Media File 3 of 3 - Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061].mp4
AV File 3
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00:00 - 00:00
English [Transcript]
https://d9jk7wjtjpu5g.cloudfront.net/file_transcripts/associated_files/000/092/359/original/UA0017-DVCAM-0061_edited.vtt.vtt?1774451358
00:00 - 00:06
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: : child, shh, it is whispered. But when will someone tell me the full story? We buried
00:00 - 00:00
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
[laughter and applause]
00:06 - 00:13
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: his house under cast-off sheetrock, beams, and broken appliances. Walk in my
00:13 - 00:18
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: flowering peony bed and you'll find it. A TV antenna made from a bent wire hanger.
00:18 - 00:26
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: What's left of Ralph Ellison's house. It picks up mysterious whispers.
00:31 - 00:40
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: Ars Poetica Number 100. I Believe. Poetry, I tell my students, is idiosyncratic.
00:40 - 00:47
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: Poetry is where we are ourselves, though Sterling Brown said, every eye is a
00:47 - 00:52
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: dramatic eye, digging in the clam flats for the shell that snaps, emptying the
00:52 - 00:59
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: proverbial pocketbook. Poetry is what you find in the dirt, in the corner, over here,
00:59 - 01:05
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: on the bus, God in the details, the only way to get from here to there. Poetry, and
01:05 - 01:13
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: now my voice is rising, is not all love, love, love, and I'm sorry the dog died.
01:13 - 01:20
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: Poetry, here I hear myself loudest, is the human voice. And are we not of
01:20 - 01:29
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: interest to each other? So now out of Ars, Poetica, just two more poems.
01:32 - 01:40
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: The dream that I told my mother-in-law. In the room almost filled with my, with,
01:40 - 01:46
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: again, in the room almost filled with our bed, the small bedroom, the king-size bed,
01:46 - 01:52
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: high up and on casters, so sometimes we would roll. In the room in the corner of
01:52 - 01:56
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: the corner apartment on top of a hill, so the bed would roll, we felt as if we
01:56 - 02:03
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: might break off and drift, float, become our own continent. When your mother first
02:03 - 02:07
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: entered our apartment, she went straight to that room and libated our bed with
02:07 - 02:13
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: water from your homeland. Soon she saw in my cheeks the fire and poppy stain, and
02:13 - 02:19
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: soon thereafter on that bed came the boy. Then months, then the morning I cracked,
02:19 - 02:24
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: first one, then two, then three eggs in a white bowl, and all had double yolks. And
02:24 - 02:31
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: your mother, now our mother, read the signs. Signs everywhere, signs rampant, a
02:31 - 02:35
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: season of signs and a vial of white dirt brought across three continents to the
02:35 - 02:40
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: enormous white bed that rolled, and now held three, and soon held four, four on
02:40 - 02:45
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: the bed, two boys, one man, and me, our mother reading all signs and blessing
02:45 - 02:49
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: our bed, blessing our bed filled with babies, blessing our bed through her
02:49 - 02:56
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: frailty, blessing us in our bed, blessing us in our bed. She began to dream of
02:56 - 03:02
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: childhood flowers, her long-gone parents. I told her my dream in a doctor's
03:02 - 03:07
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: waiting room. A photographer photographed women, said her portraits revealed their
03:07 - 03:13
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: truest selves. She snapped my picture, peeled back the paper, and there was my
03:13 - 03:20
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: son's face, my first son, myself. Mama loved that dream, so I told it again. And
03:20 - 03:27
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: soon she crossed over to her parents, sisters, one son. War took that son. We
03:27 - 03:32
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: destroyed one another, and women came by twos and tens, wrapped in her same fine
03:32 - 03:37
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: white, bearing huge pans of stew, round breads, homemade wines, and men came in
03:37 - 03:42
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: suits with their ravaged faces, and together they cried and cried and cried
03:42 - 03:47
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: and keened and cried, and the sound was alive, hives swelling and growing, all the
03:47 - 03:52
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: water in the world, all the salt, all the whales, and the sound grew too big for the
03:52 - 03:56
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: building, and finally lifted what needed to be lifted from the casket, and be
03:56 - 04:04
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: quieted, and watched it walk up and away, like feather, like ash. Daughter, she said,
04:04 - 04:10
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: when her journey began, you are a mother now, and you have to take care of the
04:10 - 04:12
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: world.
