WEBVTT

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This poem also expresses an
accurate and sort of twisted

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perspective on things.

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And it's about-- it's
called "Fortune".

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In a way, it's about good
luck which is invisible

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because when you have good
luck, you think you deserve it.

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Although it's all
around us all the time.

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But it's very invisible.

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And it's about-- the
title is "Fortune"

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so it's also about fortune
cookies in Chinese restaurants,

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which make a prediction.

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Fortune has the sense
of making a prediction.

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And then fortune
also has the sense

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of being existant fortune,
just good fortune.

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And I was at a
Chinese restaurant

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with a bunch of people.

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And at the end of the meal,
they serve that wonderful slice

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of orange with the bill, which
is beautifully choreographed

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moment.

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And then-- and then you
have your fortune cookie

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and you get to do that wonderful
ritual of breaking something

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and finding something out.

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I was at a table to
people, the kind of people

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who all read their fortunes.

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Like in America, we're
supposed to share all the time.

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I didn't feel like
telling anybody

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what my fortune was so I lied.

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And I told them that my fortune
said ideology is bad for you,

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because secrecy is
important and valuable.

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So, "Fortune".

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"In a Chinese restaurant, it
is the perfect forethought

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and timing with which
the slices of orange

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arrive on a small
plate with the bill.

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So while you are
paying what is owed,

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the sweet juice fills
your mouth for free.

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And the fortune cookie
too, which offers you

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the pleasure of breakage.

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And then that other pleasure
of discovering, extracting

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and reading the little strip
of paper with a happiness you

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maybe conceal the way
the child you once were

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is even now
concealed inside you.

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Maybe you will marry
a redheaded woman.

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Maybe you are going to
take a long journey.

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Maybe a redheaded woman
will steal your car

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and take a long journey.

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Maybe you will be buried
next to your mother.

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And when the people you
are dining with smile

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and read their
fortunes out loud,

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and ask you to
tell them your own,

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you smile and tell them a lie.

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And they laugh and think you
were weird and funny and sad.

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And you know that you
are of those things.

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But you don't tell
them the truth,

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because you don't trust anyone.

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And you never have.

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That is your fortune."

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