WEBVTT

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I'm going to bob and weave
between a new manuscript

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of poems and some prose
from a new book, which

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will be out in May.

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And then new poems
from my new book,

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which is I just got copies
a couple of days ago,

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and well, I like the
book I don't, know.

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[LAUGHTER]

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The first poem is called
"The Wrestler's Heart."

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When I was 16, 17, 18 years
old I used to wrestle.

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And this is sort of a summary
of my years wrestling.

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"I had no choice but to
shave my hair and wrestle.

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The 30 guys humping
one another on a mat.

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I didn't like high school.

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There were no classes
in archaeology

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and the girls are too much like
flowers to bother with them.

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My brother I think was a
hippie and my sister I know

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was a runner up queen of
the Latin American club.

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I saw her in the--

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when I saw her in the
cafeteria waved and said things

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like Debbie, is it your
turn to do dishes tonight,

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she would smile and make
her eyes real scary at me.

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My brother I believe was taking
reds and batting dust motes.

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The wrestling coach
was the same person who

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taught you how to drive a car.

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But first, there was
wrestling the young guys

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in the steamy room.

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And coach with the silver
whistle, his clipboard,

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his pencil behind
his clubbed ear.

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I was no good at wrestling.

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Everyone was better than me.

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Everyone was larger
in the showers,

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their cocks like heavy wrenches,
their hair like the scribbling

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of a mad child.

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I would lather as best I could
to hide what I didn't have

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and then walk home in the dark.

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[LAUGHTER]

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When we wrestled
Madera High School

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I was pinned in 12 seconds.

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My mom threw me a half a stick
of gum from the bleachers.

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She shouted it's Juicy Fruit
and I just looked at her.

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[LAUGHTER]

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I looked at the three
spectators all crunching corn

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nuts their faces like
punched-in paper bags.

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We lost that night.

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The next day in biology I chewed
my half stick of Juicy Fruit

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and thought what can
go wrong in 12 seconds.

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[LAUGHTER]

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The guy who pinned me
was named Bloodworth.

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There was a meaning
in that name.

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And that night I asked my mom
what our name meant in Spanish.

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She stirred the crackling papas
and said it meant Mexican.

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I asked her what was the worst
thing that happened to her

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in the shortest period of time.

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[LAUGHTER]

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She looked at my
stepfather's chair

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and told me to take
out the garbage.

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[LAUGHTER]

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That year I gained weight,
lost weight, and lost more

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matches nearly all by pins.

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I wore my arm in a sling
when I got blood poisoning

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from a dirty fingernail.

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I liked that.

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I liked being hurt.

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I even went as far
as limping which

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I thought would attract girls.

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[LAUGHTER]

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When the counselor
called me to his office

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and asked what I want
to do with my life,

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I told him I wanted to
be an archaeologist.

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And if not that, then
an oceanographer.

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I told him I had these
feelings I was Chinese,

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that I'd lived before and
was going to live again.

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He told me to get a drink of
water and by a third period

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I should reconsider
what I was saying.

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[LAUGHTER]

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I studied some, dated once, ate
the same spam sandwich until it

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was spring and most of
trees had circled the campus

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and wrestling was over.

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Then school was over.

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That summer I mowed
lawns, picked grapes,

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and rode my bike up and
down the block because it

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was good for heart and leg.

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The next year I
took Driver's Ed.

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Coach was a teacher.

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He said, don't be
scared but you're

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going to see some
punks getting killed.

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If you're going to
cry, do it later.

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He then turned on the projector,
a funnel of silver light

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that showed motes of dust
then six seconds of car wreck

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from different angles.

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The narrator with the
wrestler's haircut came on.

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His face was thick like a canned
ham sliding onto a platter.

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He held a black tennis
shoe and said the boy

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who wore this sneaker is dead.

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Two girls cried,
three boys laughed.

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Coach smiled and
slapped the clipboard

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against his leg kind of hard.

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With one year of
wrestling behind me,

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I barely peeked but
thought six seconds

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for the kid with the sneakers,
12 seconds for Bloodworth

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to throw me on my back,
tough luck in half the time."

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[LAUGHTER]

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