Welcome everybody! Welcome to the T.W. Wood Gallery and we're really very excited to have George Longnecker back for Tom City and launching his new book as well. So, I'm Ginny Callan, I'm the director here at the gallery. We've been here about three years, open to the public. We used to be up on the hill at Vermont College for many years. And Vermont College became Vermont College of Fine Arts and wanted to start exhibiting their student work. And so we had to look for a new home. So we bought this building with the Monteverdi Music School and River Rock School. And it's become the Center for Arts and Learning and we're really trying to have lots of broad arts and broader than that activity. So if you haven't been here before, we're really glad you found us. The gallery does a lot of different things. We do summer art camps for kids. We're having a art excursion to the Clark Museum in early June for a Women in Paris exhibit. We have classes going on. There's a watercolor class coming up in a couple of weeks with Robert O'Brien, some paint and sip classes, flower design, a number of different things and there's a listing out in the hallway. So there's an email list if you want to get on our newsletter list comes out a couple of times a month and we'll tell you all the great things that are happening here. We have an after school arts program. We have a number of little mob pillar kids come over every afternoon and do art activities. So we're a small non-profit. We survive by volunteers and membership and donations. So if you're not a member think about doing that, there's information in the hall. I want to introduce Tom McCone who is going to introduce George and most people if you live around Montpelier, you know Tom because he's been such a great stimulus at the Kellogg Hubbard Library doing so much for the community as well. So thank you Tom. Thank you, Ginny. Isn't this great? Standing room only for a poet. Well as many of you know George Longenacker lived a few miles from here in Middlesex. He was professor and chair of the Department of English, Humanities and Social Sciences at Vermont Technical College. He is a longtime member of the Green Mountain Club and you may think that's slightly off-topic but not at all because you know appreciation and love of the outdoors is a big part of George's life and it comes out in his poetry also. So I've admired and appreciated George's poetry for a lot of years and I have lots and lots of poems on single sheets of paper and now I have 62 of them bound together in one book and that's really wonderful to have in this durable form. So I'm going to read to you passages that a couple of other poets have written about George. First is from Karen McCann and many of you know Karen too. From domestic sweetness to the large-scale catastrophes these poems toggle between. From school drills against atomic bombs to visiting memorials to witnessing war in our time through the media. From a kitchen in Vermont to a bombed out kitchen in Syria. George's long and echoed needles at sadness through beauty catching the details of dailiness and of tragedies that can break and open our hearts. These love poems for the world for his family are wide open and his eye is keen. I love the resounding we in these poems in love steady at home as the world spins apart. These poems stare up at the universe and give us children who sleep all night in fossil seashells coiled in a bed of time. Birds fly in and out of these love poems too arguing for sense amidst it all and from poet Marge Percy. George long the knickers star route is an excellent and moving collection. It's rare to find a poet who writes knowledgeably and in precise detail about nature but also turns his craft to poems about married love our constant wars about death of children of strangers of friends of our destruction of the planet and each other. Here is a poet with intelligence craft and heart. I love that line. Would you please welcome a poet of intelligence craft and heart. George long and star route. She lived on the star route. Bliss pond road her dented rural mailbox one of two on the corner by a sugar maple. Let me kiss you she said I missed my turn and drove all the way to Libra. November stars flared between black branches somewhere between bliss pond and Orion I turned and followed the right road home.  Some nights we still spread our wings and fly west past Orion wings tip to tip Libra to Pisces along the star route up over the Pleiades blue stardust sparks in her eyes. Let me kiss you she says and we swoop so low over the pond that our feathers touch stars in the water. Thank you Ginny and the Woodard Gallery. Thank you so much Tom and Rachel Seneschal at the library for all you do for Poland City. There's no other event like this in the United States that does so many events in one month is poem city. I'd like to thank Main Street rag my publisher Scott Douglas to help turn out this book is poet editor publisher and he actually prints his own books. There aren't many people like that. And you're right Harley Dave. One thing I'm going to do in my workshop in a couple of weeks on the 20th is talk about poems of witness. How do we witness history and bear witness without being too didactic too preachy and teachy. I'm going to read some poems in which I try to do that. One takes place here in Montpion. Bottles and Victoria's Secret. Tim searches for five cent bottles and cans along the Winooski River fills his sack crosses the tracks to the Redemption Center. Lots more back there. He tells the clerk as she hands him a dollar 70. It's a good day. Look what I found. Tim shows her a damp Victoria's Secret catalog bronze model and purple bra and panties on its cover. My daughter would like this. Her name is Victoria too. But she left years ago with her mother after Tim's Vietnam memories returned like a grenade to the head. He pockets the money leaves with his sack and Victoria's Secret. Behind the store Tim sleeps near the river under a railroad bridge. New redemption. He says when people ask him where he lives. His mind floats. Griftwood on the Winooski. Kids walking home from school giving change and leftover lunch. One student wrote of Tim in a PTSD report. Punching creosote stains the bridge trains hauling granite rattle the tracks above his bed rats run on feather feet. Scurry by on their way to dumpsters. He sees Victoria with her alphabet blocks. TC DD PTSD 245 T CD E F. He hears bullets smells defoliant like oranges or old beer bottles. But it all blows away as red maple leaves and snowflakes drift down to his bed. Tim watches ice bones and bottles in the river. The siege of Leningrad.  