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One of the writers in the
20th century of America,

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especially in my region
in the Northeast,

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who meant the most to
me was Paul Goodman,

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whom I knew although we
were not close friends.

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He was older than I and
he died some years ago.

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And one night I wrote
this little poem

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called, "In Memoriam."

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I used to-- I used to work in
a little shack in the woods,

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and in the wintertime I heated
it with a little wood stove.

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"This warmish night of
the thaw in January,

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a beech chunk smoldering in my
Herald number 22-A box stove,

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suddenly takes
fire, and burns hot.

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Or rather I suddenly,
who was reading

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the sweet and bitter poems of
Paul Goodman, dead last summer,

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am now aware how my
shed becomes a furnace.

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And taking my shovel, I
ladle a great mush of snow

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into the stove's mouth
to quieten it, and then

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step quickly outside again to
watch the plume of steam rise

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from my stovepipe straightly
and vanish into the mist."

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[APPLAUSE]

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