WEBVTT

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Thank you.

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Thank you.

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Thank you.

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It's wonderful to be here again.

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It's wonderful to
see the Poetry Center

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flourishing,
thriving, and poetry

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alive, and off the books.

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Thank you, Diana.

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Thank you, Tyler.

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Thank you, Paola.

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Especially thank you
to the librarians.

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Thank you to the docents--

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docents.

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[LAUGHS]

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It's in a foreign language.

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[LAUGHTER]

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And everybody else, sound
people, and booksellers,

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and people who clean
up, and thank you all,

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especially thank you for coming.

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I want to begin by
reading from a new book,

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a new unpublished
manuscript called

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Fire: Poems Against Pandemic.

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I had COVID five times.

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The first time was--

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you know, that first week,
I got it March 6th, 2020

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when no one really knew what it
was except that you might die.

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I woke up in the
middle of the night,

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and my lungs didn't work.

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Wolves' hour, about
four in the morning.

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And anyway, I survived.

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And I wrote a book.

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This is the last
poem in the book.

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I think I'll be reading the
first poem and the last poem,

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but I'm going to be doing
them in an opposite order.

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I'll read the last poem of
the new manuscript first.

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I wrote this poem a couple
of weeks ago, September 3rd.

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And I'll end with the first
poem in the manuscript,

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and then I'll be reading
from April on Olympia.

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