WEBVTT

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Yeah.

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Going along with what I learned
in those wonderful Latin

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American Women's
Literature courses,

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I was imbued with concepts
related to marianismo.

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And for those of you who've
studied feminist theory,

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the concepts are the same
with a Catholic overlay.

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You're either a virgin, a
wife, a mother, or a nun.

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And then there's
only one other thing.

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So--

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[LAUGHTER]

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So in this context, I was
a single mother at age 20--

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a single mother on welfare
to make matters worse.

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And so for my experience, and
on behalf of my experience

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and of all the women
of my generation

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who went through this
process and this alienation

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and isolation from family,
I dedicate this poem

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called "Other Marias."

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"Once there were 50 Marias,
each with 50 lovers.

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There was Maria
Luz, the secretary,

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who crooned Latin-French-Spanish
to her Brazilian sailor,

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the son of a diplomat,
who brought her music

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boxes from Las Vegas, where he
slept with Maria del Pilar who

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lay with the Finnish carpenter
who stroked her calves as

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if to raise the grain
on a staircase finial.

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Maria de los Dolores
caught a lash

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from the bricklayer whose dust
raised welts on her shoulders.

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While Maria Elena fixed
paella for the Spaniard

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who sneered at her Yankee taste
for sweet beef and lettuce,

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always lettuce at every meal.

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Maria de las Rosas
snuck Marxist tracks

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into the copy room
for her Tijuana lover

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so he could multiply
them hundredfold

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for his morenita, Maria
la Negra from Cuba,

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who scored at a
Venceremos Brigade

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with the insurance
sales boyfriend of Maria

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de Jesus, mother of
a two-year-old, who,

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awaiting trial on drug
smuggling charges,

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caught her lawyer's eye.

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Which provoked his mother,
Maria de los Remedios,

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who refused to bless their
union saying her son, who

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would make a fine judge, should
marry a pure Maria, undefiled,

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not this Maria with child, who
favored the creak and sproing

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of cheap motel beds, the smoke
white scent of pliant sons

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who matched her rising rhythm.

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Not to this passionate Maria,
definitely not a virgin."

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It's a get-even poem.

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[LAUGHTER]

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