WEBVTT

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Well, I teach in Buffalo, which
is the home of the Language

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poets, so I felt I ought
to write a Language

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poem to be in the swim.

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So this is my version of one.

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It's called "Manifesto."

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"Is it a time for you, words of
the world, to unite and resolve

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not to work anymore for the
bosses, who look upon you as so

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many hands and feet,
drudges and drones,

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in a garment sweatshop, turning
out code so rich, so elegant,

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they make the ugliest
customers appear respectable?

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Isn't it time to gather
under the flag I'm

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standing under, after my little
stint with lesser causes,

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the flag of art?

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Proudly it waves over a
workshop where the management

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puts its employees first.

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No more crowding together
in ill-lit basements.

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Each of you will receive
the elbow room you deserve,

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by a bright window
that opens on a garden,

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happy in an establishment where
means and methods are just

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as important as any end.

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"Accept no substitutes,"
that's the new motto

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I've sewn in our union logo.

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One sentence stitched with
devotion says more than 10

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pasted together to
meet a deadline.

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And here's a clause in
the contract that says,

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whenever you feel
weary from overuse,

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you can take off a month
to get your strength back.

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No more worry about replacement.

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No scab of a synonym will be
smuggled on to the payroll

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to do the job only you can do.

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Imagine it, words, no
foreman ever again.

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No chain of command if you
work together as equals.

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The noun "confusion," the
companion of "muddle,"

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the adjective "mortal," at
its ease with "death-bound."

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Each of you will be
known from every other

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by your own peculiar pointedness
on my tongue, your own torque,

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twisting the line, and pushing
over the line between chop

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and office, into the
greener pastures, where

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crowds press forward to
touch your sharp inflections.

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How proud I'll be, my
colleagues, of your angles

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and edges, how you won't
let anyone file them down."

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