WEBVTT

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And this is two sections
from a long poem

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called "Homage to
Longshot O'Leary,"

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which was written in
memory of the poet

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Thomas McGrath, the great
poet Thomas McGrath.

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"Complications and
responsibilities

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of the appropriate response
in these days, when

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cold gazes measure the range
of projectiles, the grievance,

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the building site of
another fenced camp

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when no single store or
catalog offers better value.

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When spectacles of
thrilling outrage

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swing back and forth
before all eyes and injury

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comes in solids
stripes and checks.

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A car is always on fire to
one side of the highway.

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A woman walks up her
steep unpaved hill.

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The weight of the morning
marketing in her string

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bag and passes a man coming
down through the mud,

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talking on his
cellular phone as he

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carries an empty plastic
bucket to the one well.

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At the steps of a closed
church on a street

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I think might be
Avenida Salsipuede,

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a blear-eyed,
starving dog stands

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motionless very slowly
turning its head

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to watch us in the hot
sunlight as we walk past.

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Offering us its own thought
in its own language,

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which for this once we
can easily comprehend.

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I would like to be as simple
as a starling in the rain.

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Sometimes I would like to eat
only seeds like a sparrow."

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I think I'll stop there.

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[APPLAUSE]

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You could hold it all for
the end, it would be OK.

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Yeah, don't clap.

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You just encourage us.

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Unless you feel so
overcome to do that.

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Now I am from a tradition
that if you guys want to say,

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hey, go ahead--

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That's true.

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--do that shit brother, right?

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That's, all right.

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It's OK to do that, right?

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This is not your
daddy's poetry reading,

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unless you brought your
daddy with you, OK?

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And I come from a
long line of people

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that talk back to the movie
screen, so you can't scare me.

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