04:12 - 04:21
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
[applause]
04:21 - 04:29
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: The African Picnic. World Cup finals, France v. Brazil. We gather in Gideon's
04:29 - 04:36
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: yard and grill. The TV sits in the bright sunshine. We want Brazil, but Brazil won't
04:36 - 04:41
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: win. Aidan waves a desultory green and yellow flag from the east to the west, to the west
04:41 - 04:47
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: the east. We scatter and settle and scatter some more. Through the window,
04:47 - 04:52
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: mama watches from the pool indoors. Jonah scarfs meat off of everybody's plate,
04:52 - 04:57
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: kicks a basketball long, and hollers, bold, and roars like the mighty lion he is.
04:57 - 05:04
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: Baby is of Kasha, surrounded by pillows, in the bevy of Horn of Africa girls, who
05:04 - 05:10
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: coo like lovers, pronounce his wonders, oil and massage him, brush his hair. My
05:10 - 05:17
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: African family is having a picnic here in the USA. Who is here and who is not?
05:17 - 05:23
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: When will the phone ring from far away? Who in a few days will say goodbye? Who
05:23 - 05:28
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: will arrive with a package from home? Who will send presents in other people's
05:28 - 05:32
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: luggage and envelopes of money in other people's pockets? Other people's children
05:32 - 05:38
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: have become our children here at the African Picnic. In a parking lot, in a
05:38 - 05:44
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: taxi cab, in a winter coat, in an airport queue, at the INS, on the telephone, on
05:44 - 05:49
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: the crosstown bus, on a south side street, in a brand new car, in a jella-ba, with a
05:49 - 05:54
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: cardboard box, with a Samsonite, with an airmail post, with a bag of spice, at the
05:54 - 06:01
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: African Picnic, people come and go. The mailman sees us say goodbye and waves
06:01 - 06:06
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: with us. Goodbye, goodbye, as we throw popcorn, eulolate. Ten or twelve
06:06 - 06:12
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: suitcases stuffed in the car. Goodbye, mama, goodbye. The front door shut, the
06:12 - 06:19
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: driveway bare. Goodbye, mama, goodbye. The jet alights into the night, a huge metal
06:19 - 06:26
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: machine in flight. Goodbye, mama, goodbye. At the African Picnic, people come and go
06:26 - 06:30
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Elizabeth Alexander: and say goodbye. Thank you.
06:30 - 06:48
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
[applause]
06:48 - 06:50
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: : Hi, everybody.
06:50 - 06:53
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Audience: : Hey Toi.
06:53 - 06:58
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: : I was just thinking about what Sonia was saying about security. Remember when she was
06:58 - 07:10
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: talking about security? I was thinking, this room is a big security risk. Really big.
07:18 - 07:26
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: I'm going to read a few poems of despair and a few of love. I hope you can tell the difference.
07:26 - 07:32
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
[laughte]
07:32 - 07:38
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: My mother tried to do some historic research about our family. She searched public
07:38 - 07:44
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: documents and asked family members who still live in Beaumont, Texas, but Black
07:44 - 07:50
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: births weren't recorded until after the Emancipation Proclamation. So it seems our
07:50 - 07:58
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: family tree goes over a cliff if you go backwards. The first birth recorded was three years after
07:58 - 08:10
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: Philomene Durant, born in 1868, my great-grandmother. Before then, it's like we never existed. My
08:10 - 08:16
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: mother wrote to our Aunt Faye, the oldest living relative, for information about Philomene,
08:16 - 08:22
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: her grandmother, my great-grandmother, who was known as Mom. This was Aunt Faye's letter.
