WEBVTT

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I was working, as I said,
with the alchemists.

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And I devised this form
that the alchemical furnace

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had a pan at the bottom of it.

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And when they were burning
the metal to make the gold,

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presumably, the ash fell
to the bottom of the pan.

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And so, I was putting language
at the bottom of the page

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to make something like
an alchemical furnace,

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because we could reuse it.

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And so, these little thingies
at the bottom of the page

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are just details that came
into writing the poem.

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These are poems
about depression.

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They're straight edge.

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They are poems about being
a straight-edged depressive,

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so not using chemicals to
deal with the depression.

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And there's something
about the idea of stages

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and alchemy that interests
me, that the business

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of the human spirit renewing
itself in a very cyclical way--

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and having to.

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So I thought I'd read four
of these little short poems

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with the drippings or
whatever they are--

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ash, my husband
calls them-- ash.

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"Horizontal Series--"
they're a little abstract.

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So don't worry if
you don't get them.

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It's OK.

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[LAUGHTER]

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They're hard.

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Come in, you said.

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But the day did not hear you.

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And you saw for the first time
it wouldn't be as you supposed.

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The heart would always
hurt from not being chosen.

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Doves line the longing streets
with their east colored silks--

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their latitudes.

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You didn't have
to be like those.

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You could pretend the other
magic also had returned--

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even if it hadn't.

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His depression, his writing--

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it's hopeless.

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He'll try the new drug.

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Third stage-- sublimation,
Jupiter, dry refinement.

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And I explained the rules
of football to her--

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wide receiver.

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