They ate only bread. One piece each day. Now one candle burns for each day of despair and siege in 1944. This was a ruin of stone and bones. Breath turned to frost as people stepped over frozen bodies in the gutter. Eyes icy white each day of the siege death and course bread. Below ground is the memorial where candles burn bread under glass long ago turned to stone. Only one piece each day. My daughter asks me outside as a fountain where visitors toss pennies and rubles into icy water. Some leave roses and carnations which instantly freeze. How long ago was it? She asks. I can tell her how long ago but can't explain bread hard as stone or children turned to ice and bone. Catacombs at Pechuri. Deep in the catacombs of the Pechuri monastery skulls of monks are piled to the ceilings. Femurs stacked like firewood deep beneath the Russian soil. We move along narrow passageways lit by candles and torches. Shadows flicker and empty eye sockets. My daughter wants to know how long the monks have been dead. We find dates on team tombs from the reigns of Elon and Katerina. But there are no dates of birth and death for the piles of skulls. But for them, time hardly matters. They were born skulls pressing out of warm vaginas. They were born in the umbilical cot. My daughter cannot turn away from the bones too close to birth to ignore death. It's winter in Russia. Yet in the catacombs, it's warm with the sweet fruity smell of soil and death. Above sun shines on gold. Orthodox crosses that glitter on snow. We are gone and the catacombs are dark. We are born in the pile of skulls grows light flickers in skulls eyes. The next one's an ecrastic poem for art reason. Ecrastic poem is about a work of art or a picture. Salt and sorrow. A kitchen in a residence in Aleppo, Syria. Damage Sunday and fighting. Narcisco Contresos photo the New York Times. Walls are blackened. There's a refrigerator with rust at the bottom. Stickers of yellow butterflies and blackbirds on its door.  We can't see what's upright in the rest of the home. If its power is on, earth walls and windows are intact. Charred ceiling plaster covers the floor. No mortar shells or shrapnel though.  We don't know, but nobody can live without salt or sorrow, no matter where. On a lower shelf rest three small pairs of sneakers. We can't see the children, their parents or the photographer. They must all be somewhere outside, but outside is not in the picture. We can't hear if there are explosions and artillery fire. On the wall hang pans, a strainer and measuring spoons. Why do some things fall and not others? All the utensils are blackened, but we can't tell whether from cooking or just war. In a dish strainer cups dry, they'll need to be washed again. If the family returns, if they live, their blackened kitchen sent naked around the world. Purple socks. Another photo from Aleppo.  Shattered cement all around him.  All we can see are the feet wearing purple socks. A child who awoke and dressed like it was an ordinary day, but there are no more ordinary days in Aleppo. Or maybe slept in clothes because they heard planes. After all, they live in a city that is ceased to exist. The parents, if they still alive, will bury their child still wearing purple socks. So a diptych, which is the title of this poem is, you know, probably known from art museums, it can be either a side by side pair of paintings like other diptychs or tryptics, or it can also be a type of memorial speech. Diptych. Early April at Yonksi on Hudson. I always forgot how much I like the sun setting and reflecting orange on the river off battery part. I remember how much I like this restaurant. I hadn't known if it survived. Across West Street from this cafe, the sky glowed with burning jet fuel. I imagine they grip something in those final seconds, fingers curling and incinerated. Their dust settled in this restaurant. I remember the times showed how the blast blew open windows of apartments upstairs. Sometimes forget how much I like my daughter's fingers. So intricate the way she uses her chopsticks. She flies back and forth from California often. But wasn't on one of those planes. People sometimes forget that this has not been the only place Leningrad or even the worst Nagasaki. Though it's hard to remember when you're in the place where ash and dust fell, where bodies fell. I always forget how much I like the Sichuan shrimp here. Lights coming on across the Jersey side, the sun still dull orange in the river, fingers of late light between the buildings. Some people upstairs were still home to see orange fireballs. I see the pictures again and again. So orange and huge. Hard to forget those sanity demand demands we only remember so much. For some reason, I think of sweet smell oranges. Humanity demands we not forget too much. Though it's hard to think too much about Gettysburg, fetid sweet smell of 10,000 rotting joyous vultures and crows coming for miles. I've never really liked large cities. But I always forget how much I like lights reflected in the Hudson and the sounds of tugboat horns. Only other only four other people in the Yangtzeon Hudson still early time enough to get uptown to the play. Sanity demands that we not remember in our every waking moment, bodies falling through the sky or collapsing in pieces on battlefields at Vicksburg vultures circling optimistically, hoping for another civil war or catastrophe. It was so warm that some windows upstairs were open that day. You forget how much force, how much dust blew in reality demands that we accept the dust and ash upstairs at Buchenwald. But sanity demands that we scream at dip ticks of the dead. Sanity demands we forget in Gola and Fallujah and here. But humanity demands we remember. I remember that the subway station is still closed at battery and we'll have to walk around the hole. We finish eating and pay. The ash and orange have almost vanished in the river. My daughter watches the water gin resting on fingers. Only a faint reflection remains. I sometimes forget how quickly it fades. This fox walks into a poem. Around the bar stand a wolf, a vulture, a crow and two rabbits. On the Villanelle lounge a boa constrictor, a couple of chinchillas and three cats. What are you doing here? The crow asks. May I ask what you're doing here? Fox replies. Oh, we all symbolize something or other says boa.  