WEBVTT

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This is the last piece.

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It's about my father.

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My father was the
reason I write.

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And I'm an only child.

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So my mother was
the disciplinarian.

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She was the person
that took me to church

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and spanked me and
checked my grades.

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And my father was the dreamer.

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My father and I used to be
in the kitchen every day.

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And I would just
tell him everything.

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And when I decided that I wanted
to be a newspaper reporter,

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my mother said, you can't do
that because only white men

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do that, which I found
out later was true.

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[LAUGHTER]

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And then I would
go to the kitchen

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and my father would whisper,
never loud enough for my mother

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to hear, you do
anything you want.

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You know, so my father
was the person I just

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spilled everything to him.

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And so when my
father died my mother

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and I looked at each other
like, and you would be who?

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And we're still-- my
mother's just not-- she's not

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very emotionally giving.

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My mother's all
business like, you know.

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And my father was
the scoundrel and so

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I wound up being the scoundrel.

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So this is a part--
and one of the things

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he did, when we
were in the kitchen,

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he would teach me how to cook.

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And that was our sort of excuse
for being in the kitchen.

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I'm going to teach
her how to-- teach

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the girl how to cook something.

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And the first thing my
father ever taught me to cook

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was something called
hot water cornbread.

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Uh, huh.

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There's always somebody
who's like, uh, huh.

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Hot water cornbread
is delicious.

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But anyway, it's
real simple to make.

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So this is a poem about my
dad and cooking and missing

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him and everything.

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The recipe for hot water
cornbread is simple.

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Cornmeal, hot water.

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Mix till sluggish, then
dollop in a sizzling skillet.

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When you smell the
burning begin, flip it.

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When you smell the burning begin
again, dump it onto a plate.

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You've got to wait for the
burning and get it just right.

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Before the bread
cools down, smeared

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with sweet salted butter, and
smash it with your fingers,

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crumble it up in a bowl of
collard greens or buttermilk.

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Forget that I'm
telling you, it's

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the first thing I ever
cooked, that my daddy was

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laughing and breathing
and no bullet in his head

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would be talking.

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Mix it until it looks
like quicksand, he'd say.

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Till it moves like
a slow song sounds.

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We'd sit there in the
kitchen in the half dark,

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licking our fingers and laughing
at my mother, who was probably

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scrubbing something with
bleach or watching "Bonanza"

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or thinking how stupid it was to
be burning that nasty old bread

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in that cast iron skillet.

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She always used
whole milk and eggs

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and baked her cornbread until
it was plump and sugary.

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And she granted me
hopeless as a homemaker,

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too damned interested in sitting
in the kitchen in the half

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dark, learning nothing at all
from a man who had other women

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and stayed out late
on Saturday night.

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When I told her that I fixed
my first-ever pan of hot water

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cornbread and that my daddy
had branded it glorious,

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she sniffed and kept mopping
the floor over and over

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in the same space.

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So here's how you do it.

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Take out a bowl, like the one we
had with blue flowers and only

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one crack.

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You put the cornmeal in it.

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Then you turn on the
hot water and you

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let it run while you tell the
secret about the boy who kissed

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your cheek after school,
or about how you really

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want to be a reporter instead of
a teacher or a nurse like mama

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said.

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And the water keeps
running while Daddy says,

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you will be a wonderful writer.

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And you will be famous someday.

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And when you get famous,
if I wrote you a letter

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and sent you some money,
would you write about me?

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He is laughing and breathing
and no bullet in his head.

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So you let the water
run into this mix

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until it moves like mud moves
at the bottom of a river, which

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is another thing Daddy said.

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And even though I'd
never even seen a river,

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I knew exactly what he meant.

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Then you turn the fire
way up under the skillet

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and you pour in
this mix that moves

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like mud moves at the bottom
of a river like quicksand,

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like a slow song sounds.

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That stuff pops something
awful when it first

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hits that blazing skillet.

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And sometimes Daddy and I
would dance to those angry pop

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sounds.

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He'd let me rest my
feet on top of his

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while we waltzed
around the kitchen.

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And my mother huffed and puffed
on the other side of the door.

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When you are famous,
Daddy asked me,

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will you write about dancing in
the kitchen with your father?

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I say everything I
write will be about you.

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Then you will be famous too.

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And we'd dip and swirl and spin.

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But then he stops
and sniffs the air.

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The thing you have to remember
about hot water cornbread

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is to wait for the burning
so you know when you flip it.

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And then again, so you know
when it's crusty and done.

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Then eat it the way we did,
with our fingers, our feet still

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tingling from dancing.

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But remember that sometimes the
burning takes such a long time

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and in that time,
sometimes poems are born.

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[APPLAUSE]

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Please join us-- please
join us in the lobby.

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There is carrot cake and
lemonade and the university--