WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:05.520 align:middle line:84% And here's a poem which, I don't really 00:00:05.520 --> 00:00:06.900 align:middle line:90% know why I decided to read it. 00:00:06.900 --> 00:00:08.370 align:middle line:90% The moon figures in at the end. 00:00:08.370 --> 00:00:11.460 align:middle line:90% 00:00:11.460 --> 00:00:16.050 align:middle line:84% It's some sort of justification for existence. 00:00:16.050 --> 00:00:18.360 align:middle line:84% It's called the "Heaven of the Poor." 00:00:18.360 --> 00:00:23.850 align:middle line:84% Sometimes, we all get down in the dumps, 00:00:23.850 --> 00:00:25.740 align:middle line:84% and we need some sort of justification 00:00:25.740 --> 00:00:29.230 align:middle line:90% for our own existence. 00:00:29.230 --> 00:00:31.653 align:middle line:84% It is about certain kinds of people. 00:00:31.653 --> 00:00:32.820 align:middle line:90% They don't have to be poets. 00:00:32.820 --> 00:00:35.460 align:middle line:90% It can be anything. 00:00:35.460 --> 00:00:38.880 align:middle line:90% But good people. 00:00:38.880 --> 00:00:40.860 align:middle line:84% And it has, again, a biblical epigraph. 00:00:40.860 --> 00:00:43.680 align:middle line:84% The biblical epigraph is, blessed are the poor in spirit, 00:00:43.680 --> 00:00:45.180 align:middle line:84% for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. 00:00:45.180 --> 00:00:47.280 align:middle line:90% Matthew 5:3. 00:00:47.280 --> 00:00:50.670 align:middle line:84% Much ink has been spilled over those two lines, what 00:00:50.670 --> 00:00:52.230 align:middle line:90% that means, the poor in spirit. 00:00:52.230 --> 00:00:54.870 align:middle line:90% I don't know, really. 00:00:54.870 --> 00:00:58.290 align:middle line:84% But I've tried to define it, I guess, in this poem. 00:00:58.290 --> 00:01:01.140 align:middle line:90% "The Heaven of the Poor." 00:01:01.140 --> 00:01:02.940 align:middle line:84% Through the needle's eye, we can see 00:01:02.940 --> 00:01:06.630 align:middle line:84% them clamoring to get in, each offering to give up 00:01:06.630 --> 00:01:10.020 align:middle line:84% what he cherishes most, not knowing he has 00:01:10.020 --> 00:01:13.140 align:middle line:90% become what he cherishes most. 00:01:13.140 --> 00:01:17.310 align:middle line:84% We who are here had nothing to give up except our vanity. 00:01:17.310 --> 00:01:19.390 align:middle line:90% And that was not required. 00:01:19.390 --> 00:01:21.540 align:middle line:84% How can a weak man give up his strength 00:01:21.540 --> 00:01:24.270 align:middle line:90% or an ugly woman her beauty? 00:01:24.270 --> 00:01:28.080 align:middle line:84% In the Heaven of the poor, the past keeps going away, 00:01:28.080 --> 00:01:30.240 align:middle line:90% but is never quite gone. 00:01:30.240 --> 00:01:31.390 align:middle line:90% I was young. 00:01:31.390 --> 00:01:34.440 align:middle line:84% I was so young, I thought I would get over it. 00:01:34.440 --> 00:01:39.000 align:middle line:84% And all I have learned is that we never get over anything. 00:01:39.000 --> 00:01:43.170 align:middle line:84% Some of us were born to look for a child who has no legs 00:01:43.170 --> 00:01:45.090 align:middle line:90% and wants only to dance. 00:01:45.090 --> 00:01:47.700 align:middle line:84% And when we find that child, we take it 00:01:47.700 --> 00:01:52.900 align:middle line:90% in our arms and dance and dance. 00:01:52.900 --> 00:01:56.830 align:middle line:84% Among bricklayers and lawyers and even poets, 00:01:56.830 --> 00:01:59.800 align:middle line:84% there are good people who work alone 00:01:59.800 --> 00:02:03.370 align:middle line:84% at honest and difficult professions debauched 00:02:03.370 --> 00:02:05.260 align:middle line:90% by others. 00:02:05.260 --> 00:02:08.860 align:middle line:84% Their reward will be the Heaven of the poor. 00:02:08.860 --> 00:02:11.320 align:middle line:84% When they see the wormholes in the statues 00:02:11.320 --> 00:02:13.990 align:middle line:84% and realize there are kings who need no followers 00:02:13.990 --> 00:02:18.950 align:middle line:84% and have none, they will begin to escape from the world. 00:02:18.950 --> 00:02:21.340 align:middle line:84% Each of them will come to a river, 00:02:21.340 --> 00:02:24.370 align:middle line:84% and how he gets across it, if he gets across it, 00:02:24.370 --> 00:02:27.910 align:middle line:90% will be how he learns to swim. 00:02:27.910 --> 00:02:31.750 align:middle line:84% When he crawls out, wet and exhausted on this side, 00:02:31.750 --> 00:02:36.130 align:middle line:84% he will look back and see the bridges he did not know he had, 00:02:36.130 --> 00:02:40.150 align:middle line:90% burning, burning. 00:02:40.150 --> 00:02:43.150 align:middle line:84% There are no cities in the Heaven of the poor, 00:02:43.150 --> 00:02:45.850 align:middle line:90% no families, no friends. 00:02:45.850 --> 00:02:49.990 align:middle line:84% We do not pray for what we want, nor do we pray for salvation. 00:02:49.990 --> 00:02:53.650 align:middle line:84% We have already been saved, and each night our dreams 00:02:53.650 --> 00:02:57.820 align:middle line:84% show us what we wanted and could never become. 00:02:57.820 --> 00:03:01.990 align:middle line:84% Some of us walk on an empty beach, leaving no footprints. 00:03:01.990 --> 00:03:03.910 align:middle line:84% And others live alone in the desert, 00:03:03.910 --> 00:03:07.780 align:middle line:90% accepting the rain as love. 00:03:07.780 --> 00:03:11.020 align:middle line:84% We do not call it happiness, exactly. 00:03:11.020 --> 00:03:15.550 align:middle line:84% But we have the moon to talk to, and it always answers us. 00:03:15.550 --> 00:03:18.190 align:middle line:84% Do you believe me about the moon? 00:03:18.190 --> 00:03:20.680 align:middle line:84% Do you think I care whether or not you do? 00:03:20.680 --> 00:03:30.325 align:middle line:90% 00:03:30.325 --> 00:03:31.950 align:middle line:84% I always wanted to end a poem that way. 00:03:31.950 --> 00:03:34.470 align:middle line:90% 00:03:34.470 --> 00:03:36.770 align:middle line:90% It's called taking risks.