08:22 - 08:30
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: I just took the letter and broke it into lines. I left the spelling. I might say a parenthetical
08:30 - 08:42
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: remark just to clarify. Now, About Mom. I have never heard anything about these things
08:42 - 08:52
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: that has been told to you. Mom had her children, but did not raise them. When Lawrence, one
08:52 - 09:00
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: of her children, came to visit me, he went all over Beaumont to find a lady that he thought
09:00 - 09:08
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: a lots of. She had been good to him as a child in his young life. And he never talked about
09:08 - 09:18
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: Mom, Philomene. You see, Mom had more than one set of children. Clarence O. Jackson lived
09:18 - 09:28
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: with a family of Italian and spoke their language. They had a store. Lawrence's and your mother,
09:28 - 09:38
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: Regina, were Durants. Their father was a Frenchman. Then there was Rosa Gaud. Alice and Baptiste
09:38 - 09:48
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: were Gauds. The woman that raised Baptiste, he brought her to see me. Philomene had a temper,
09:48 - 09:56
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: would pick up anything to hit her children with. She worked hard here in Beaumont for a little
09:56 - 10:06
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: or nothing for Jews. She washed and ironed. When your mother and father separated, Mom, Philomene,
10:06 - 10:14
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: stayed with her son-in-law, your father, Mr. Joe. Your mother left a lots of things in the house that
10:14 - 10:22
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: Philomene treasured because they were her daughter's. I am sure why Mom's children never talked about
10:22 - 10:34
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: her life was because they had different fathers. About property, no mention anything about it. Mom's life
10:34 - 10:42
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: was not the best. She worked hard and she went to church. You know, she had what you call a milk leg,
10:42 - 10:52
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: a painful sore. She was ill. I went and got her and brought her home, taking care of that leg daily.
10:52 - 11:04
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: Your mother came and carried her to Louisiana to care for Alice, the darkest child, who had TB. Alice passed in
11:04 - 11:18
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: New Orleans March 13, 1941. She was with Sister Rosa. Alice, they called her Boots, was 29. Forget about the stories,
11:18 - 11:22
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: that's in the past about Mom.
11:22 - 11:29
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
[applause]
11:29 - 11:37
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: I'm very interested in what our families didn't talk about and in the shadow that that
11:37 - 12:00
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: casts in our lives and in our own hearts. The Body Awakening. Each morning when I get up, I sit with the body. The clitoris feels dead hiding in my abdomen, the tightened muscles are at crossed purposes.
12:00 - 12:10
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: Whatever is not felt it in the clitoris is deflected, blocked in the body like staunched blood.
12:10 - 12:24
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: I know the center of creativity must come from that tender bud so circumscribed. A few weeks ago at a writer's conference, my whole body hurt
12:24 - 12:40
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: with feelings. The clitoris throbbed. I was extruded out of myself. But when I left that place, came back to my safe husband, the man who loves me and will stay with me no matter what.
12:40 - 13:04
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: I began to feel sheltered, separated from the most powerful feelings, and the clitoris too drew back. I questioned my marriage. I married my husband because he was a harbor, a safe place in which I could stop feeling.
13:04 - 13:24
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: What is more punished among the angry than anger, among the unsatisfied than desired, among the hate-filled than hate, among the frightened than fear? I wanted to be still.
13:24 - 13:53
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: Such a ringing clearness, such a transparency of soul, that most vulnerable and singing part. The clitoris, like the shyest girl, must not be approached directly, but as if being entreated to make herself known, as if being sung to on a balcony by one filled with love and desire.
13:54 - 14:16
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: It is the very deepest secret that must be loved. Now, instead of demanding that my body respond, terrified and angry if it doesn't, I talk to myself, relax, you don't have to do anything, I won't push or demand.
14:16 - 14:36
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: A determination lets go some wall of protection, skin the hood around the clitoris, some psychic box receives. I'm with myself, like being in the presence of one you deeply love.
14:36 - 14:56
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: I found the G-spot, its rubbery quarter of a dime behind the cervix. I touched it in squat position until I felt its blood thickening, its full leaf like the thick petal of the pocketbook plant.
14:56 - 15:12
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: This is the place that makes me feel as if my womb breaks open, flowers, the pillow the penis rests on. A lesbian friend says, a hand is good enough for me.
