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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Richard Brautigan
Much of the information regarding Richard Brautigan's life and death is uncertain. He was born in 1935 in Tacoma, Washington. His father left home before he was born, and his...
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FURTHER READING
Poems About Friendship
After the Movie
by Marie Howe
How I Am
by Jason Shinder
Mending Wall
by Robert Frost
On Gifts For Grace
by Bernadette Mayer
sisters
by Lucille Clifton
Skunk Hour
by Robert Lowell
Stanzas in Meditation
by Gertrude Stein
The Armadillo
by Elizabeth Bishop
We Have Been Friends Together
by Caroline Elizabeth Sarah Norton
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Your Catfish Friend  
by Richard Brautigan

If I were to live my life 
in catfish forms
in scaffolds of skin and whiskers 
at the bottom of a pond 
and you were to come by 
   one evening
when the moon was shining 
down into my dark home 
and stand there at the edge 
   of my affection
and think, "It's beautiful 
here by this pond.  I wish 
   somebody loved me,"
I'd love you and be your catfish 
friend and drive such lonely 
thoughts from your mind 
and suddenly you would be
   at peace,
and ask yourself, "I wonder 
if there are any catfish 
in this pond?  It seems like 
a perfect place for them."



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From The Pill Versus the Springhill Mine Disaster by Richard Brautigan, published by Houghton Mifflin. Copyright © 1989 by Richard Brautigan. Reprinted by permission of Houghton Mifflin. All rights reserved.
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