Crow is along a little off-key. Well, I gotta take a whiz wolf house and head for the John door. He's lifting his leg to piss in the Villanelle when Fox comes in. This place is one big metaphor. Tell me wolf snaps. Lowering his leg. I can't stand it. How come she put you in the poem? One of the cats asks Fox. Oh, she needed something to rhyme with locks or talks and keep her pentameter, I guess. Now the boa is hitting on one of the chinchillas, but she knows he's only after oral sex. Last stands a bartender calls closing in four lines. Fox ordered another round. Talks over the music as the ravens play their last number. They all finish with tequila sestinas as the poet locks the back door. So, I said I was going to read from a frog forgotten Vermont poet, Francis Frost. I found her in an anthology of literature that UBM and Dartmouth put out in 1973. She's not related to Robert Frost. No relation at all. She was a good poet, but she's not in the Vermont anthology and the anthology of American poetry. The big ones are Rita Doves and the others. She's not an American war poetry. They're just surprising. I wanted to read a few of hers. And her book Mid-Century came out just after World War II as in a number of poems. Mid-Century, Francis Frost. O'Chemic Age. O'Century of sorrow. What shall the heart compel? The brain contrive that will outwit the treacherous tomorrow. By what quick silver strategy survive? The child, the dog, the red mercurial fox, the tottering big-eyed calf, the silver running of the frightened mouse. What chipmunk in the rocks will nibble dawn with cobwebs and with cunning? What shall we save in cities ruin us? Of precious crucibles of fiddles crying? When mortal meteors made luminous scream down the fiery plummet of their dye?  What shall we leave upon this hemisphere? What shape of hands? What maggot in belief? What war-crazed eyes? What agonies of fear? What name for God? O century of grief. This one also by Francis Frost, his first snow. Out of the northwest, down the coast, the snow covers the sweet firm. Lodges and bayberry hushes the break of the hidden tide on the windward rocks. Here on the fractured cliff, the blackberry bushes are purple. Hooped under whiteness, their berries forgotten by the tongues of the island children, the eaters of snow. Children, if down your coast, among your islands, fly the low gray birds, their cockpits stuttering death. Be no more afraid than of the aiming gulls who've cried toward their nesting rocks through your childhood evenings. Taste blood with no less delight than you taste new snow, made as less cold and as brief as the melting flakes. And her next one is time out. By night in hedge or hurried hole in ruthless house by day, beneath the plunging stars or flung in sand or rainy head, wherever there lies down to sleep, a fighting man and grim, too tired for hate or grief, a child curls down to sleep in him. Francis Frost, I wanted to do some poems of history and bearing witness tonight and then some memoir and a couple of newer poems as well. I want to thank my wife, Cindy, who's a great editor. She has an eye for words and she's inspired many of these poems. Fourth of July at Toscano. From our table by the window, we watch a constant procession of leashed coodles, collies, corgis and muts on Charles Street's cracked brick sidewalk. One collie wears a flag tucked into its star-studded collar.  Our waitress recites house specials like poetry. Vino Nobile, Corte, Aliflora, Fungi, Parabella, Minestrone, Dividura, Argosta. We sip our wine. Across the street three starfish decorate the sash of third story apartment windows. Already there are crowds on Charles and Chestnut moving to the river for the concert and fireworks. A flag that once flew over Kandahar drapes the band shell and the Esplanade where the Boston Pops will place stars and stripes forever. In the back bag, gigantic flag hangs high on the old Hancock building. Its field of stars is as big as the restaurant. While inside, away from the heat on brick and cobblestone, we enjoy our Minestrone and Argosta. As we eat, three fighter jets roar over in formation. Soon fireworks brighter than stars will light Boston. A cannonade of thunder and fire too much like real artillery or like cannonballs over Boston harbor in the revolution. For all the noise it's hard to believe in God or anything at all. The tables at Toscano are full while outside, greyness descends into human night. All of us happy to at least have a holiday with good wine. Fourth of July. On the fourth of July, we climb the ladder up the town water tower to a circular walkway a hundred feet above Reddit. Street lights flickered on below. Three 16-year-old boys on the edge of the night where we climbed the ladder from the steel catwalk up the bulbous globe, gripping and ascending until we were 150 feet up. As twilight faded on the shore of Lake Quantapaua, we rested on the dome of the world, one hand clutching the ladder, the other gripping ourselves. Three boys atop a water tower on the fourth of July waiting for the fireworks. We unzipped the sky. There was nothing between us and the stars as fireworks erupted into black sky and sparked and sputtered. Shivering a shimmy down the ladder from the globe to the catwalk where I crunched against the cold railing and photographed the fourth of July finale with my 35 millimeter. The coda chrome slides are all that's left. Their colors have dimmed but the fireworks still spark in the night. It wasn't only for stars and fireworks. We needed to climb that tower until we tasted death. I look up at that ladder now and wonder how we survived three k crazy 16 year olds high on the night. Yet I take my camera and climb that ladder again. For the night the three of us were together falling into sky, erupting with fireworks and slowly drifting with the sparks down into Lake Quantapaua. Rambler.  Tells the age of this group. Rambler. We thought that car would go on forever. Our 59 rambler american with three-speed shift an overdrive on her steering column. A lime green turtle of a car purred across the kansas prairie through kiawa south into oklahoma and all the way to Mexico when Vietnam and Biafra were everywhere. On the radio we heard body counts famine and carpet bombing. We thought maybe in Mexico we could leave it all behind but how could we have thought that our rambler could go on forever. Everything american seemed wrong from Memphis to Chicago from LA to plakoo but maybe in Mexico maybe a little farther and for a while with tires humming humming on pavement the ride was all we needed you falling asleep next to me as we rode on into the dusty fire of a plain sunset. We were so sure that car would go on but shouldn't we have seen how it would end the rambler finally dying on a hill off hate street in san francisco while dead soldiers were still being shipped home and so so many highways later you walking away down in the road down the road in vermont but that night the rambler american's flat six purrs had carried us south across the oklahoma panhandle just a little farther and we leave