15:12 - 15:34
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: From this I learned, tenderness, I who have been so demanding of others, of myself, to show or prove. We survive on a thin balance, testing the universe for signs of love.
15:34 - 15:56
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: As yesterday, gardening, a brown unburied seed speckled with dirt and carved with its own particular face. I found the clitoris, that earthy bone. I rubbed myself along the roughened texture of a sheet.
15:56 - 16:16
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: I found the nerves at the small fingers length in the anus. I have to take myself tenderly in my hands. Listen, I have to let myself happen, hoping but not certain.
16:16 - 16:43
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: Apart let's go. I will not force others as I will not force myself. I learned to respond in fear. I stayed alive in fear. I beat a life out of myself, a life in which I made myself smile, charm, act loving.
16:43 - 16:56
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: I did this by thinking about the possible loss under everything I did, thinking that I already had lost everything, lost my life.
16:57 - 17:21
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: Once a great poet said to me, one day you'll stop sitting there smelling sweet. These indications are not to be gotten rid of. Every cinch in my beating, breathing, every awareness of the rivers of nerve is a song of myself.
17:22 - 17:40
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: My body is instructor, aching, or so laid back that I feel dead to myself. To hold all these parts in consciousness as if it were a small thing, my life.
17:41 - 17:57
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: I think with great love of that little seat of power and wisdom, the clitoris, how it can't be seen unless, like the face, you look at it in the mirror.
17:57 - 18:20
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: This tenderness does not make the world easy. It is another way to envision living with myself as a child of a vicious father, and that part always with me, the old enemy, my aim and direction.
18:21 - 18:36
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: To live with myself, to regulate the unseen. Nothing on earth will change but this.
18:36 - 18:49
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
[applause]
18:49 - 18:53
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: And I'm hoping I can get a couple Telly poems in.
18:53 - 18:57
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
[applause and cheering]
18:57 - 19:06
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: Somebody came up to me after the last reading and and said Telly lives! Telly lives! Telly is a fish.
19:06 - 19:12
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: And so there are a couple poems about Telly that I'm going to try to get in now.
19:14 - 19:22
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: And it starts with a quote from Lucille Clifton, flesh is the coat we unfasten and throw off.
19:23 - 19:25
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: For Telly the Fish.
19:25 - 19:33
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: Telly's favorite artist was Alice Neel.
19:33 - 19:47
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: When he came to my house, I propped up her bright yellow shade with open window and a vase of flowers, postcard size, behind his first fishbowl.
19:47 - 19:59
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: I thought it might give him something to look at, like a heart, the center of the house you keep coming back to, a root for your eye.
19:59 - 20:16
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: It was a wondering in me that came up with that thought, a kind of empathy across my air and through his water, maybe the first word that I'd propped up between us in case he could hear.
20:16 - 20:27
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: I put up others, but Neel was the only one he'd stare at for hours, hanging there with his glassy eyes wide open.
20:27 - 20:39
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: At night he wanted the bottom, as if it were a warm bed, he'd lie there, sort of dreaming, his eyes gray and dim and thoughtless.
20:39 - 20:49
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: For months he came back to her, the way a critic or lover can build a whole life on the long study of one great work.
20:49 - 20:56
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: I don't know why he stopped, maybe it was when he first noticed me, the face above my hand feeding
20:56 - 21:05
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: For sometimes when I'd set the food on top, he'd still watch me eye to eye,
21:05 - 21:11
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: As if saying, food isn't enough.
21:11 - 21:18
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: Once when I'd bent, he jumped up out of the water and kissed my lips.
21:18 - 21:23
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: What is a fish's kiss like?
21:23 - 21:30
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: You'd think it would be slimy, but it was quick, nippy, hard.
21:30 - 21:42
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: Maybe it was just what I expected, for all our fears of touch, it takes so long to learn how to take in.
21:42 - 21:49
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: When he stopped coming to the top, I guess I did all the wrong things.
21:49 - 21:55
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: The fish medicine, that smell, the codeine measured carefully for his ounce of weight.
21:55 - 22:05
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: For his gills worked so hard, and he lay still, tipped over slightly, like a dead boat.
