WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:01.050 align:middle line:90% Yeah, there's that. 00:00:01.050 --> 00:00:04.390 align:middle line:90% [APPLAUSE] 00:00:04.390 --> 00:00:04.890 align:middle line:90% 00:00:04.890 --> 00:00:06.330 align:middle line:90% Thanks, Tyler. 00:00:06.330 --> 00:00:09.180 align:middle line:90% Thanks, y'all. 00:00:09.180 --> 00:00:11.945 align:middle line:84% Well, I'll just tell you, if I cry, it's OK. 00:00:11.945 --> 00:00:15.300 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:00:15.300 --> 00:00:21.030 align:middle line:84% Dearly beloved, we are gathered here today for a wedding. 00:00:21.030 --> 00:00:24.540 align:middle line:84% I know you think you're here for a poetry reading, 00:00:24.540 --> 00:00:28.080 align:middle line:84% but we're actually here to witness a promise, 00:00:28.080 --> 00:00:30.930 align:middle line:90% the fulfillment of a promise. 00:00:30.930 --> 00:00:37.410 align:middle line:84% We are here to participate in making a promise. 00:00:37.410 --> 00:00:39.170 align:middle line:90% Wow, that really changes things. 00:00:39.170 --> 00:00:41.340 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:00:41.340 --> 00:00:45.750 align:middle line:84% And even something of a wager, a beautiful risk, 00:00:45.750 --> 00:00:49.350 align:middle line:90% and a love-filled dare. 00:00:49.350 --> 00:00:51.850 align:middle line:84% In order to get us ready for this moment, 00:00:51.850 --> 00:00:54.960 align:middle line:84% I've brought flowers, and plants, and pieces 00:00:54.960 --> 00:00:56.700 align:middle line:90% from the desert. 00:00:56.700 --> 00:00:59.880 align:middle line:84% And Tyler is going to get a crew of people 00:00:59.880 --> 00:01:01.750 align:middle line:90% to help pass these out. 00:01:01.750 --> 00:01:03.555 align:middle line:90% So help Tyler. 00:01:03.555 --> 00:01:06.250 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:01:06.250 --> 00:01:11.580 align:middle line:84% And you've brought yourselves your bodies, which includes 00:01:11.580 --> 00:01:15.450 align:middle line:90% your hearts and your minds. 00:01:15.450 --> 00:01:20.040 align:middle line:84% So as they are passing out these bits of our living 00:01:20.040 --> 00:01:26.850 align:middle line:84% powerful planet around, I ask that you take a piece of this. 00:01:26.850 --> 00:01:32.560 align:middle line:84% However much you need, enough to hold and cherish, 00:01:32.560 --> 00:01:39.130 align:middle line:84% and also enough to be sure that everyone has a share. 00:01:39.130 --> 00:01:42.820 align:middle line:84% So you all start working that out. 00:01:42.820 --> 00:01:45.700 align:middle line:90% And I'll keep going. 00:01:45.700 --> 00:01:51.320 align:middle line:84% Over 15 years ago, in "(Soma)tic Midge," CA wrote, 00:01:51.320 --> 00:01:57.020 align:middle line:84% I cannot stress enough how much this mechanistic world, 00:01:57.020 --> 00:02:00.020 align:middle line:84% as it becomes more and more efficient, 00:02:00.020 --> 00:02:03.590 align:middle line:84% resulting in ever-increasing brutality, 00:02:03.590 --> 00:02:10.389 align:middle line:84% has required me to find my body, to find my planet in order 00:02:10.389 --> 00:02:13.660 align:middle line:90% to find my poetry. 00:02:13.660 --> 00:02:18.375 align:middle line:84% And in their latest book, Listen to the Golden Boomerang Return, 00:02:18.375 --> 00:02:23.590 align:middle line:84% CA says, a potato born by shovel. 00:02:23.590 --> 00:02:30.730 align:middle line:84% I am a bride of poetry in my orange and purple gown. 00:02:30.730 --> 00:02:32.930 align:middle line:90% So here we have the bride. 