kansas biafra and vietnam behind for a while and us riding and knowing that we and the rambler and the flat planes must go on forever. Oh to gasoline i love you but i hate you you've always been so refined and i like your aroma but you're killing me i have fond memories of your high octane brew forget about co2 oil spills gasoline you and i have gone so many places we crossed the kansas plains in my triumph black oil pumps rocked gently sucked fossil fuel from bedrock brought crude that took us all the way to california you had pumps at every crossroads i'd gas up and drive to escape city pollution watch purple sunsets through dust and ozone haves janice joplin singing nothing left to lose i loved the wilderness and hated you but you took me everywhere now they blame it all all on you gasoline who filled my karmann guia my rambler took us to brice zion and yosemite i know you're dangerous but my heart's an engine you've kept beating for so long tell me it can't be all your fault raw crude on beaches melting glaciers hurricane i want to inhale your fumes hit the gas go west like nothing matters except wind and a full gas tank i have to shuffle papers i will read you a couple of new ones at the end seven ten across the street is a white church steeple whose clock long ago stopped at seven ten on the corner beyond the yield sign is parked a baby blue 72 karmann guia sleep blows east as one of my students hurries in red face and other folds her arms on the desk while outside yellow leaves still cling to branches sometimes i wish i were their age again and cling to the idea that if i could go back something would yield i'd love you better we'd get up saturday and not argue maybe we'd even listen to each other we'd fly off in our karmann guia it's a whiny engine worrying we'd stop somewhere at seven ten stay in bed forever we have time to do it all over again maybe do it right this time snow clings to gravestones in the cemetery across from the church a few maple leaves fall i swear the frozen clock has moved its hand so when i taught it for my tech i sometimes taught in the red schoolhouse used to be one of the randolph elementary schools you know the play and just across the way is the church clock i wrote this i was doing the same exercise with my students we came in the next day of the clock with hands and feet maybe it hurt my parents this one is dedicated to sarah my yoga teacher yoga class imagine earth below us she says i think of a stone slab a top mount hunger where i've napped in warm sun she says to look for balance in life i think of stone balancing for eons then i think of hunger remember my dream a hotel room i can't get out of a dining room i can't find student papers piling forever higher but i want to think of birds yellow throat warblers that balance on tiny branches branch out she says then we can't own i hear warblers saying think inside your body she says as we breathe deeply i think of my heart as electrical resistance hear ohm feel it beating imagine myself a warbler heartbeat five times faster we move into tree pose i balance feel my heart pump think of silly cliches heartache heart sick i'm balancing on a pine branch resting on warm stone my heart beats so slowly and perfectly i'm barely aware i'm here poems of fish behind stones and brooks resting in eddies they pick through detritus flowing down leap to eat gadflies floating on the surface make their own verse from beer cans fishing line used condoms their own dead cherry blossoms my father helps me clean the trout my mother pan fries it with butter and breadcrumbs we light the fireplace more for light than warmth in the old lodge bare wood floors and beams creak a stuffed deer head watches from high on the wall no past or future just poems of trout who ignore syntax live in present towns flow on forever my mother and father still with me only today with our fish and besides being dedicated to Cynthia this book is dedicated to my dear friend George Nathan who died last year he's a great poet collaborated on many of these poems with me book last poem for George Nathan here where you wrote so many poems sawgrass plates click in the breeze gather drops of morning mist while herons wade the marsh along with a few rosy eights bloombills wings slashed with red but there will be no new poems today on a beach nearby dawn rises yellow and mist clovers make tracks in wet sand we counted your last days like your mother counted days before birth slowly your words faded lettered olive shells worn down by sea tides couple of new ones this one was also inspired in part by George rain taxi soft music down a windy street worn smooth by light years of frustration traffic the fugs true red oak leaves stuck to the side window of an old checker cab headlights reflected in dark puddles the old Hancock towers light glowed red for rain and from a higher building a beacon revolved in the night horns of boats in the harbour harbour echoed through streets or water splashed up from gutters ran down the sidewalks there on a corner i thought i saw you with your bag of poetry books and pens first drafts a stoplight glowed red in a puddle and when my cab finally moved on you were gone of course i should have known it couldn't be you we wouldn't write any more poems together i'd seen you die on the first day of strength i forgot where i was going in all this rain i didn't know why the streets were so wet why this cab was so old i forgot what you had been writing about the last time we were together the rain across rivers of streetlights a new one coyotes howled the minute we finished reading your poems they started first a few gaps from distant woods then howls that rolled across the meta and moved with coyotes across moonlight you should have been here except of course you're dead not deceased departed gone to heaven dead you thought all animals should be wild we'd argue about that in so many things in between revising poems while my cats brushed against your legs the coyotes howled again as the moon rose they must have been running in a pack we couldn't have planned a better memorial for you who put so many animals in your poems heron alligator osprey but you're not here to write this one and how i miss arguing about words with you take my words take every line breaks stands and dash take a glass of red wine like drink between poems take my poem take moonlight and coyotes howls take off into meadow and forest and run wild it doesn't matter much on jupiter you wake me to see jupiter so bright aligned with four more planets satyr mars venus and mercury when the moon sets those other worlds glow all the night barred owls call back and forth from palms and pines breeze off the