WEBVTT

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I wrote a lot of strange
poems, I would say.

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I'll read this poem.

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I have never read this
poem in public before.

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This is called "A Little Old
Funky Homeric Blues for Herm."

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It's based on the
"Homeric Hymn for Hermes,"

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which was an anonymous
poem of ancient Greece.

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It's called "homeric"
because although it probably

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wasn't written by
Homer, whoever he was,

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it's written in his
manner, with lots

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of extended similes and repeated
epithets and things like that.

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It tells the story
of Hermes overcoming

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Apollo in the contest to see
which was the best musician,

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and how Hermes tricked Apollo
out of his herd of cattle,

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I think, of goats.

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But it puts it in
contemporary language,

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the idiom of Afro-American
people in this country

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in the '30s and '40s.

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I won't try to read it as
they would pronounce it

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because I can't, but I'll do--

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but the language itself is
relatively authentic, I think.

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There are words in here
that you won't understand.

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"Knock off that hincty
blowing, you Megarians.

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I got a new beat, mellow
and melic like warm, man.

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I sing of heisty Herm.

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'Twas was early dawn when
somebody smashed the stars

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and hard-nosed Herm was born.

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He lay there on his
cot a while, then

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he raised up and said,
"Ma--"" that's Maybelline--

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""Ma, who's my daddy?"

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"Him," snorted Maybelline.

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"Yeah, but who is he?"

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"He come in the white cloud."

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"Ha!

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I knows the kind.

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Them so big balled."

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"Gully-low he was, sure enough.

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He live up Sugar Hill,
up some hill somewhere,

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that's all I heard.

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I know that."

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And hero Herm he laughed
and looked in the glass

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and smarmed to himself, an
eight rock mama and an ofay pop.

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Hey man, you've got
something coming sure.

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Then the window flashed
with curious light.

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"Ma, Ma, what's that?"

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"Oh, just a car going by."

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"Car?

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What kind of car?"

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"Hmm, it looked like a Jaguar."

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Horrid Herm flaked out
in a fake of sleep,

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but then rose up,
unseen, and out the door,

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down the dark hall
where he found

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a rusty pipe which cried
out, "no, no, I too

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am an object of this world."

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But hectic Herm, he said,
"bah, you nothing now."

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And he killed it with
one blow, and bent it,

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and then and there,
all by himself,

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invented the tenor sax.

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Oh, hippocrine Herm, he
blew, he strutted, he

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made the walls fall down
and then fall up again,

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with only 96 bars of hermetic
swan-shaped blues, and bowed

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and departed.

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Down the stairs, down the
block, past fizz and fuzz.

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You mess with me,
baby, I bite your ass.

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Down Fifth and down and
down, till there it stood,

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the great red Jag, tethered
right outside the pad

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of Apollonio.

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Appollonio, the brave, fair,
friend to all, talented,

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liberal, who played all day
on his symphony orchestra.

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Hoodoo Herm, he fingered
the secret switch

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and drove that Jag like a
fist of fire across the park,

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up Amsterdam, to a cave
on Morningside Heights.

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Wham, it was hidden.

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Hieratic Herm sat down
and pulled his pud,

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and then and there,
all by himself,

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invented man's sacrificial
relationship to fate.

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Twelve times he jetted to
the twelve prophets in order.

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Handsome Lake, Simon Kimbaugh,
John Wilson, Andre Matswa,

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Muana Lesa, Kanakuk, Marcus
Garvey, Enoch Mgijima,

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Wodziwob, Dr. George,
Isatai, Makandal,

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and bowed and said, "I
done what you told me."

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Then home and slipped
through the keyhole

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in the form of a flatted
seventh, back to the cot.

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Maybellene cried,
"where you been, child?"

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But Holy Herm, "nowheres.

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How you expect a little
newborn baby going to go?"

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Then Maybelline looked wise,
"little fucker, I knows you.

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The day that big man from up
yonder stuck his thing in me,

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he got a heap of
trouble on the world."

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Then hijacker Herm, he
snuggled in his rildy

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and answered, "Ma,
you's quaker oats.

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Now listen, ain't you
heard about status yet?

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It's like powerful,
like being on top

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but with class, no sweat, see?

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And I aim to get me some.

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If nobody, meaning that Mr.
Big on the Hill, give it to me,

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I gets it any way.

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That's all.

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Any way I can.

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Don't you worry none.

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I blowing real sharp
on this gig already."

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And he fell asleep,
snuffling and snoring.

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Then came the fuzz with
Apollonio to wake him up.

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"Boy, where'd you
stash that Jag?"

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"Jag?

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Jag?

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I don't know nothing
about--" But Apollonio

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lifted him and shook
him hard, and here's

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where handy Herm
did his cleverest,

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for he farted juicily
inside his diaper

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and topped it with a sneeze.

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Awed Apollonio dropped
him like a toad.

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Yet at last they agreed
to submit the matter

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to the man on the
hill, who smiled

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when he heard of heretical
Herm and the big red Jag.

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Smiled and said, "you've
got to give it back."

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And haunted Herm said, "shucks."

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And he said, "dadgumit."

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But what could he do?

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Something tied his tongue.

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He was like a child.

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He was a child.

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He had to give it back.

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So haywire Herm and
affable Apollonio

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trucked down the avenue together
until, after a ways, Herm

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unslung his horn, the
golden tenor, and with

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a groan and a squeal,
popped out to changes

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on Cora Banty's Ride.

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And Apollonio's
blond wig stood up,

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and he jigged, he twitched,
he chuckled, and he prespired.

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And at last, he leaped and
cried, "oh man, I dig you!

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Teach me to play that thing."

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"What?" said hispid Herm.

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"You'd grunch and groan?

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You'd dirty them
fingers so lily white?"

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"I got to, man.

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I got to.

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Give me that beat
again," cried Apollonio,

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down on his knees and rocking.

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"What it worth to you?"

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"Anything, anything.

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Take my Jag, take my
electronic wristwatch,

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I got to have that horn.

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Oh Herm, we are brothers now."

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And so hilarious Herm went home
again, grinning and gloating.

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But Maybelline, she said, "you
too big for your britches, boy.

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They're going to fix you yet.

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Prince of thieves,
they calls you.

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Maybe you is and maybe
you ain't, but you know

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what they're going to make you?

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Prince of storekeepers,
that's what.

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Prince of nickels and dimes,
Prince of gouging and niggling.

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You're going to be a rat just
like them, Little Prince,

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you hear?

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Squeezing and scrambling and
squawking just like them.

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Just like them.

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And the very best name
they ever going to call you

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is Psychopompos."

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"Shit," said homunculus Herm."

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[LAUGHS]

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[APPLAUSE]

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Psychopompos, in case you
haven't studied Greek,

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is the person who leads the--

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