WEBVTT

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There's a poem of Dylan Thomas,
which I'm sure you know,

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which begins, "it was
my 30th year to heaven."

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And there's a line in this
poem, because he just died,

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which refers to the fact that he
was now one second from earth.

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There's also a reference
to wrong-again Emily

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because Dylan
Thomas used to tell

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a story of how, on one occasion,
when he came to America,

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he was met by a
cigar-smoking husband who

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said not one single
word and his wife who

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said many and prattled on
very pleasantly but eventually

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said, to Dylan Thomas, how
much she enjoyed his Hornblower

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series.

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And the husband eventually
took the cigar out of his mouth

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and said, wrong again Emily.

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[LAUGHTER]

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All down the valleys they are
talking and in the community

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of the smoke-laden town.

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Tomorrow, through
bird-trailed skies,

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across neighboring
waves, wrong-again Emily

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will come to the dandelion
yard and, with rum tourists,

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inspect his grave.

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Death was his
voluntary marriage,

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and his poor silence sold to
that rich and famous bride.

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Beleaguered in
that essential kiss

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he rode the whiskey-meadows
of her breath

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till, mortal, voiceless,
he gave up his nailed ghost

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and he died.

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No more to celebrate his
disinherited innocence

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or your half-buried heart,
drunk as a butterfly,

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or sober as black.

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Now, one second from earth,
not even for the sake of love

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can his true energy come back.

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So cease your talking.

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Too familiar you blaspheme his
name and collected legends.

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Some tears fall
soundlessly and aren't

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the same as those that drop
with obituary explosion.

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Suddenly, others who
sing seem older and lame.

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But far from the blind country
of prose, wherever his burst

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voice goes about
you or through you,

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look up in surprise,
in a hurt public house

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or in a rain-blown
street, and see

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how no fat ghost but
a quotation cries.

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Stranger, he is laid to rest
not in the nightingale dark

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nor in the canary light.

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At the dear last, the
yolk broke in his head,

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blood of his soul's egg in
a splash of bright voices.

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And now he is dead.

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I'd like to--

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