everglades brushes our skin like moth wings carry scent of mud from mangrove swamps so far to jupiter yet the planets tonight are as close as our bodies on this blanket where we lie just three feet above sea level palm fronds tick and the wind for a while owls still call as clouds turn pink it doesn't matter much on jupiter the earth's polar ice melts the florida slips under sea planets and stars fall to the horizon a storm blows on jupiter older than all of our history love i hope we can survive for one more night thank you thank you so much i'll take a few questions but first the commercial i do have books for sale back here i know some of you pre-bought books so i'll be glad to sign moes have books for sale at $14 i take u.s cash cash from any other nation as long as you know the exchange rate checks or if you came with no money or a check don't be embarrassed i have a way for you to take the book home get my address and send me later so any questions on the writing process or anything else is anything that's answerable in a poetry group which other poet is or poets have most influenced you oh a lot i i studied with uh palm beach poetry festival with charged in order to have a poet laureate of the month marge piercey whose class i took on the waltz three on k cod 40 years ago she she's been a huge support actually a couple of the words like softened the title softened sorrow came from her the late promise locks this class i also took that at palm beach i carried macad what a pure poet a great poet but that'd be a whole hour long talk jane tell you all how will do you when you started jordan writing poems started i started writing poetry when i was about 20 which was half a century and i really didn't do any more for years i did around 200 radio commentaries for wncs and i taught comp lit so about 17 16 or 17 years ago i started writing poetry again you know i knew how to write that doesn't necessarily mean you know how to write a poem so i really needed and susan thomas is another person i should mention of marshfield and new york poet i studied with her and she really said to to write poetry you need to read poetry you need to read contemporary poetry that's true for any you're writing a novel or you've got to be aware of the literary so yeah this this is a project that's coming together for about 16 years so you've been published in a lot of journals can you talk about the challenges relating to getting your own book yes to submit to journals the ratio of uh submission to acceptance is 50 to 1 so you have to send out a lot of stuff any of you i see other poets you're not and yeah you've got to send out a lot of stuff and you know nobody this this editor the editor of my book doesn't know that she doesn't make any money on that journals don't really don't earn money unless they get some good grant money so i started submitting i went to the colrain manuscript to learn how to submit and how to revive and i sent it out 25 or 30 times then gave up and then sent two more submissions last year and this one was an open submission meaning it's not a contest you don't have to pay but bingo i got it and this was a quick turnaround i it was accepted in june and here it is in march which is unusual turnaround was often two years the other thing nice about this poem but not really an answer to your question but he let the authors do their own covers that's my photo myrtle beach south carolina other questions about submission or the writing process what is your writing process um inspiration and i need an idea i keep lists of ideas i keep a journal so on one side of the journal i have whatever i did that day and i write in cursive i think just the exercise of writing helps the brain but often not every day but on the other page i often jot down poem ideas or lines or take something i observed and write it out and i have a bunch of to do lists when you were going to school thinking back to first second third grade did you have a time paying attention to i before e except after c when there was something to go on on outside the well i have a poem about that and read that one tonight i had a terrible time paying attention i spent two years in fourth grade i probably started school too young to begin with i got the writing process down and i read a lot but i know yeah you got it i was totally unfocused just one follow-up question yeah um you mentioned a friend of yours do you exchange ideas that was george yes another when you write a poem now do you ever evaluate it and wonder how all how well it's going to be received yes all the time wonderful yeah you can't be too preoccupied with that but on the other hand you need to know how the poem is going to read when you read it that's the refraction and you have to know if it's going to be confusing there are two schools of poetry there's the more abstract what the hell did she say i i tend to be more literal you can't be too little but your reader needs to if the poem has some kind of chronology like where's the rambler is going they need to be able to figure that out i'm gonna sit over here on sign books asking questions while i sign so it sounds like these poems stretched over 15 years at work uh yes the oldest slum and i think it's jurors slum is the oldest slum here it goes back 15 years so how did you and your publisher come upon the body of work that was going to go into this you have to have the manuscript done 90 percent done when you send it to a publisher they don't want to go through choosing a poem so that's important that's one thing i learned when i went to the chlorine manuscript workshop was ordering a poem so the poem is like the reading i read a lot of them in the order during the book they have to flow together even though they're separate poems and once it's once it's accepted the publisher realizes the book's okay then you have some leeway to edit and add some new poems take stuff out but not too much you've got some basically the same book you submit then once it it's in what's called the galley proof it's too late unless you really screw not reheated you're not you're not doing final edits or switching stuff around with that for that editor will never take another one of your books other questions or comments i'm sorry george when you when you dwell on something yeah that's uh do you ever get an opinion you've got yes yeah when i dwell on a lot of things about the state of the country in the world today i don't get nervous about doing this i work doing this but just thinking about yeah what's happening in the world i don't think everybody gets that feeling i think everybody's nervous about something whether they literally seem tame or not okay do you write poems to be heard or to be read both poetry really is like song it should be read it's the idea of just reading it is more modern so yeah the poem should have a music but you as a poet i also have to pay attention to the fact that most people are going to be reading them on the page so it's got to make sense you can't do all that other stuff you know voice emphasis on the page it's got to work on the page and decide what the rhythm is where the line breaks are if it's going to be in pentameter this is um what's going to be available in like comic format on the Amazon no because of the way that some of that type is no he just doesn't my publisher doesn't do it doesn't do that he doesn't he's a hand on doesn't really work it's not hundreds of it is i didn't he doesn't use amazon i did put some sale on amazon on his cell but he doesn't like he doesn't like amazon turish thank you very much thank you tom thank you


