WEBVTT

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One more for you guys.

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This is titled "The Lazarus
Project" and it is for Barbara.

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Some things can't be explained.

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Your mother's
illness, for example,

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or why scientists have
invented a cell phone

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charger that runs on urine.

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Rheobatrachus silus has
become the first extinct frog

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to be cloned.

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It reproduces by
swallowing its own eggs

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and regurgitating its young.

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You say you don't know
anyone who loves their kids

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but doesn't regret having them.

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I babysat for a friend
on her birthday,

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by 3:00 AM her daughter's
eyes are flickering

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street lamps at the mouth of
the alleyway leading into sleep.

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At 4:00 AM her mother calls.

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I'm in the middle of
sucking this guy's cock.

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Love is a black horse named
Falada who has seen too much.

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When you worked at
the amusement park

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you were the first to find the
man on the bench at twilight.

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He'd blown his head
open with a shotgun,

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looking out over the city.

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You said it was
beautiful, the view.

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You saw the leaves weighted
down by his remains

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and the tree that didn't move to
stop him or get out of the way.

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We drink bourbon.

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And it's a wonder our stories
don't end with the breath.

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They go on into the night
like wars, satellites,

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and naked women who give up
their bodies to the rain.

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How elusive we can be
even to our own skin.

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The doctors are playing
Marco Polo with the gene

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in your mother
cannibalizing her brain.

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They say it's like
Huntington's disease but not.

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I say, science is the
future's mythology,

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we just don't know
where it ends.

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I'm 30 and afraid
it's genetic, you say.

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I've been scared of
everything since puberty.

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I've only ever
slept with one man

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and I feel grotesque
like Alice Hindman.

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You took photos,
black and whites,

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for 10 years of your
mother's illness.

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It's settled into her like
the stain of a tanning

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wine on a snowy cloth.

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Everything she was, taken.

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Her blonde hair and beauty,
everything taken but her voice.

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I dream of the head of that
horse nailed to the drywall

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sky.

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What would it say to the body?

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She's not my mother.

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I don't even love her anymore.

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Flipping through
your portfolio, I

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am struck by the image of her
hand wrinkled over an ashtray.

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How she smoked but now can't
even close the dishwasher

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on her own.

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Your father yells at her for
things she can't remember.

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When she had the first
seizure, years ago,

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he wishes he'd let her die.

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And if she only knew
how the heart would rue.

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Sometimes being alive
is so overwhelming.

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Sweat is a skin telling
our story without blame.

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The only thing that gets
me through is reminding

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myself our son will die.

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I finish the bottle
of bourbon and try

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to talk of other things.

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What we are, asterisms,
and this endlessly finite

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funnel of vein and bone.

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We are dour because it's
easy being inebriated alone.

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It only rains when we aren't
looking up into the sky.

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Faith working its way into
the shoulders like clams

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into barrels of rock.

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Why defend the dolorous?

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A coworker emailed to say
he's leaving his wife for you

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but you didn't ask for this.

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You asked why people
call this giving up

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because if you do have
your mother's illness

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you'll live longer
than she will.

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You like movies, and music,
swimming in the ocean,

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and making art.

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That's enough.

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Even science is
starting to believe

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we might actually be alone.

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Each black hole holding
another solar system

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in its heart at its
center another void

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with its own possession of
stars and endless tunnel.

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We are barreling through
the universe like a slug.

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We may never know a resurrection
outside the sacred walls

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of this test tube.

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Our bodies overflow with whiskey
and other things we cannot

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understand like love.

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I brought you flowers
to replace the bourbon.

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I left them on the liquor shelf.

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Try not to let it wreck you.

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Thank you.

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[APPLAUSE]

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