00:02:32.930 --> 00:02:36.880 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:02:36.880 --> 00:02:37.990 align:middle line:90% The beautiful bride. 00:02:37.990 --> 00:02:41.390 align:middle line:90% 00:02:41.390 --> 00:02:45.100 align:middle line:84% And I want to address you directly, CA. 00:02:45.100 --> 00:02:48.070 align:middle line:90% And this is where I might cry. 00:02:48.070 --> 00:02:52.780 align:middle line:84% And say thank you for your poems, for every draft, 00:02:52.780 --> 00:02:58.420 align:middle line:84% for every ritual, every scribble, full notebook page. 00:02:58.420 --> 00:03:00.700 align:middle line:84% I thank you for these poems because I 00:03:00.700 --> 00:03:03.670 align:middle line:84% know that with each one of them, they shape 00:03:03.670 --> 00:03:06.670 align:middle line:90% the poem you make of your life. 00:03:06.670 --> 00:03:09.610 align:middle line:84% Thank you for the generosity of attention 00:03:09.610 --> 00:03:13.660 align:middle line:84% you bring to the experience of living and writing, 00:03:13.660 --> 00:03:19.660 align:middle line:84% for wedding the two together, for looking war, and genocide, 00:03:19.660 --> 00:03:24.730 align:middle line:84% and political fuckery, and shame right in the face, 00:03:24.730 --> 00:03:27.520 align:middle line:84% for the witness of your war hair, 00:03:27.520 --> 00:03:32.950 align:middle line:84% for writing into and with all that it means to be human, 00:03:32.950 --> 00:03:36.700 align:middle line:84% which is to say suffering, and joy, 00:03:36.700 --> 00:03:41.150 align:middle line:84% and protection, and softness, and absurdity 00:03:41.150 --> 00:03:45.120 align:middle line:84% because we are so goddamn absurd as humans 00:03:45.120 --> 00:03:49.220 align:middle line:84% and so goddamn responsible for everything. 00:03:49.220 --> 00:03:51.350 align:middle line:90% Thank you for loving. 00:03:51.350 --> 00:03:56.120 align:middle line:84% Thank you for showing us how to love anyway. 00:03:56.120 --> 00:04:00.030 align:middle line:84% For your rituals, your sharing, your process, 00:04:00.030 --> 00:04:03.080 align:middle line:84% bringing your body into the poem, which 00:04:03.080 --> 00:04:08.070 align:middle line:84% invites our bodies into the poem for saying, 00:04:08.070 --> 00:04:10.260 align:middle line:84% as you said in a chapbook that I have, 00:04:10.260 --> 00:04:12.980 align:middle line:90% I want you to write your poems. 00:04:12.980 --> 00:04:15.800 align:middle line:84% And that's what you say to so many people. 00:04:15.800 --> 00:04:18.149 align:middle line:84% When they ask you about your poems, 00:04:18.149 --> 00:04:19.759 align:middle line:90% you say, what about your poems? 00:04:19.759 --> 00:04:21.110 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:04:21.110 --> 00:04:23.930 align:middle line:84% And your co-creation of tens of thousands 00:04:23.930 --> 00:04:27.230 align:middle line:84% of poems with poets at every stage, which 00:04:27.230 --> 00:04:30.410 align:middle line:84% is to say tens of thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands 00:04:30.410 --> 00:04:32.210 align:middle line:90% of lives. 00:04:32.210 --> 00:04:34.160 align:middle line:84% I don't think it's any exaggeration 00:04:34.160 --> 00:04:38.570 align:middle line:84% at all to say that your way of getting this garden planted 00:04:38.570 --> 00:04:41.570 align:middle line:84% and giving our fruit away to one another 00:04:41.570 --> 00:04:45.200 align:middle line:84% has been life-sustaining for queers, and trans, 00:04:45.200 --> 00:04:49.430 align:middle line:84% and non-binary folks, myself included. 