WEBVTT

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Long time visitors to
this reading series,

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we're making a radical
break with tradition.

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There is no table with
lemonade and brownies tonight.

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Oh, I know.

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Don't leave.

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Don't leave.

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Well, this is a creative
and temporary solution

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to some budget
cuts that we've had

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and we had the option of
having some more adult

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non-alcoholic beverages served
from the cappuccino cart.

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Does mean the refreshments
aren't on the house tonight,

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but see how you like
it and let us know.

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If you can't stand
it, we will bring back

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the lemonade and brownies,
but we won't be doing it

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for every reading this year.

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Only some of the readings.

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So we're sorry, but on the other
hand cappuccinos OK, right?

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The books, on the other
hand, are for sale.

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My Alexandria is out there,
courtesy of ASUA bookstore,

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and I'm sure Mark would be happy
to sign them after the reading.

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Mark Doty is the author
of three books of poetry.

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Turtle Swan, Bethlehem
in Broad Daylight,

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and My Alexandria,
which was chosen

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by Philip Levine for
the 1993 Poetry Series.

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He's had lots of
awards, including

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being nominated for the
Lambda Literary Award,

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having fellowships from the NEA,
the Vermont and Massachusetts

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Arts Councils.

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We're happy to add some new
information to the list.

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My Alexandria just won
the LA Times Book Award,

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and it's been nominated for
the National Book Award,

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so he gets to go to a
glamorous dinner in New York

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to find out whether he actually
gets the prize in about a month.

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A stressful honor, I'm sure.

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Mark teaches at both
Sarah Lawrence College

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and at the MFA program
at Vermont College, where

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I studied and got my MFA.

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I did my last semester
under his guidance

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and I'm very thankful for that
and I want to acknowledge him

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publicly for it.

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I was really struggling
with a lot of things,

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especially trying
to figure out how

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to have the guts to
write longer poems

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and I don't know how he
did it, but he gave me

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the courage to do it.

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Partly by the passion and
courage in his own poems,

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partly by his
generosity as a teacher

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and partly because he's
one of those writers who

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goes about the task
in a serious way.

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In terms of it being real soul
work in his own development.

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So I'm really honored to
introduce to you, Mark Doty.

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[APPLAUSE]

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It is a rather daunting and
extraordinary pleasure for me

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to be here.

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I went to high school
in Tucson at Rincon,

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and before I got out of that
place, I met Dick Shelton.

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[AUDIENCE LAUGHTER]

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We'll try this again.

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Who really sort
of plucked me out

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of a difficult place
some time in my life

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and was it-- my
first poetry teacher

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and a tremendously helpful
influence and friend to me.

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I came to my first poetry
reading on this campus.

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It wasn't in this room.

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It was in the
liberal arts building

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at that time,
which is also where

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I had my first sexual
experience and I

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we'll get this reading off to
a good confessional start here.

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So coming here coming here to
read feels like a kind of return

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that I really don't
think I ever imagined.

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And it feels terrific.

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There are people here from
many parts of my life.

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People who are writers
I admire, students

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who have become my friends,
my current students, and it's

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a real gift to me to be here.

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And because I love
this place, I want

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to start out with a
poem about the place

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where I live now, which is a
place that has become enormously

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important to me.

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I've been living for three years
in Provincetown, Massachusetts

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out at the end of Cape Cod.

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It's a little very narrow
little spit of land,

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65 miles out into the Atlantic.

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And at the very narrowest
end of that spit of land

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is a salt marsh.

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It's a place where I
try to go every day

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and I've tried to talk
to people about what

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I love about that salt marsh
and have found that enormously

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difficult to describe.