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John Grey

Reading The Great Gatsby in the White Mountains

 

In my wilderness tent,
I’m reading, by flashlight,
“The Great Gatsby”
for the tenth time or more.

I’m so involved
in what I could almost
recite by heart
that I don’t even notice
the barred owl’s,
“who cooks for you,
who cooks for you all”
or the distant cry 
of a coyote.

Not even light-plush
night sky
or a robust full moon 
can drag me away 
from New York 
in the roaring twenties.

I find being 
away from it all
is the perfect opportunity
to get into it all.

I’m right at the point
where Daisy runs down Myrtle
in Gatsby’s car.

So are the banks of a lake,
wind through the trees,
a raccoon rustling
the underbrush.
 

Brett Stout Broken_Hands_Converge_A_Brea
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