00:04:49.430 --> 00:04:54.920 align:middle line:84% For the sun storm of wonder you share with anyone lucky enough 00:04:54.920 --> 00:04:57.690 align:middle line:84% to share time with you on the planet, 00:04:57.690 --> 00:05:00.740 align:middle line:90% be it in person or on the page. 00:05:00.740 --> 00:05:02.654 align:middle line:90% Thank you. 00:05:02.654 --> 00:05:06.063 align:middle line:90% [APPLAUSE] 00:05:06.063 --> 00:05:08.990 align:middle line:90% 00:05:08.990 --> 00:05:12.246 align:middle line:90% This person is a miracle. 00:05:12.246 --> 00:05:15.500 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:05:15.500 --> 00:05:18.650 align:middle line:90% It's unbelievable, really. 00:05:18.650 --> 00:05:24.230 align:middle line:84% And so now, I want to address you, Dearly Beloved, 00:05:24.230 --> 00:05:27.620 align:middle line:84% and the pieces of the planet you are holding. 00:05:27.620 --> 00:05:31.705 align:middle line:84% Because the invitation now and always with 00:05:31.705 --> 00:05:35.030 align:middle line:90% CA's work is for two weddings. 00:05:35.030 --> 00:05:39.330 align:middle line:84% One we witness between CA and their poems, 00:05:39.330 --> 00:05:42.230 align:middle line:84% and the other we are asked to co-create 00:05:42.230 --> 00:05:47.450 align:middle line:84% to be wed to this moment, to what can unfold here, 00:05:47.450 --> 00:05:52.400 align:middle line:84% to wed our lives to quote, learning how to live so 00:05:52.400 --> 00:05:57.240 align:middle line:84% wilderness never becomes a mythology. 00:05:57.240 --> 00:05:59.490 align:middle line:84% In that spirit, I want to invite you 00:05:59.490 --> 00:06:06.270 align:middle line:84% to remember that you are simply 30 trillion cells configured 00:06:06.270 --> 00:06:10.080 align:middle line:90% and reconfigured continually. 00:06:10.080 --> 00:06:14.010 align:middle line:84% In the next hour, your heart will squeeze blood from its 00:06:14.010 --> 00:06:20.580 align:middle line:84% chambers and relax to refill between 4 and 5,000 times. 00:06:20.580 --> 00:06:22.890 align:middle line:84% Your lungs, too, will gloriously, 00:06:22.890 --> 00:06:28.410 align:middle line:84% without any direction on your part, fill-- 00:06:28.410 --> 00:06:28.930 align:middle line:90% excuse me. 00:06:28.930 --> 00:06:32.430 align:middle line:90% Fill and release 8-- 00:06:32.430 --> 00:06:34.590 align:middle line:90% excuse me. 00:06:34.590 --> 00:06:35.525 align:middle line:90% A lot of times. 00:06:35.525 --> 00:06:37.140 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:06:37.140 --> 00:06:38.885 align:middle line:90% 1,000 times, in fact. 00:06:38.885 --> 00:06:40.230 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:06:40.230 --> 00:06:45.480 align:middle line:84% And 8 billion red blood cells will die and another 8 billion 00:06:45.480 --> 00:06:47.820 align:middle line:90% will be produced. 00:06:47.820 --> 00:06:52.570 align:middle line:84% You yourself are constantly in process, 00:06:52.570 --> 00:06:57.880 align:middle line:84% being revised right in front of each other's eyes. 00:06:57.880 --> 00:07:01.620 align:middle line:84% But it's easy to forget this or look away. 00:07:01.620 --> 00:07:07.680 align:middle line:84% As CA says, everyone paying attention, enjoy your visit. 00:07:07.680 --> 00:07:09.360 align:middle line:90% Everyone else? 00:07:09.360 --> 00:07:10.190 align:middle line:90% Good luck. 00:07:10.190 --> 00:07:11.730 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:07:11.730 --> 00:07:13.500 align:middle line:84% So I'd like for you to take a moment 00:07:13.500 --> 00:07:17.730 align:middle line:84% and turn your attention to the something alive just outside 00:07:17.730 --> 00:07:20.370 align:middle line:90% of you in your hand. 00:07:20.370 --> 00:07:25.750 align:middle line:84% This piece of our incredible planet. 