WEBVTT

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I'm going to start
off by reading

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because I had just met someone
from St Louis who grew up

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with me.

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Not with me, but in the
same area that I did.

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So she-- I wasn't going
to read this poem.

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So I'm going to read
this poem about my mother

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and then read one
about my father.

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To start off.

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My mother is 84 now.

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So I wrote this poem
first and you'll

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learn a little bit about me.

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It's a kind of poem that
I don't write usually,

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but I had to write
this one for my mother.

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"Mother: for Dorothy
Smith Marshall".

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"When I was growing
up, she used to sit

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in the bathroom each and
every morning smoking

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cool cigarettes,
drinking hot coffee,

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reading newspapers,
a hard toilet

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seat caressing her derriere.

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Reading glasses in
place, serious as cancer.

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The way her eyes
devoured everything,

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finished old newspapers stacked
up high as her waistline

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when she stood proud,
erect, defiant,

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all of 5 feet 2 inches
tall in high heeled shoes.

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Petite, she was a pistol
when she was young.

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Eyes blazing, boring
in like bullets

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when her temper squeezed
the trigger of her ire hard.

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Her rage angry scars
she raised on me

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and my brothers backs
and legs dealt out

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with ironing cords that
hissed through the air like

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whips, coiled snakes
about to strike.

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It was her mother's influence.

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She was scared to death
of her mother, mama to me

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and my brother Timmy, who
believed in retribution,

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payback, fear, to
the bitter end.

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We watched mama slap mother
around hard once or twice

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for some perceived
transgression or indiscretion

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but we loved them both
deeper than fear itself.

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Love mother, mama too because
we knew we were a lot to handle.

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My brother and me
born to do mischief

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in a neighborhood full of young
thieves, malcontents, murderers

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to be, you name it.

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They thrived and
flourished there.

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The good and straight
we rejected out

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of hand as past tense,
Negro, square as

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blocks we played with once
until we wrapped our hands

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around straight razors.

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So she'd crack the whip hard,
raised welts on our backs

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and hardening butts, legs, and
arms, kept fear alive in us

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to keep us in line and alive.

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She always had books
around the house,

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introduced me to
poetry and novels,

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wanted to be a schoolteacher.

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Raising me and my brother
got in the way of that

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and as we grew older, she left
a string of glassy eyed suitors

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in her wake my father being
the first who didn't make it

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all the way home.

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Where her sweet perfume trailed
through the air like flowers

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blooming fresh in
springtime, gardenias

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of lady day, sometimes
jasmine or roses.

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It depended on her mood
but there was always

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something about her that kept
them coming back for more.

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Time and again, whatever
she had bewitched them with,

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her charm maybe that could be as
dazzling as the smile flashing

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above her sensuous
walk that beckoned,

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her step so light she
seemed to float through air,

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meriny yellow in skin tone,
plum cushiony lips splashed

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bright red and full, smooth.

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She called herself a party
girl though she was always

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much more than this,
though she was this too.

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With a great sense of style,
dressed to kill, cock-robin,

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could press pedal to the
metal out on the dance floor,

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she caused heads to swivel
on necks like spinning tops

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whenever she passed, her
fragrance tantalizing

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nostrils trailing behind her
like a sweet smelling invisible

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plume.

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She's in her 80s now, still
sits on the toilet stool

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each and every morning
repeating the same ritual.

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Only now she doesn't
smoke anymore.

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Everybody's gone to the other
side on her side of the family.

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Mama, her brothers, Garfield
and Allan, aunts and uncles,

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cousins, her daddy,
mine too, men her age

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still sniff behind her, glassy
eyed whenever she honors them,

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when she looks their way.

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Still a fashion plate,
the best of her time.

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Her smile remains
dazzling, her skill

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to squeeze copper from a
penny, squirrel away money -

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a survivor of the
depression, she is tenacious

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- for rainy days.

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She's softer now.

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Tells me she loves me every time
we speak over the telephone.

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Tells me with regret she
could have done better by me,

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but that's hogwash because
she did the best she could

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with what she had and that
was more than enough to get us

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through all the madness.

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She is still a pistol at 81,
has all her real teeth too.

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Has outlived all her suitors
except this last one Biff

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who she says is
slowing down at 79.

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She still walks with
a bounce in her stride

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seems to still float
across and through the air,

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her eyes blazing bore in on
you still like bullets whenever

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she squeezes the trigger
of her hot temper

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and I love her more than
I could ever imagine.

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Love her far deeper
than fear itself.

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