WEBVTT

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This poem is called,
"The Trouble with In."

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It's four letters--
four words, not three.

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"The Trouble with In."

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Someone told me once,
who was teaching English

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as a second language,
that the way you--

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the thing that gave away
non-native speakers, however

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affluent their
accents were, however

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well-tutored they
were in vocabulary,

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what gave them away was not
the big vocabulary words,

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it was the prepositions.

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It was how they were using--

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I mean, you know
like when you use--

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well, this isn't-- these
aren't exactly prepositions,

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in this usage.

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They act as adverbs in a sense.

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But that all those words
you can put after the word,

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hold, like hold in, hold for,
hold to, hold off, I mean,

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there are a million-- hold on.

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There are a million
different things,

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but just that little
word changes everything.

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And those are all the little
colloquial things that

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amount to native understanding.

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But I got obsessed with
prepositions for a while,

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so apologia.

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"The Trouble with In."

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In English, we're in trouble.

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Love's a place we fall into.

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So sooner or later,
they ask, how deep?

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Time is a measure of extent.

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So sooner or later,
they ask, how long?

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We keep some comforters inside
a box, the heart inside a chest,

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but still it's there the trouble
with the dark accumulates

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the most.

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The end of life is said to be a
boat to a tropic, good or bad.

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The suitor wants to size
up what he's getting into,

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so he gets her measurements.

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But how much is enough?

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The best man cannot
help him out,

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he's given to his own
uncomfortable cummerbund.

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Inside the mirror,
several bridesmaids

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look and look in the
worst half light,

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too long, too little,
not enough alike.

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And who can stand to
be made up for good?

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And who can face being adored?

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I swear there is no frame
that I would keep you in.

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I didn't love a shape
and find you'd fit it.

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Every day, your sight
was a surprise you made.

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My taste made sense, made eyes.

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But when you set me
up in high esteem,

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I was a star that's
bound in time to fall,

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the bounds, the
soil of the song.

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I loved you to no end.

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And when you said, so
far, I knew the idiom.

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It meant so long.

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