WEBVTT

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I would like to read--

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somebody asked me to read
another series of poems

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and then just a couple more.

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Some people tell me
I'm very religious

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and I haven't been in church.

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The last time I was in
church was a long time ago,

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and I fell out of the
pulpit at the time.

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Because I was going to--

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I was going to speak at a
Founder's Day for my father,

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my father's church.

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And I thought I would
talk about my mother,

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because they didn't
know her very well.

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My mother was sanctified.

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So, this was kind of
what, if you know anything

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about churches that was a little
tackier church than Baptist.

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And so I thought I'd talk
about my wonders mother.

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And I had forgotten that I had
stepped up into the pulpit,

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you know.

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And I was going to town,
I mean I was so holy.

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And I finished with
a great flourish

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and forgot to step down
and fell out of the pulpit.

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And then a lady who had
taught me in Sunday school

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when I fell said,
that's her all right.

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And I thought, you
know, I had no idea

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that my reputation was what
it was but it apparently was.

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Anyway, while on one
hand, I don't guess--

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I don't think I'm
particularly religious.

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I do seem to have in every
book something about,

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some kind of biblical thing.

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And these are some
poems about Mary.

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I'm quite fond of Mary.

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I was listening to
television today

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and they were talking about
people having Pat Boone.

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He likes to talk
about stuff like this.

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And he was talking about people
having a personal relationship

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with God and I like
to think I have

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a very personal relationship.

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But I tell him off all the
time, you know I'd laugh

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and I tease him.

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But he's real fond of me
and and I'm fond of him too.

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I guess he tells me
off periodically,

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just to keep me honest.

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Well this is about
Mary and it is

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written in a kind of
West Indian dialect.

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I wanted to write about how Mary
might have felt about it all.

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I think she may have
thought that this

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was one of those mixed blessings
that comes from time to time.

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And I wanted to use
a language that was

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particular to Rastafarianism.

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Rastafarianism is
a sect in Jamaica.

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People wear wonderful hair
called dreadlocks, do they not.

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And the belief is that Rastafari
who is Haile Selassie, was God

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and that he is going to return
and take us from Babylon.

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And there is a kind
of wonderful language

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and I believe that all language
is possible for poetry.

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Some people believe there's
only a certain kind of language

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that can be used in poems.

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A language which
seems to include

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nightingales for some reason.

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And I like to believe
that all language is

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available for poetry.

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And so, I thought about
this little sect in Jamaica

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and I thought about how
the early Christians were

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a little sect where they
were and they may well have

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had a kind of private language.

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Anyway, someone asked me to
read this and so I'll share.

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There are a few poems.

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The first is called
The Astrologer Predicts

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At Mary's Birth.

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This is the astrologer
when they see Mary.

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This one, lie down on grass.

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This one, old men will follow
calling mother, mother.

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She womb, will blossom then die.

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This one she hide from evening.

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At a certain time, when
she hears something

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it will burn her ear.

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At a certain place,
when she sees something

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it will break her eye.

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