WEBVTT

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So that was a long
poem about three things

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that I couldn't do without.

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The poem, the poetics,
and the poetry.

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I can give a lecture
on that, but I won't.

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I'm going to read
this sequence here.

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It's shorter than the
other one, but basically, I

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had to approach prisons that
were on occupied, stolen,

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Indigenous land,
which all of them

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are and thinking of how
I even walk up to one,

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and how to engage with the
landscape and the environment

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around which prisons are built.

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How prisons are usually
in remote places

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because we don't
want to see them.

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We don't want to
see them because we

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don't want to face the
inhumanity with which we

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are complicit.

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So they usually-- in
California at least--

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they put them way out in
the middle of nowhere,

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which also makes it more
difficult for people

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to visit their family,
their loved ones.

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And so in places
where the prison is

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in the center of town,
there's these things

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called prison chic which
aestheticize and romanticize.

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And particularly, the
prison closest to me

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where my brother-in-law
is held, he's

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serving life in
Folsom Prison, is

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made famous because of Johnny
Cash and Johnny Cash's visit

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to the prison.

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Folsom Prison Blues, and so
it's a very wealthy, affluent

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community with a bike trail
that goes around the prison,

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and the prison itself is
hidden in the architecture

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of the landscape around it
with the Folsom Dam there.

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But nonetheless,
the bridges take

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on this prison chic of being
built by the same stones

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that the prison was built
in like guard towers

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and turrets, decorative
guard towers and turrets.

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And so you have these kinds
of almost like Alcatraz

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kind of tourism with
widely-funded public art

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and expensive road bikes.

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So this is where
that poem comes from

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and documenting
the plants that are

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outside of the
prison on that trail

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and their curative properties
as a way of thinking

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how people heal.

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Even, how do they heal when
healing is just out of reach?

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How to heal with
language and weeds,

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and the myths of these plants
that are so close to us.

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The redbud and the
dogwood in specific.

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It is called "Eclogue:
A Field Guide and Cure".

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Walking seven miles
around Folsom Prison,

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my job, for it is a job, is
to document plants and log

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their curative properties.

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Sweet fennel, black
locust, yerba santa,

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dove weed, chaparral broom,
Eastern redbud, sweet gum.

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A schemata.

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If maps minus borders
equals debt then what could

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they have healed for
whom there is no healing.

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There's a lot of
curative properties

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like carminative, galactagogue,
properties of plants.

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I am required to tell you I
have a cousin serving life

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without parole in Folsom Prison.

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In your imagination
of his crime,

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for you have already imagined
it, there must be a gold bell.

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It behooves you to imagine it
ring and the rain that follows.

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It rained and we did
nothing about it.

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The court said there is no
further explanation needed.

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His time and his nails
like blue division,

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as in departing from
a common source.

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A house inside another
house, and so we arrive.

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Tragedy plus time equals comedy.

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Six hummingbirds
nailed to a wall.

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The prison museum named The
Big House in bold italics.

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My brother remodeled
this prison kitchen.

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Pots as big as a bath
bolted to the floor.

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Biggest he'd ever seen.

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Ungodly heavy.

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I went to school where
the football stadium--

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not unlike this
football stadium--

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was also called The
Big House and where

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people screamed and screamed.

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If comedy minus time
equals tragedy then

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there is shame here, but
not how you imagine it.

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Black sunflower seeds
evenly placed on the table.

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The sound of them
opening and closing.

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Now, unlike those
I saw on the trail.

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How ungodly large and heavy
the redbud and dogwood

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were in biblical times.

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The dogwood used to
crucify the son of God.

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The redbud used by his traitor
Judas to hang himself in shame.

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Thenceforth, both trees
in their unique guilt

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never again grew large
enough to hold a body.

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Their branches thenceforth
too thin to ever hang from,

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and their petals no longer
white but red in spring.

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Thenceforth, named
the Judas tree.

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Ungodly beautiful.

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Mile after mile.

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Febrifuge, black
locust for fever,

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[? eaten ?] for the tumors that
grow in whatever empty space is

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left in your body.

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Emetic, analgesic to move the
pain in your mouth in circles

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until it feels like stirring
a large pot of warm broth

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in winter.

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If wealth plus comedy is greater
than or equal to madness,

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then you are lovely in
the eyes of the state.

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Gum bush, California
yerba santa,

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the lips of the hanged
Judas unable again

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to defile with a
kiss the most holy.

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You can make a tincture
and tea from their bark

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to stimulate the
respiratory system.

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It treats chronic asthma,
not just for a poem person,

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but a person person.

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If breath minus time is less
than or equal to tragedy,

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then my job is to
imagine a crime absolved

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of these oils of the sweet gum.

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Emmenagogue,
carminative, anointed.

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The court recommends
an explanation.

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So be it.

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This manicured trail named
after Johnny Cash's famous visit

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has polite cyclists on
expensive bikes and public art.

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A cold infusion for the
common flu and congestion.

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Mile after ungodly mile.

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White flowers, red flowers,
some kind of peppermint.

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Consumptive weed ingested
to terminate pregnancy.

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Its very same feathery
seeds at one time

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used to stuff baby toys.

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Henceforth, each mile through
the town center's prison

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aesthetic.

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Bridges designed with decorative
guard towers, rusted grates,

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and hedge walls lined with
the same quarried stones

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used to build a prison.

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A rustic panopticon's charm.

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If tragedy plus repetition
is greater than permanence

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over tragedy, then, of course,
they were wildly capable.

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Febrifuge, analgesic,
the scent of almonds.

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Dear cousin, this is the closest
I can and have ever come.

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Nearby, antique shops
sell the collateral damage

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of outdated restraints
long after they've outlived

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their usefulness and practice.

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Use, as in use this for that.

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The restorative power of
your life set to a score.

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Both a purge and hunger to know
your best self in your best

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starch shirt, in your
best ironed pants.

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Lemon-scented gum to
keep the mosquitoes away.

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More shiny bicycle thank yous.

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Henceforth, cheers
from the inmates.

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Cheers from the guards
holding Mary Magdalene.

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Cheers and screaming and more
cheers and more screaming.

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Unknown variable,
plus or minus beauty.

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Standard deviation
plus or minus two.

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Even the Folsom
Lake has dried up.

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This is the last section.

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Even though Folsom
Lake has dried up,

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the beachside homes have
firmly maintained their value.

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More cheers.

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More lemon-scented gum.

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The blood and blood
you gave, which

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made way for a bewildering
path I could never follow.

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The last adjacent mile
to you, dear cousin.

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The last bird thrumming
like a nervous finger.

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More cheers deranged by the
absence of cardinal points,

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useless instruments, stamens.

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We lose and loosen direction
on good, white, legal paper.

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Dear cousin, dear
son, idle brother,

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your blue opera
swimming down river.

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Your greatest good of that
bronze redemption of Christ.

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I document the oldest
tree in existence.

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I run into a bellflower.

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I run into a field
and clamor of bells.

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Thank you.

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[APPLAUSE]

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