WEBVTT

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See, I didn't plan
this, obviously.

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I'm just sort of getting
the feel of the audience,

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of see how much
you'll stand for.

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Then I'll just read.

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Let's see.

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I don't think I read
this poem this well,

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but it's an interesting poem.

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I don't even know where
it came from, exactly.

00:00:24.690 --> 00:00:30.400 align:middle line:84%
It's not that much like me,
in a way, or like my work.

00:00:30.400 --> 00:00:33.930 align:middle line:84%
It was in this issue of
Antaeus, anniversary issue.

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And I sent in one that I thought
was much better to go in there.

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And then I realized,
actually, this

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was, because it was so
different from what I do.

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This is called "Salomé."

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"I scissor the stem
of the red carnation

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and set it in a bowl of water.

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It floats the way your
head would if I cut it off.

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But what if I tore you
apart for those afternoons

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when I was 15 and so,
like a bird of paradise,

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slaughtered for its feathers.

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Even my name suggested
wings, wicker cages, flight.

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"Come, sit in my lap," you said.

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I felt as if I'd flown there.

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I was weightless.

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You were 40 and married.

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That she was my
mother never mattered.

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She was a door that
opened on to me.

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The three of us blended into
a kind of somnolence and musk,

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the musk of Sundays,
sweat and sweetness.

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That dried plum and licorice
taste always back of my tongue

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and your tongue against my
teeth, then touching mine.

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How many times?

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I counted, but could
never remember.

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And when I thought we'd go
on forever, that nothing

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could stop us as we fell
endlessly from consciousness,

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orders came.

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War in the North.

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Your sword, the gold
epaulets, the uniform so

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brightly colored.

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So unlike war, I thought.

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And your horse, how
you rode out the gate.

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No, how that horse
danced beneath you

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toward the sound of cannon fire.

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I could hear it so
many leagues away.

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I could see you fall, your face
scarlet, the horse dancing on

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without you.

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And at the same moment, mother
sighed and turned clumsily

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in the hammock.

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The Madeira and the thin-stemmed
glass spilled into the grass.

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And I felt myself hardening
to a brandy colored wood.

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My skin a thousand
strings drawn so taut

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that when I walked
to the house, I

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could hear music tumbling
like a waterfall of China

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silk behind me.

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I took your letter
from my bodice.

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Salome, I heard your
voice, little bird, fly.

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But I did not.

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I untied the lilac
ribbon at my breasts

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and lay down on your bed.

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After a while, I heard
mother's footsteps,

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watched her walk to the window.

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I closed my eyes.

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And when I opened them,
the shadow of a sword

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passed through my throat.

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And mother, dressed
like a grenadier,

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bent and kissed me on the lips."

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