WEBVTT

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And the last one I'm going
to read to you is one

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that I don't think
was in your materials,

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but it's one of my favorites.

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And it's about my
grandmother, and it's

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about me growing
up here in Tucson,

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and how we lived together
for many, many years.

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It's called "Grandma."

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"Watching the last possessions
leaving through the back door,

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she smiles at the
fifty-year static

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rising from the oriental
rugs she prized.

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Investments against a market
she could not control or give

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her concern.

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Eye still bright, gleaming,
wit and rage at 99,

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she does not notice
the mothball smell

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preserving the flowered-silk
purse, the square-heeled shoes,

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almost fashionable.

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The rolling metal
chair she calls home,

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has replaced the painted
English upholstery

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from which she shared
holidays celebrating

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the miracle of Oz turning green
from the old black and white

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console.

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Football championships
covered in snow brought

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by the wonder of
electricity, and ritual meals

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served with dull regularity
to distant relatives glowing

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in the warmth of winters
invited 60 degrees.

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Struggling to gift her
life's collections,

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she uncovers memories of
weekends at the drive-in.

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Already a grandmother,
these 45 years

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passed, concealing the
drunk second husband

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in the garage of her faith.

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Happiness experienced
long ago, now balances

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empty on sorrows edge,
exhausting the clarity of age.

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Watching generations of her
men move cherry wood and ivory

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to a neighborhood
forbidden to her youth,

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she strives to connect
this ghost world.

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Hapless and precarious
to the old ballroom

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of her confusion of a
wedding, dresses, boulevards,

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and sisters devoured by time.

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Ignoring the silence
beyond tomorrow,

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she grapples with the
doctors cold pronouncement,

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either cruel nor suspenseful,
unforgiving in her return

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stare of truth that will
withstand the last pain.

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Her long elderly
face, hair thinning,

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will not be dazzled by his
poor human vision slipped

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through the depths.

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She knows she cannot
win the eternal bet.

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Struggling against the
decrepitude of the empty room

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before her reign, left to
solitary escapes, her time,

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thoughts verge on the
task of living day to day.

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Knowing so long as
her acerbic tongue

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can defend against
nature's incursions,

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she remains in the exile of
a life, gathered and lost.

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She has had no more
or less than others.

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She will determine
when it is time to go."

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[APPLAUSE]

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