Have you not suffered enough? Can't you see what is going on around you? It is not in my place to point and give a name of somebody you have to vote for, but these are three things you look out for if you are voting for somebody in this country. The three things, the first one is competent if this person competent enough to lead the nation because he have what it takes, is he efficient to take on this country? The second one is capacity because he have the capacity to take on this country. The third one is the most important and the most crucial character, it is a character that you see integrity, it is a character that you see no corruption, it is a character that you have empathy. Record on the ground shows that the election will be dominated by the Nigerian youth. Yakubu who said he was encouraged by the turnout of registered voters to collect their PVC said over 600,000 eligible voters collected their PVC in Lagos alone within the last one month. The INEC boss also stated that there are currently 93.4 million registered voters in Nigeria out of which 37 million that is 39% are young people between the ages of 18 and 34. So out of that 93.4 million, 70.4 million registered voters are between the ages of 18 to 49. So Yakubu stated this, now what does this mean for the upcoming election and do you think that the youth truly have the power to install the next president of Nigeria? Now please let's hear what you have to say, remember you can join the conversation, send us an SMS or WhatsApp to 08-1803-4663, you can also tweet at us at Weishu Africa one with the hashtag Weishu. Alright so this conversation is quite interesting, I like that William Tsuchimba's video because he said get up! I was almost standing up for my chair to go and collect another PVC that I've already collected. Well hey, there is a lot of movement happening on social media, there's a lot of sensitization happening. The Nigerian youth they've never been this, yes they've never shown this vested interest about these particular elections. And it's no brainer why because of what we've been through in the last eight years. But now when we're talking about installation of the next president of Nigeria, do you think the Nigerian youth, because I know that Uti will not have the same opinion as you. But let me save her opinion for, let me hear your thoughts. And if you think it is possible for the Nigerian youth to install the next president, why do you think so? And let me hear you and I'll hear Glory. Okay in my own opinion I think this is a silly question because from the data I was going to quote that same data. If you're telling me that 40% of the people who have registered as voters are youth between the ages of 18 and 34 now, not even 18 and 49 because if you now go for that 18 and 49 you're not looking at votes about maybe 60%. So definitely the youth has the power to change or rather to vote in a new president right. And if we have for that almost half of 100, I don't think that there's so much more to say again if 40% of the people are youth and then they can actually exercise this power. Now the question is, I hope that these people that have even registered and then picked up their PVCs maybe would actually go out on that day to now exercise the power of voting. But then if we actually put in because there's a strong demographic, so if we actually put in this work. Yeah I think it's possible for the youth to actually change power. How are you Glory? I'm fine. I don't think I know that Nigerian youths have the power to install the next president. Statistics already show it. Like if we are not assuming the figures are there to say it, then it's also about the intentionality right. The drive, the passion, people really want change. I watched a video I think two days ago right on Waze where you found a young man sitting saying he's been sitting for two hours. So this is different. This era is different. The youth are more enlightened. They are really really participating in the political process and everything going on. And you cannot compare. You know some time back some people say we're standing for us trying to vote. People don't have that time. No, people are willing to sit down for five hours now. That's the current state we are now. You know, me personally I've never been so intentional about politics or about voting as I am now. I'm aware that my future lies in this as well as many other youth outside. So if it's this is this is not just a question. This is a fact right. Maybe if I may paraphrase it maybe you're trying to say that all these things is it social media or are they really intentional. Are they going to come out that they truly the system is really trying to frustrate people's efforts. You know you're going to say I was speaking to someone today and said there are people that have not collected. So they will go there. They will say it's not available. They will go again and find people going, going and going. This was not how it was. So people are really intentional. Not people. Their youths are really intentional. They want this change and they want it so badly. So yes the youth we have and let me tell you something like we are no longer going to be cajoled or deceived to say our vote does not count. Let us vote first. We will vote. We will stand there for us right. So many things are coming up videos trying to dissuade us trying to distract us to say this and that. We are not getting distracted over. This is this twenty twenty three election is for the youths right. Since during ensass the youths now know the power they have right. They know we have a voice and that's why I see most of the old the older ones the older generation then they know this thing. So they know we've realized it right and so they are now bringing other political tactics and jargon to distract us. They are not getting distracted. Let me tell you right. Mind you are youths. It's not a question. We have the ability to put someone on that seat and guess what if that person messes up we still have the power to remove the person. The power belongs to the youths. This is twenty twenty three over. Thank you very much. Okay. I like the three words you used. You said intentionality. You said drive. You said passion. But I'm thinking in my head. Intentionality, intentionality. But let me hear Uti's thought before you come back to what I'm thinking in my head. Uti, your thoughts on this. Do you think the youth have the power to install the next president in Nigeria?  