WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:02.640 align:middle line:84% This is called "The Angel of Phillips Park", 00:00:02.640 --> 00:00:06.190 align:middle line:84% and it's about in the neighborhood 00:00:06.190 --> 00:00:09.395 align:middle line:84% I live in Minneapolis, which is a fairly racially 00:00:09.395 --> 00:00:10.270 align:middle line:90% diverse neighborhood. 00:00:10.270 --> 00:00:17.340 align:middle line:84% There was a kid who was playing basketball, and he was shot. 00:00:17.340 --> 00:00:24.030 align:middle line:84% He was not the designated target, but he was shot. 00:00:24.030 --> 00:00:29.100 align:middle line:84% And so this is called "The Angel of Phillips Park". 00:00:29.100 --> 00:00:32.490 align:middle line:84% Two crows in the alley garbage, shrieking and scuffling 00:00:32.490 --> 00:00:36.150 align:middle line:84% at a leg bone or stale eggs sandwich. 00:00:36.150 --> 00:00:38.790 align:middle line:84% The night impatient takes them down. 00:00:38.790 --> 00:00:44.280 align:middle line:84% The raucous throats and wing flurry now silent. 00:00:44.280 --> 00:00:49.980 align:middle line:84% Night of the first violence just after a strong spring rain. 00:00:49.980 --> 00:00:52.110 align:middle line:84% Walking out for a few hours, the dealers 00:00:52.110 --> 00:00:54.540 align:middle line:84% at the corner fists and their baggy pants, 00:00:54.540 --> 00:00:58.200 align:middle line:84% Nikes sliding the walk, black hoods or knit caps, 00:00:58.200 --> 00:01:02.310 align:middle line:90% bleary eyes catching it all. 00:01:02.310 --> 00:01:05.190 align:middle line:84% In the park on Franklin outside the Four Winds School, 00:01:05.190 --> 00:01:08.130 align:middle line:84% the last kid on the scholarship of his mind 00:01:08.130 --> 00:01:11.490 align:middle line:84% pops the air with arcs, trey after trey, 00:01:11.490 --> 00:01:15.150 align:middle line:84% counting the final seconds of the game. 00:01:15.150 --> 00:01:21.360 align:middle line:84% The crowd roars in his ears like the ocean he's never seen, 00:01:21.360 --> 00:01:23.890 align:middle line:84% and just as he hits the top of the key, 00:01:23.890 --> 00:01:26.610 align:middle line:84% the first shot steels through the sternum one 00:01:26.610 --> 00:01:29.640 align:middle line:84% then his shooting hand so quick pulling the trigger. 00:01:29.640 --> 00:01:33.300 align:middle line:84% And it flows from the porous spot appearing in his gut 00:01:33.300 --> 00:01:36.840 align:middle line:84% like a black hole in the heavens. 00:01:36.840 --> 00:01:40.380 align:middle line:84% On this court where he always won and gave it all, 00:01:40.380 --> 00:01:46.260 align:middle line:84% his body topples in a puddle so epic and slow in its fall, 00:01:46.260 --> 00:01:49.590 align:middle line:90% some bit of his brain still hot. 00:01:49.590 --> 00:01:50.760 align:middle line:90% Made it. 00:01:50.760 --> 00:01:51.840 align:middle line:90% Nothing but net. 00:01:51.840 --> 00:01:54.830 align:middle line:90% 00:01:54.830 --> 00:01:56.750 align:middle line:90% Silence now. 00:01:56.750 --> 00:01:59.540 align:middle line:90% Stepping through wet grass. 00:01:59.540 --> 00:02:01.640 align:middle line:84% Held in check to the flashing lights 00:02:01.640 --> 00:02:04.670 align:middle line:84% and the tires of the city's finest screeches 00:02:04.670 --> 00:02:06.980 align:middle line:90% to the tennis courts. 00:02:06.980 --> 00:02:09.830 align:middle line:84% The static on the radio, mics 10-4 breaking up. 00:02:09.830 --> 00:02:13.910 align:middle line:90% The crows start at it again. 00:02:13.910 --> 00:02:17.510 align:middle line:84% And no one sees one rising higher and higher on wings 00:02:17.510 --> 00:02:21.740 align:middle line:84% of blackness and prayer a jam so devastating and powerful 00:02:21.740 --> 00:02:25.040 align:middle line:84% revealing all the light in this universe 00:02:25.040 --> 00:02:33.040 align:middle line:84% and giving it back as a crow, a night, a boy, a star. 00:02:33.040 --> 00:02:36.000 align:middle line:90%