WEBVTT

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This is coming into
Central Park Zoo.

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This zoo is a museum in itself.

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It was designed in its latest
iteration with Lila Wallace's

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money and Kevin Roche,
who did the new wings

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of the Metropolitan Museum
of Art, designed the museum.

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So it's really quite
a beautiful place.

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And so what I
wanted to do is have

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invitations at the opening.

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And then the full pose
would appear later.

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So the first one is from Rilke.

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And it's in both English and
German from the rose window.

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"The lazy pacing of their
paws creates a stillness

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that's almost dizzying."

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And I wanted to have Rilke
as one of the first ones

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because Rilke, as
you probably know,

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became a secretary to
the sculptor Rodin,

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because he wanted
to understand how

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Rodin could capture the essence
of being in his sculpture.

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And this was what he was
there to learn from Rodin.

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And what Rodin did was
send him to the zoo.

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He sent him to the
Jardin des Plantes

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where he spent a lot of time.

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And he said, study the animals.

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There, you will see into
the nature of being.

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And that's what Rilke did.

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Rilke said, what he
liked about Rodin was

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everything was held and seen.

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Everything was right there
and nothing could escape.

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And yet it was all alive.

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And the metaphor he made
for that, he said the way

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the soft fragrant
fruit pulls away

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from the rind with the entire
rich aroma of its flesh, which

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is warm and pulsing
from hidden summers.

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So even though it was marble,
it had that essence of fruit

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about it.

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The next one is Gary Snyder.

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And I don't know
if you can read it.

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It says, "The Secret and the
Secret Hidden Deep in That."

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And I learned to begin
to play with these,

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to put out little pieces
so that they became

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little cones or little riddles.

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And the kids who come
through love this,

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in particular, because they want
to know where's, the secret,

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where's the secret,
what's the secret.

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Come on, come on, come on.

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So you learn when you get to
the other side of Central Park,

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the full poem is over there.

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And this is the closing of that.

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The secret hidden deep in that
is Gary Snyder and his son

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have found a fox by
the side of the road.

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They have prayed over the fox.

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They have split
open its stomach.

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The fox, with the whole
ground squirrel, well-chewed,

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plus one lizard foot.

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And somewhere from
inside, the ground

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squirrel, a bit
of aluminum foil.

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"The Secret and the
Secret Hidden in That."

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And then the next poem,
the last invitation

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coming into the Tropic
area, is Randall Jarrell's

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from The Bat-Poet.

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And if you don't
know that book, it's

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a wonderful book for
children, adults.

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It's just a really, really
wonderful book of poetry.

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"Their single shadow printed
on the moon or fluttering

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across the stars
whirls on all night."

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