WEBVTT

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Now, this second of
my three light poems.

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This is what can happen
to people who leave life's

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highways, and go into the arts.

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This is a new poem but
when the incident actually

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happened, on which
the poem is based,

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I had less gray in my
hair than I have now.

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You will see why I mention this.

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This is called
"The Vision Test".

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And you can guess how many
of us failed the vision

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test in this poem.

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My driver's license
is lapsing and so

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I appear in a room full of
waiting others and get in line.

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I must master a lighted
box of far or near,

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a highway language of
shape squiggle and sign.

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As the quarter hours
pass, I watched the lady

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in charge of the test
and think how patient how

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slow, how nice she is.

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A kindly priestess, indeed,
her large round flat face,

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her vanilla pudding
baked Apple and spice

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face in continual smiles.

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As she calls each dear
and honey and tells

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first timers what to see.

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She enjoys her job.

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How pleasant to be in her
care, instead rather than

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brute little bureaucrat
or sales lady.

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I imagine her life
as a tender placing

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of hands on her
children's hands,

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as they come to
grips with the rocks

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and scissors of the world.

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The girl before me stands
in the glow of good feeling.

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I take my place at the
box, and how are you

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this lovely morning, dear?

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A few little questions
first, your name, your age,

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your profession, poet.

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"What?"

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She didn't hear.

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"Poet!"

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I say loudly.

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The blank pink page of
her face is lifted to me.

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What?

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She says.

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"Poet!"

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I yell.

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P-O-E-T. A moment silence.

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"Poet?"

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She says.

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"Yes."

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Her pencil still.

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She turns away from me
to the waiting crowd.

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Tips back her head like a
hand drinking clotted milk.

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And her ha-ha, hee-hee-hee
of hysterical laughter rings

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through the room.

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Again, Oh, ha-ha-ha-ha,
he-he-he-he.

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People stop chatting.

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A few titter, it's clear I've
told some marvelous joke they

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didn't quite catch.

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She resettles her glasses
pulls herself together,

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pats her waves, the
others listen and watch.

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And what are we going to
call the color of your hair?

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She asks me.

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Well, perhaps it's turned
white on the instant.

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Are green is the
color poets declare?

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Or perhaps, I've merely
made her distrust her side.

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Up to now, it's
always been brown.

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Her pencil trembles.

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Then with an almost comically
obvious show of reluctance,

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she lets me look in her box
of symbols for normal people

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who know where they want to go.

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