WEBVTT

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The next poem is called, it's
called At Last The Poet Returns

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to the City.

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Which actually
started as a prompt

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given to me by Lisa O'Neill
for a reading at Casa Libre.

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We were given a single word.

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I just thought of this right
now, I've forgotten that word.

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Remember?

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I was given the word retable.

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And this is somehow what I did
with it, even though actually I

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think in the end retable
does not make it in.

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Table does, though.

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At Last the Poet
Returns to the City.

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"At last the poet
returns to the city.

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Nobody recognizes her.

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Nobody knows she has returned.

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She watches the
people come and go,

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bringing their goods
to the marketplace.

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Now a blind man walks by
and recognizes the poet.

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Ah, he says, so you've returned.

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It was for your own good
that we sent you away.

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Now everything is as it appears.

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You need no longer speak
in riddles and tongues.

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The people gather around.

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They build a table
for the poet, and they

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sit the poet at the table.

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Now the poet will
defend herself.

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Do you swear, the blind man
asks, raising his right hand,

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to fasten each word only
to what is solid and true?

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That though man is
rarely of one mind

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and is often therefore
at war with himself,

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that you will lead him so far
as you are able toward reason

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and law, away from
conflict, indeterminacy,

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and unreasonable suffering?

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The poet opens her mouth to
reply but no sound comes.

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Confused, the people cry out.

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What possible meaning
is there in any of this?

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But the words break
on their tongues

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and gather like
stones at their feet.

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Someone picks up a stone.

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He slams his fist on the
table the people have built

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and he throws his
stone at the poet.

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The people cheer and
shout every cheer turns

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to a stone at their feet.

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The people pick up their stones.

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They beat on the
table with their fists

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and they throw the
stones at the poet.

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The table shatters.

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The poet flees.

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The people sit-in
the ruined agora.

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They pick up the pieces of
the table they had built.

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I thought this was
a table, they say.

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But how can it be a table if
it shatters at a single blow?

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How can it be a table if
it is only this part?"

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