WEBVTT

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Gee, thanks.

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I'll do what I can.

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It's wonderful to be here,
everyone in their woolies

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coming from New York where it's
almost the same temperature.

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Of course, I ran out this
morning to look at the sun.

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We don't have the
sun in New York.

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Oops, I'm going to have
too many books up here.

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Anyway it's great to be here.

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And thank you, Jim
and the Poetry Center,

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for the privilege
of reading here.

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I thought I would begin
with poetry, since poetry

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is what joins us and brought the
Center and myself into being.

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In a confounding--
the usual procedure,

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I thought I'd read you
my most recent work

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rather than leave it to the
end when you're dozing off

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and not interested.

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This is from a manuscript called
Treason, and it's the epigraph.

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It's from the 14th
century custom

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of putting a mask on a condemned
person with the face of Jesus

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on it.

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And then all of
the people who've

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come to watch the execution
follow in a kind of parade,

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a passion play up to the point
where the person is executed.

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As you can see,
it could have lots

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of great psychological effects.

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It's called Play.

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"You are not you.

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You are the someone
on this mask.

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And we are your
followers, we who

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applaud when you don't
cry out or tear it off,

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when the noose or the
knife comes at last.

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And our sins rise
with your soul that

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is better than a beggar's
stealing butter."

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