I don't like to answer questions in the absence of context. When you ask a black and white question that has to work and then you can install. Uti, while losing your audio, sugar. Uti, can we try one more time and see? Yes, we can hear you now. I don't like to answer a question outside of context. Nobody disagrees with the statistics that Nigeria is a largely useful population. Nobody disagrees with the statistics that the Ainaikirana has come out to say. But where I say that context is missing is that even though you have a PBC, which is why when I see videos like William this video that we just played, I get a little bit frustrated. I first of all love this journey that we're on, that more and more people are passionate about their current circumstances. And we won't change. But I want to take us back to 2015, where the mantra was that we were going to get change. If you all remember, in 2015, it was APC change current. And everybody was excited for change. Everybody wanted change. And you at that point, if we went back to 2015 without the crystal ball that we now have eight years later. We were all rejoicing and happy at the time that we had gotten change. That the youth will install a president. What is it that you are really looking for in the next president? And how do you get it? That last comment there about if we put a president in position, we don't like the president. In four years, very powerful statement. But if you consistently make the same mistakes over and over again, you will consistently get the same results. So we're going in the right direction. But if you look at it contextually, we should be asking a different question. And that question would be what? So the question is not about whether we can install a president. The question is whether we understand what it takes to pick the right president. So he has so in one sense said character competence capacity. On what basis is the average 20 year old or 21 year old making that decision? What information and what knowledge do you have?  Do you understand the impact of your choice? Do you understand what it takes to run a country? Do you understand that one person does not make the change that you're looking for? Do you understand that this change is a process? So whilst I see people tweet on Twitter that the minute we get this person as president in five months in Nigeria would have changed. It tells me that we have a knowledge problem and that knowledge problem is more dangerous. Because when you get to the ballot box, when you get there to vote, you only have a limited number of choices to choose from. The bigger problem is that you can't write a name on that paper. So what you do is you take the choices that you have and you pick the best of the worst. So we need to go beyond this passion for just the PVC and get passionate about actually changing Nigeria's fortunes and understanding that we each have a role to play. The card that everybody is shouting about now is to get your PVC card. Nobody is talking about going to join a political party. The party that everybody is pulling for the candidate. How many people have gone to join that party? How many people are interested in the actual future beyond the play of the election? How many people have stopped to think that when this person is finally chosen, how are they going to run the country? So these are the questions that for me, let's not get so focused on just the today. Because if you don't get it right today and you say, oh yes, I can change in four years. A lot of damage can be done in four years. So this passion and part that we're using behind get your PVC because let's change the narrative. And let's get young people involved. Everybody saying you can't pick your future. How about you say that you are the future? How about we say you are the future? So let's look at the statistics that matter. How many people have joined political parties? I keep trying to reiterate this that the ballot still has 18 people or however many parties that we have. You can't write a name on there. Now do you have it saying how that name got there? No.  How many PVCs were in circulation at the last election? How many people actually used them and voted? Absolutely. So that's why I said that it's important for us to ask the right questions and not just play to the gallery to say this is what every change can be good or bad. I remember when we were shouting change in 2015, change change in 2015, who could have told you that the people who were passionate enough to go out and vote then because they believed in the change narrative would believe that Nigeria would be where it is today eight years later. And somehow we're about to, instead of learning from our mistakes, we're still going down the same path and hoping for a different result. I don't see how. All I see is that we are guaranteeing that either, if maybe there's some miracle, because miracles can happen, or we're going to get the very same result. Okay. So I want to, I want to butt in here for a bit, Uti, because I'd like to ask a question based on what William Tsuchemba said, which is what I hear come on around the Nigerian youth, right? When he was talking about what to look out for, Uti, you were spot on when you talk about political parties. I mean, we've said this thing several times. We've said it that it is not at the ballot that decisions are made for good leadership. It is at the political, what's it called, the local government level, your council, all those places where you're supposed to be part of a political structure that eventually selects the people that go on to the ballot. So you are very spot on when you talk about us changing that narrative and moving it towards people going actually to register in a political party. That is spot on. However, this is where we have gotten to right now. The young people are not in political parties that much. But what we are faced with are three choices, which is what we always do every four years