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16 Recreation at seven o’clock in high summer, there was still light bleeding in the nigger sky. the twilight silence swelled; we felt the tickle of North wind coming off the santee river. Birds swooped down into the yard, dancing around the snare left out by my father who was snoring his life away behind the hog pens upwind, where the air was fresh. the birds reading the clues, turned in mute animation, caught the wind and flew. to pass the time we made love in the bush. i stared at the faded line of a coming moon. i have not heard such silence as that secret meeting, everything whispered, then grunts and stifled gasps; never heard such silence since i took off from those cotton groves that year they exploded Pearl Harbor and our boys went to spill their blood among the bamboo and coconuts. 17 Nowadays, the mutter of radios, staccato talk of television and the drone of engines on the interstates frighten away the ghosts. i no longer hear in the swollen dumb season the thud of horse hooves coming, stallions snorting something ghastly like Revelations, beating to my heart’s pulse thumping after the flicker of excitement of his hand on me, the feel of his trembling. i still recall those idle dusks when we waited for night to come upon us quickly, and then slept. ...

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