WEBVTT

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Well, since I'm reading
brand-new stuff,

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this is a poem that I
sent to The New Yorker,

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way back in January.

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And I haven't heard from them.

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[LAUGHTER]

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You ever call up The
New Yorker poetry?

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I think I called up to
find out what was going on.

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And you call The New
Yorker poetry line.

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They have a machine,
and it says,

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this is The New Yorker
poetry department,

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and then they tell you
exactly-- they say,

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you can submit any
number of poems

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so long as they don't exceed
a total of five pages.

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And if you haven't heard
from us within 90 days,

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please feel free to submit
again, because we do

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get thousands and
thousands of poems.

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We read everything, but if you
haven't heard from us within 90

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days, feel free to submit
again, because yours

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might have gotten lost in the
shuffle, that kind of thing.

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We accept no emailed
poems and no poems by fax.

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So I got it straight.

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I sent them a couple of poems.

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This is one of them.

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And it's a poem that
took a year to write.

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I wrote it on airplanes.

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And I don't know
where it came from.

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And one of the marvelous
things about poetry

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is that it's an opportunity to
tap into all these mysterious

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and kind of, I think,
divine sources.

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And I would only write
on this in a notebook

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when I was on planes,
and it took fully a year.

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I completed it in London
in November of '96,

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and I don't know
where it came from,

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but it's called "An
American Champion in Love."

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And it's about a pubescent
girl who's a track champion.

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I used to run track in
high school as a sprinter.

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I did the 220 and 440 and
all that, so that could

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be connected with it.

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But something happened,
and it came out

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in these quatrains rhymed, and
I'm going to read it to you.

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"An American Champion in Love."

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And one of the things you'll
find in reading my poetry

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is that I'm not a big fan
of the confessional mode.

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I like to try out a
lot of different voices

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and just pretend to be other
things and other people

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and all of that.

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I find it more interesting
than the "I" all the time.

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I was telling the undergraduates
at the poetry colloquium

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yesterday that Philip Levine,
he came to Stanford once when

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I was teaching there years ago.

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And he said that--

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he told me that his
first book of poems,

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which was being
handset in Detroit,

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was repeatedly held up because
the printer was always running

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out of capital I's.

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[LAUGHTER]

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So that made him think
about what he was doing.

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[LAUGHTER]

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"An American Champion in Love."

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"On borrowed time, she
took another prize,

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yet something held her back,
breathed down her neck.

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What slowed her breathing
slept around her eyes,

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their salty edges
thickening where

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flecks of reckless
juicy light rushed in.

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First place no
longer met her need.

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Her big time dream dissolving,
sliding, melted on her face.

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Even her dreams
would scald her when

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they steamed into
their hot half lives

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and she could feel
their weight--

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the medals.

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Wild sweat clogged her nose.

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What had her on the run?

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What made her heel
and toe the line now?

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Love.

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The way it rose like afternoon,
no night before, no dawn,

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no morning sun, no
warning light, no clue.

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Was it OK to cry,
all right to yawn?

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No frame of reference, no
things to do list aided her.

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No.

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Nothing but a glimpse of parted
clouds remembered, skydive gear.

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The rush a silly monkey's jump,
a chimp's; the moving ground,

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a grin from ear to ear.

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Fear suited up.

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Love cut her gut some slack.

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To run only to win seemed
pointless, dumb, like living

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on the mark, get set, attack.

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Where had the old thrill gone?

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Now she felt known.

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She'd lost her heart, but how?

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No silver cup, no bronze, no
plaque, no cash, no ribbon

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went with territory wired to
trip her up at every turn.

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Tricky.

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What had win meant?

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Where had she spent
her childhood?

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In a vault?

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She loved to run.

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Her parents loved to win.

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She'd win a race and
turn a somersault,

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and daddy, mommy, both
would clap and spin.

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Her trainers told
her, 'Stop that.

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Act your age.

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Be dignified.

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Don't pull that kind of stuff.'

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So sure enough, she studied
sports page, TV, news magazines,

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and even rough, old,
scratchy, training films

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they showed at school, the
'36 Olympics in Berlin,

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Ben Johnson's fall, why
steroids were uncool,

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that German girl they
caught with doctored urine.

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Routinely, they watch re-runs
of their meets on videotape.

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What could they teach?

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Sometimes her fantasies would
beat their own retreats,

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flickering with
pissed off Hitlers,

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busted rhymes she'd
hear and picture

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blasting while she raced.

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When Wilma Rudolph cheered
her from the stands,

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she knew she couldn't lose.

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The meet was aced.

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She dreamed of setting
records, foreign lands,

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Olympic sprinting,
winning, triumph, cash.

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Poor, sickly Wilma
never told herself,

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'100-meter relay or
dash, 200, hey, no way.

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I'm on the shelf with
this bad leg of mine.

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Just count me out.'

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So just as all her
heroes had inspired

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the way she outstepped
shadows, undid doubt,

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this runner always scored.

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She never tired, never ran out
of steam or guts and balls,

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whatever girls ran
out of-- ovaries?

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A winner, yes, but not the kind
who hauls off, takes the cake,

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and splits.

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October sees to that--

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her birthday month,
a lucky time of year.

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'I'm yours,' October
always told her.

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To crave my light has
never been a crime.

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A patriot, she was.

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No athlete soldier dispatched
to patch up social policies.

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Democracy is a tyranny, she'd
read in Plato's The Republic,

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ancient Greece.

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Their lit class
gasped, 'What nerve!'

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That's what he'd said.

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We've got the greatest
system in the world.

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There never would
have been a USA

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if every king, and queen, and
duke, and earl, and emperor,

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and tyrant had their way.

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She'd fight for that.

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Oh, yes.

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She would defend the land she
loved, the only home she knew,

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the same way Jesse Owens
put an end to Nazi big talk,

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proving who was who.

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Her country, love,
which would she

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sacrifice when duty called,
if push came down to shove?

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The fix was in.

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She thought it rather nice to
let it hang, not have to choose,

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just love."

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[APPLAUSE]

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