WEBVTT

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I grew up in Buffalo, New York.

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And I'd like to read a poem
now that means a lot to me.

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I give homage in reading it
to Gwendolyn Brooks who wrote

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a poem called, The Mother.

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Do you know that poem?

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And it was through her writing
the poem, The Mother, that I

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was able to write this poem.

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And hopefully someone
might hear it and be

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able to write another poem.

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And I'd like to read
it especially for Mike.

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It's called The Lost Baby Poem.

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"the time I dropped
your almost body down,

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down to meet the
waters under the city,

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and run one with the
sewage to the sea,

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what did I know about
waters rushing back?

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what did I know about
drowning or being drowned?

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you would have been
born into winter,

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in the year of the
disconnected gas and no car.

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we would have made the
thin walk over genesee hill

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into the Canada wind,
to watch you slip

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like ice into strangers hands.

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you would have fallen
naked as snow into winter.

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if you were here
I could tell you

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these and some other things.

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if I am ever less
than a mountain

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for your definite
brothers and sisters,

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let the rivers
pour over my head,

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let the sea take me
for a spiller of seas,

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let black men call me stranger,
always for your never named

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sake.

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[APPLAUSE]

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Thank you.

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[APPLAUSE]

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