant mating.

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Brought to life by their
guns, the weekend hunters

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worry such mountain-breaking,
making passion in a living

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thing, is dangerous."