WEBVTT

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OK, I'll shut up and start this.

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I promise not to read
for more than 39 minutes,

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but I'm going to take
you on a little tour

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of different
translations starting

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in the 15th century
with Nezahualcoyotl who

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was a philosopher,
and an architect,

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and is mostly known as a poet.

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He was the ruler of
Tetzcoco in the Golden age

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of pre-columbian Mexico.

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He had this
incredible experience

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where he was visited
by a presence--

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the presence of poetry.

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An unknown, unknowable Lord
of everywhere, he called it.

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And to which he built an
entirely empty temple,

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in which no blood sacrifices
of any kind were allowed.

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This is a poem that I
translated from the 16th century

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Spanish translation of his work,
which was written in nahuatl.

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I sense the secret,
the dark truth.

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Oh my brothers!

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Being mortal, being men
side by side, all of us

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must pack ourselves off,
must die on the Earth.

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Like a painting we will fade.

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Like a flower we'll dry
up here in this dirt.

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Like a cape made
from the feathers

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of a zacuan, that rare
rubbernecked bird,

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we start to come apart the
moment we leave the house.

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Consider this, my friends--

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eagles and tigers,
though made from Jade,

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though carved from gold
come to the same end,

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to the same broken place.

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All of us must disappear,
none is given to stay.

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Where to go where
there is no death?

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And so we lug ourselves
around weeping?

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I sense the secret,
the dark truth--

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oh my brother's!

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Being mortal, being men,
side by side, all of us

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must pack ourselves off,
must die here on the Earth.

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Yeah-- Yeah, so pretty relevant.

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Written in a language that's
still spoken in parts of Mexico

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and other parts
of Latin America.

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yeah, that's a long time ago.