00:07:25.750 --> 00:07:30.850 align:middle line:84% Take notice of its contours, its textures, 00:07:30.850 --> 00:07:33.495 align:middle line:84% its way of holding and reflecting the light. 00:07:33.495 --> 00:07:36.300 align:middle line:90% 00:07:36.300 --> 00:07:40.540 align:middle line:84% So often in our writing and in our living, 00:07:40.540 --> 00:07:43.110 align:middle line:84% we carry an unacknowledged obligation 00:07:43.110 --> 00:07:47.340 align:middle line:84% to the past that does not serve us. 00:07:47.340 --> 00:07:49.710 align:middle line:84% And so I want to take this moment 00:07:49.710 --> 00:07:53.700 align:middle line:84% to remind you as CA does in their work, that none of us 00:07:53.700 --> 00:08:00.470 align:middle line:84% are beholden to who we have been up until this moment. 00:08:00.470 --> 00:08:06.140 align:middle line:84% 15 years ago, only a few years into my personal physical gender 00:08:06.140 --> 00:08:11.070 align:middle line:84% transition and still struggling with my own personal precipice, 00:08:11.070 --> 00:08:14.570 align:middle line:84% I read CAConrad's The Book of Frank. 00:08:14.570 --> 00:08:19.010 align:middle line:84% It was part tender, queer, mystical rager and part riot 00:08:19.010 --> 00:08:21.860 align:middle line:90% girl surrealist relief. 00:08:21.860 --> 00:08:24.680 align:middle line:84% That would be the first full-length collections 00:08:24.680 --> 00:08:26.810 align:middle line:84% of collection of poems that would 00:08:26.810 --> 00:08:31.670 align:middle line:84% lift me and shake me and bind me to my brother 00:08:31.670 --> 00:08:34.610 align:middle line:90% sister of the page. 00:08:34.610 --> 00:08:37.530 align:middle line:84% I'm just going to read a quick poem. 00:08:37.530 --> 00:08:43.280 align:middle line:84% Frank ate clear around the sleeping worm of the apple. 00:08:43.280 --> 00:08:46.720 align:middle line:84% Any life saved in this place is magic. 00:08:46.720 --> 00:08:52.450 align:middle line:84% Frank said, it's life coming back to you. 00:08:52.450 --> 00:08:55.840 align:middle line:84% So let's look at the worm in the apple. 00:08:55.840 --> 00:08:57.790 align:middle line:90% Let's let it sleep. 00:08:57.790 --> 00:09:02.380 align:middle line:84% Let's enjoy the apple while the worm sleeps close to our face. 00:09:02.380 --> 00:09:06.790 align:middle line:84% And let's remember Frank saying, any life saved in this place 00:09:06.790 --> 00:09:09.070 align:middle line:90% is magic. 00:09:09.070 --> 00:09:13.180 align:middle line:84% So let's save our lives together by paying attention to them, 00:09:13.180 --> 00:09:16.510 align:middle line:90% by wetting our lives to living. 00:09:16.510 --> 00:09:22.720 align:middle line:84% And let's repeat after CAConrad, never tire of demanding love 00:09:22.720 --> 00:09:23.630 align:middle line:90% for the world. 00:09:23.630 --> 00:09:28.863 align:middle line:90% 00:09:28.863 --> 00:09:30.405 align:middle line:84% I'm going to need to hear that again. 00:09:30.405 --> 00:09:32.020 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:09:32.020 --> 00:09:32.830 align:middle line:90% Ready? 00:09:32.830 --> 00:09:35.810 align:middle line:90% 1, 2, 3. 00:09:35.810 --> 00:09:40.900 align:middle line:84% Never tire of demanding love for the world. 00:09:40.900 --> 00:09:42.710 align:middle line:90% Thank you, universe. 00:09:42.710 --> 00:09:45.550 align:middle line:84% And thank you poetry for CAConrad. 00:09:45.550 --> 00:09:48.900 align:middle line:90% [APPLAUSE]