Well, thank you Billy.
Thank you David, and Howard, and Jennifer,
and Ernesto, and especially Samuel [INAUDIBLE]..
[APPLAUSE]
Thank you all for sharing your favorite poems with us
this evening.
I want to express my gratitude to all of our sponsors
and underwriters.
They're listed in your program.
But most of all, I want to thank each and every one of you
for coming here this afternoon to celebrate the Poetry
Center's 50th anniversary.
[APPLAUSE]
You know, Tucson is an extraordinary place to live,
in large part because so many of us
care so deeply about the arts.
We are so grateful that a woman named
Ruth Stephan had the vision to leave Tucson a Poetry
Center, that the University of Arizona embraced that gift,
and that the people have sustained it
through their participation and their generosity.