WEBVTT

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Other questions that
appear in this poem,

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and it may be useful for me
to read this poem to you.

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It's called "Poem of
Disconnected Parts."

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I hope it's not unrelated parts.

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But it will be the
poem that is most

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like the series of
distractions that then

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become one walk, that
Alison Deming described

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in the introduction.

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Of the things I'm going
to read to you tonight,

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this is the one that
is most given to that,

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and it has to do with
the political stresses

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of that decade.

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And to deal with them, I needed
to deal with them on the one

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hand and the other
hand, not pretend

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that because I can make words
sound good when I fit them

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together, I know everything,
that I can tell you

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what is right politically.

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The only thing I'm
an expert on is

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the sounds of words in English.

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I do.

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I know I'm a pretty
good expert at that.

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"Poem of Disconnected Parts.

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At Robben Island, the
political prisoner studied.

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They coined the motto
'Each one, Teach one.'

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In Argentina, the
torturers demanded

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that the prisoners address
them always as Profesor.

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Many of my friends
are moved by guilt,

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but I am a creature of
shame, I am ashamed to say.

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Culture the lock,
culture the key.

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Imagination that
calls the boiled sheep

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heads for sale in
the market Smileys.

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The first year at
Guantánamo, Abdul Rahim Dost

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incised his Pashto poems
into styrofoam cups.

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Quote, 'The Sangomo says,
in our Zulu culture,

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we do not worship
our ancestors--

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we consult them," end quote.

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Becky is abandoned in 1902, and
Rose dies giving birth in 1924.

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And Sylvia falls in 1951.

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Still falling, still dying,
still abandoned in 2006,

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still nothing finished
among us descendants.

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I support the war,
says the comic.

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I support the war.

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It's just the
troops I'm against--

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can't stand those young people.

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Proud of the fallen, proud
of her son the bomber.

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Ashamed of the government.

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Skeptical.

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After the Klansman
was found not guilty,

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one juror said she just couldn't
vote to convict a pastor.

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Who do you write for, Robert?

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I write for dead people.

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For Emily Dickinson,
for my grandfather.

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Quote, 'The ancestors say
the problem with your knees

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began in your feet.

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It could move up your
back,' end quote.

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But later, the Americans
gave Ibrahim Dost

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not only paper and
pen, but books.

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Hemingway, Dickens.

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Old Aegyptius in
the Odyssey says,

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whoever has called this
assembly for whatever reason,

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that is a good in itself.

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O thirsty shades who regard
the offering, o stained earth.

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There are many fake Sangomos.

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This one is real.

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At Robben Island, colored
principles got different meals

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and could wear long
pants and underwear.

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Blacks got only shorts.

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No, he says.

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I cannot regret those
three years in prison.

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Otherwise, he would not have
written those poems incised

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in the styrofoam cups.

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I have a small-town mind,
like the Greeks and Trojans.

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Shame.

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Pride.

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Importance of
looking bad or good.

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Did he see anything like
the prisoner on a leash?

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Yes, in Afghanistan.

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In Guantánamo, he was isolated.

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Our enemies, quote,
'disassemble,' end quote,

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says the president.

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Not that anyone at all
might not mis-speak.

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The profesores created
nicknames for torture devices--

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The Airplane, The
Frog, Burping the Baby.

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Not that those who behead the
helpless in the name of God

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or tradition don't
also write poetry.

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Guilts, metaphors, traditions.

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Hunger strikes.

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Culture the penalty.

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Culture the escape.

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What could your children
boast about you?

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What will your father say,
down among the shades?

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The Sangomo told Marvin, 'You
are crushed by some weight.

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Only your own ancestors
can help you.'"

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[APPLAUSE]

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Thank you.

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I did feel that when
I was in Africa--

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and the Zulu man who
took me to the Sangomo,

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when he told me that we don't
worship our ancestors, we

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consult them, I felt
that I had heard

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in very few words my
belief and my practice.

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