22:05 - 22:10
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: How do you stop the hurt of having to breathe?
22:10 - 22:18
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: After, I took him to the middle of the yellow bridge, right near the Andy Warhol Museum.
22:18 - 22:32
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: I had put a paper towel in a painted egg and laid him in it, and at the top, I opened the casket and emptied him out into the water.
22:32 - 22:38
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
[applause]
22:38 - 22:40
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: And the last poem.
22:41 - 22:46
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: Because I was good to Telly in his life.
22:47 - 22:56
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: Because I taught him Alice Neel and fed him frozen mealworms until I found out that he'd lose his bright red tail color for that pleasure.
22:57 - 23:02
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: Because I paid $100 for a pet sitter to come when I was away on trips,
23:03 - 23:10
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: never liking those who said their betta did just fine sitting on the edge of their office desk over a long weekend.
23:11 - 23:15
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: How would you like not to eat for three days, I wanted to ask.
23:16 - 23:23
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: For choosing carefully among the pet sitters, interviewing, for looking for one who took a fish seriously,
23:24 - 23:32
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: and new betta stories of how smart they are, checking you out with a certain calm or anxious look in the eye.
23:33 - 23:39
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: Because I believed in Telly's worthiness for a funeral with elegant trappings.
23:40 - 23:45
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: Because I believed in one fish's brain and life and skill.
23:46 - 23:54
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: Because I put him in a painted wooden egg at the end and drove him down to the famous arching yellow bridge of Pittsburgh
23:55 - 24:03
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: and let him go into the frozen Monongahela, saying prayers for my lover or husband or brother of a year.
24:04 - 24:11
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: Because of this I am certain he sent me a gift from the China blue rivers of heaven.
24:11 - 24:19
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: A lovely man who first kissed me on that bridge, Kissing Bridge as he named it a few months later,
24:20 - 24:27
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: sending a photo after rain of Kissing Bridge underwater, scrawled with his loose sprawling letters.
24:28 - 24:38
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Toi Derricotte: Because all things are connected, a circle, bread on the water, as my mother said, always comes home.
24:38 - 25:10
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
[applause]
25:11 - 25:12
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Joanne Gabbin: : Wasn't this wonderful?
25:12 - 25:14
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Audience: : Yeah!
25:14 - 25:24
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Joanne Gabbin: : I just want to say a few things. Hi Marilyn! I'm so glad to see you. You're the only one that I hadn't spoken to yet.
25:24 - 25:29
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Joanne Gabbin: So welcome to James Madison University and Furious Flower.
25:30 - 25:34
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Joanne Gabbin: Well, we've had a feast. We've had more than a feast. Yes?
25:35 - 25:37
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Audience: : Somebody's glasses are laying on the lip of the stage.
25:38 - 25:39
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Audience: Yes.
25:40 - 25:44
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Joanne Gabbin: : Okay, so someone won't take those. Don't leave those.
25:45 - 25:47
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Joanne Gabbin: I want to say just a couple of things.
25:48 - 25:50
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Joanne Gabbin: No, no, no.
25:51 - 25:54
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Joanne Gabbin: This is the second pair he's lost.
25:55 - 25:58
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Joanne Gabbin: My word, come on Thomas.
25:59 - 26:02
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Joanne Gabbin: I want to tell you just a couple of things.
26:02 - 26:13
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Joanne Gabbin: The buses are available to take you back so you can revive yourselves and get ready to party.
26:13 - 26:18
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Joanne Gabbin: We have two bands coming.
26:18 - 26:22
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Joanne Gabbin: Fertile Ground from Baltimore, Maryland.
26:22 - 26:26
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
[applause]
26:26 - 26:29
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Joanne Gabbin: And Full Moon of Sonia.
26:29 - 26:33
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Joanne Gabbin: And if you haven't heard, Sister Sonia has a CD.
26:34 - 26:37
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Joanne Gabbin: And from what I've been told, I haven't heard the album it yet.
26:38 - 26:39
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Joanne Gabbin: Kalamu, have you heard it?
26:40 - 26:41
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Joanne Gabbin: I hear it's slamming.
