sub slurp {
    local $/ = undef;
    local *X;
    open X, $_[0] or die "Can't open $_[0]: $!";
    my $slurp = <X>;
    close X or die "Can't close $_[0]: $!";
    $slurp;
}

##</code><code>##

my $contents = slurp("/home/foo/bar.txt");