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Summer 1998 • Vol. XX No. 3/4 • Poetry |

Pan

Elizabeth, I must say,
Pan wasn’t raising Cain among the reeds.
He had taken off his mask,
& was lying there, puffing ganja,

Blowing Rasta smoke rings
& nibbling on a golden mango,
When he glimpsed three naiads
Prancing beside the lily pond.

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Yusef Komunyakaa’s seventeen books of poetry include Taboo, Dien Cai Dau, Neon Vernacular (for which he received the Pulitzer Prize), Warhorses, and most recently The Chameleon Couch and Testimony. His many honors include the William Faulkner Prize (Universite Rennes, France), the Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize, the Kingsley Tufts Award for Poetry, and the 2011 Wallace Stevens Award. His plays, performance art, and libretti have been performed internationally and include Saturnalia, Testimony, and Gilgamesh: A Verse Play. He teaches at New York University.

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