26:42 - 26:45
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Joanne Gabbin: And I hear that Full Moon of Sonia is going to really kick it.
26:46 - 26:49
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Joanne Gabbin: As my daughter used to say, what's the word now?
26:49 - 26:54
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
[laughter]
26:55 - 26:57
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Joanne Gabbin: I don't know whether I can even lift this up.
26:58 - 27:02
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Joanne Gabbin: But I know there's somebody out there who might even be able to dance in the aisles.
27:03 - 27:09
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Joanne Gabbin: But I want you to do, well you know we may create a new paradigm here at JMU.
27:10 - 27:19
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Joanne Gabbin: You know people in Harrisonburg, when they talk about a party, they talk about getting a glass of wine and getting some cheese, getting around, talking intellectual stuff.
27:20 - 27:25
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Joanne Gabbin: I am so happy when I go someplace else and when they talk about a party, they talk about dancing.
27:26 - 27:28
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
[laughter]
27:28 - 27:30
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
[applause]
27:30 - 27:33
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Joanne Gabbin: So that's what we're prepared to have this evening.
27:34 - 27:36
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Joanne Gabbin: I want you to have a great time.
27:37 - 27:48
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Joanne Gabbin: And we've decided to take all of the books, all the bags, all the t-shirts to Wilson, where the concert is going to be.
27:49 - 27:51
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Joanne Gabbin: So that you can do your last minute shopping.
27:52 - 27:58
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Joanne Gabbin: I have decided that this is going on sale because they were kind of hidden.
27:59 - 28:14
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Joanne Gabbin: And so I know a lot of people didn't see them, but those people who want this bag, instead of having this bag for $15, I think I'm going to reduce it to
28:14 - 28:15
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Audience: : Five.
28:24 - 28:29
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Joanne Gabbin: : Wait a minute, I am responding to something that Kalamu said yesterday.
28:30 - 28:37
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Joanne Gabbin: Believe me, we did everything in the world to get this registration down.
28:37 - 28:41
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Joanne Gabbin: Do you understand that our registration was $95?
28:41 - 28:46
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Joanne Gabbin: That was the registration cost ten years ago.
28:46 - 28:51
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Joanne Gabbin: And you know why we didn't include the bags in your registration package?
28:52 - 28:59
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Joanne Gabbin: Because it would have taken the cost of registration up to $135.
28:59 - 29:02
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Joanne Gabbin: But we want you to have this bag.
29:02 - 29:04
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Joanne Gabbin: I can't give it to you because I paid $8 to get it.
29:04 - 29:07
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
[laughter]
29:07 - 29:08
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Joanne Gabbin: You understand what I'm saying?
29:08 - 29:12
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Joanne Gabbin: So I want you to have it, and I want you to have it for $10.
29:12 - 29:21
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
[applause]
29:21 - 29:25
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Joanne Gabbin: Just a last word for this beautiful, beautiful group.
29:26 - 29:27
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Joanne Gabbin: I love you all so much.
29:27 - 29:32
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
[applause]
29:32 - 29:34
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Joanne Gabbin: Toi Derricotte talked me into being on the board.
29:35 - 29:41
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Joanne Gabbin: But I want you to know that this group is worth supporting.
29:42 - 29:53
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Joanne Gabbin: When you, Major Jackson, get your first real, real, real big book deal, I want you to give at least $10,000 to the Cave Canem.
29:53 - 29:54
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Major Jackson: : You got it.
29:54 - 29:55
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Joanne Gabbin: : You got it? Okay.
29:55 - 29:58
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
[laughter]
29:58 - 30:00
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Joanne Gabbin: Any last words?
30:01 - 30:02
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Major Jackson: : Your retirement money.
30:04 - 30:06
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Audience: : Major, I think you already won.
30:15 - 30:18
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
Joanne Gabbin: : Alright, we'll see you tonight. The performance starts at 8 o'clock.
30:18 - 30:43
Circle Jam and Cave Canem Reunion Reading, 2004 September 25, Tape 3 [UA0017-DVCAM-0061] [Transcript]
[crowd noise]