WEBVTT

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I'd like to continue by reading
two more of these poems.

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The next one is
a sort of ballad.

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It's not too portentous
to call it such.

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I'd label it a
existential ballad.

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It's derived from
a piece of prose

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I was reading by
Rainer Maria Rilke--

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I was reading him
in English because I

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have no German-- in which
Rilke described how a lady was

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sitting at a table with her
chin cupped in their hands

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like this with her
elbows on the table.

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And Rilke described how
she's is deep in thought,

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and that someone eventually
called her name out loud,

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and she, too abruptly,
he wrote, moved her head,

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leaving her face in her hands.

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And this German
expressionist image

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was one that excited
me at the time.

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And indeed, I wrote a number
of poems using the face

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as a sort of emblem to
talk about such matters

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as identity and choice.

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And this is one such.

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"The heads around
the table disagree.

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Some say hang him
from the gallows tree.

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Some say high and some say low.

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To swing, swing, swing,
when the free winds blow.

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I wanted to be myself no
more, so I screwed up the face

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that I always wore.

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I pulled out the
nails one by one--

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I'd have given that
face to anyone.

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For those vile features
were hardly mine.

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To wear another face
is a spiritual crime.

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Why, imagine the
night when I would

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wed to kiss with wrong
lips in the bridal bed.

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But now the crowd
screams loud in mockery,

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oh, string him up
from the gallows tree.

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Silence, the judge commands,
or I'll clear the court.

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To hang a man up
is not a sport--

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though some say high and
some say low to swing,

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swing, swing, when
the free winds blow.

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Prisoner, allow me
once more to ask--

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what did you do with
your own pure mask?

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I told you, your
honor, I threw it away.

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It was only made of
skin-colored clay.

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A face is a man, a bald juryman
cried, for one face lost,

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another man dies.

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Gentlemen, this citizen
we daren't acquit until we

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know what he did with it.

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It was only a face
your honor that I lost.

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How much can such
a sad thing cost?

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A mask is a
lifetime, my bad man.

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To replace such a
gift, nobody can.

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Consider the case of that jovial
swan who took a god's face off

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to put a bird's
face on, and Leda

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swooning by the
sight of the sea,

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and the swan's eyes
closed in lechery.

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No, no, your honor.

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My aim was just.

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I did what every true man would.

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Quiet, prisoner.

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Why, I remember a priest
remark that he picked up

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a dog face in the dark.

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Then he got as drunk
as a man can be

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and barked at God in blasphemy.

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It was a human face,
sir, I cast away.

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For that offense,
do I have to pay?

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The heads around
the table disagree.

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Some say hang him
from the gallows tree.

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Some say high and some say
low to swing, swing, swing,

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when the free winds blow.

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At the back of the courtroom
quietly stand his father

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and mother hand-in-hand.

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They can't understand
the point of this case

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or why he discarded
his own dear face.

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It's not my face,
father, he had said.

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I don't want to die in
a strange, wrong bed.

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Look in the mirror,
mother, stare in deep.

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Is that mask your
own, yours to keep?

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The mirror is oblong,
the clock is round.

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All our wax faces
go underground.

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Once, I built a bridge
right into myself

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to ransack my soul
for invisible wealth,

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and, afterwards,
I tore off my mask

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because I found not the
person I thought I was.

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With the wrong mask,
another man's life I live--

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I must seek my own
face, find my own grave.

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The heads around
the table disagree,

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some say hang him
from the gallows tree.

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Some say high and some say
low to swing, swing, swing,

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when the free winds blow.

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I'll sum up, the severe
judge moans, showing

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the white of his knucklebones.

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What is a face but the
thing that you see,

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the symbol and fate of identity?

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How would we recognize
each from each--

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a dog from a man--

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which face on a leash?

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And when tears fall
where no face is,

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will the tears will be
mine or will they be his?

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To select hot coal
or gold, no man

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is free, each choice being
determined by identity.

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But exchange your face:
then what you choose

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is gained, like love,
by what you lose.

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Now you twelve
jurymen please retire.

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Put your right hand in
ice and your left in fire.

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A hole where the face was
frightens us and a man who

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can choose is dangerous.

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So what is your
verdict going to be,

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should he be hung
from a gallows tree?

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Oh some say high and some say
low to swing, swing, swing,

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when the free winds blow."

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Thank you.

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That's encouraging.

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Terrible thing about
clapping after a poem

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is if I don't hear it after
the next one, I'll think,

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oh, you don't like that one.

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