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That was so nice.

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I'd like to read you part of
the poem that's unfinished.

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Just to pick on Martin.

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I've never done this before.

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I realized today I
was talking to people

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there is a finish to this poem.

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But it was just that it's
National Poetry Month.

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Something we should all
celebrate alone in our bathrooms

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with our poetry books I think.

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So this will eventually
finish itself.

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But it's called
A Poetry Reading,

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and it starts: And
this is the way

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it had been done for
years in the provinces

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with the nice young assistant
decked out in tweed and denim,

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standing up at the
beginning to evoke

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some rusty liquidity or baroque
Valentine of the curriculum

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vitae.

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To tweak the vanity of the
esteemed visitor, who would just

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then be wringing from a backpack
a handful of faded books,

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and the new precious one

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that had just from the soul been
freshly delivered and pressed

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in the black binder from which
the taut syllables would soon

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come springing.

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And this would be
as a wonder to some.

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Four who had already
heard what was

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to be spoken and
loved or dismissed it.

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12 who had dreamed
of the ones they

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had heard of attending,
who would take off

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their clothes for anyone.

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Five who knew the name,
but not the work they

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had characterized often as
promising or derivative.

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And two who had blundered
into the wrong room thinking

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to learn of crocodile habitats
or cult heresies of the Spanish

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Inquisition.

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And still others would be
here except that tomorrow they

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would be called on to name the
elements, trample a sonata,

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or defend a thesis.

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If it did not happen on the
night of the tournament,

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or on a day when
debaters were flapping

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like puppets from our grittiest
and most altruistic intentions.

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Or on a night when
Christian body builders had

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donned crucifixes and
greased pectoral standmount

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scaffolds at the
center of the coliseum

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and hunched in such
oddly hopeful positions.

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But perhaps, the university
is not the place for poetry.

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Picture that venerable line
of shamans, bards, and nervous

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wrecks hauling themselves
up from the sticky kitchens

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of Bohemia.

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And now, one drones or whinges
or signals with a fist.

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It is especially icky when
the poet';s more virile in his

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photograph.

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The African's too pale.

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The lesbian is
insufficiently militant,

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or the lights make that
noise of frying fish.

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After all, not much happens in
this lounge or small auditorium

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under the library.

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Yet those who are
here hear, don't

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they, among these
lubricated delicacies

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for the auditory senses, a
thing that is right and singular

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to the heart.

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Oh, it does not
always have to issue

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from guilt, or some lingering
inferiority to the British.

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It can be performed plainly
or in elaborate meters.

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And afterwards, after
exegesis, and tea,

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someone shy and unlikely
who loves Bishop, Whitman,

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and Wilbur may actually go
into a room alone and read it.

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I'm going to try to compress the
last two stanzas of that poem

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into about three words.

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