for an election. We always wait till the time where, at the point of choice, which is why what you're saying, put it in context, makes a lot of sense that we also should be part of the people changing that narrative that is not the PVC per se. It is the decision to elect the people that eventually make it to the ballot. That is where the real power lies, which is where those people, all the delegates and all of them, you see them exercising their muscle because at the ballot is already too late because they've already decided who they wanted to decide. That's it. So, I mean, why do we have, for instance, the Labour Party candidate, Peter will be moving to a Labour Party. It was because at the level of decision making where he was supposed to be selected, even though he seemed, he had all the credibility and everything, he wasn't selected as the flag bearer of the party. So he had to move to a different, so what you're saying is spot on. But we are where we are now, right? And the elections are in 37 days. We need to also now sit back and say, okay, what do we even look out for these options that they have thrown at us? Right? The point that I'm trying to make, right, is that the time at which this conversation is on the front burner, the time when people are really listening, is now. So it is important that we are giving the right messaging to people because if we take what has happened historically, the minute the President is elected, everybody is going to go back into their homes. Whatever happens, we will accept the outcome until the next four years. So whilst people are listening, it's important that we use the opportunity to broaden the conversation. So Mike Williams is putting out this kind of video. It's great, but don't stop there. Get the young people to really realise where their power is. Their power is not on the election day, unless they have the numbers. But that you make the right choice on that day. You can't tell the future. Just in the same way we've had politicians and people in the past offer everything and sound right before election day. Then after election day, we have the same disappointment. So Mike Williams is simply the fact that when you have people's attention. That is where you should drive home the message. Absolutely. The very first thing is going on. Yes, it's yielding fruit. But we need to expand it. If not, we will lose the opportunity to catch people. Because people take action when they are angry. People take action when they are frustrated. Which is why I use that example. Whilst everybody is being a particular candidate, please look at the activity in that party. What has the actual membership grown by? It's a very important art. Because it's not a singular activity. It's a group, it's a collective. And we must get people to understand that. It's more important than this actual let's win today. Absolutely. Let's take a very short break. We want to open our phone lines. I really love to hear what you're saying. Because what Uti has said makes sense. Now everybody is listening. So let us stay with us. We'll be right back. Alright, thanks for staying with us now. If you just tuned in, it's Ladies Night Out and we're discussing the topic. Please, let's hear what you have to say. Remember, you can join the conversation. Send us an SMS or WhatsApp to the rate 1. 8034663. You can also tweet at us at Weishu Africa with the hashtag Weishu. Now, the phone line is now open. Remember the rules, turn off the volume of whatever device you're watching us from. The number to call is<PHONE_NUMBER>9. That's the number to call. I like Mary and Chinelo to button. Because Uti raised the very valid points that how many, how much membership has Labour Party, for instance. Because that's the party for the youth, right? How much has their membership grown from the time of the ascending of Peter Obi, for instance, as the flag bearer to now? Because that is where the real number lies. And if you want to go back to our question, which is, do the youth have the power to install the precedent? Hearing Uti and saying to us that let's broaden the conversation. But not at the polling unit. Not with our PVC. We have the powers if we can then infiltrate political parties and then go there to then get the numbers to then decide who eventually will be the back. So imagine if this number of youth are in all three major political parties. What happens? We will pick all the right people from each party. So let the best man win. So we are no longer picking between the devil and the diplomacy. We are picking three competent people and the way it is still rose with the flow. If I hear Uti correctly, I think that's what she is trying to say. But let me hear your thoughts. Okay, so I think that we are on a very good path so far. And this is my reason. 2015, how many people, how many times do we hear about a liberal party? Not a lot, right? But then Peter Obi came, whatever happened with his previous party, and then he then decamped and then joined APC and then brought some form of our OS to what's the call, to liberal party, right? So we are on a very good path. Also if you look at it in 2015 as well, we had about 70 something political parties on the ballot paper to vote for. Now we have just 18. Now that means that it actually reduced to like the most important. Would I call them the most important but yeah the most relevant party. Serious-minded people to vote for. We don't now have these parties that you can't even tell already. You know, just came up from. So I think that we are not there yet. We are making good progress, I must say, in terms of politics. Because the youth have woken up. So yes, we might not be. I will tell you what it is saying. We might not be at that position where we have it all figured out, okay, maybe we used to have 20,000 people in liberal party before and now there are 70,000 people and numbers like that. But I would say from my own research, in fact I saw a video where that man who had a mother, they found it to me. There is a video he has on Twitter where he was talking about how liberal party has actually grown so far. I want to put politics in future. I will not join a party like that, right? Because I know that there is some form of progress, there is some form of growth which is not very visible right now. But when I say, I must say, if we continue like very rightly said, if we continue with this same intentionality that we have right now, trust me, we are in 2027. We won't be talking about this anymore. Okay, let me take, I think I believe you have a caller from Abuja, I think. Hi, you're live. Hello, are you there? Yes, I'm there. Go ahead. Hi, good evening. Thank you. We are asking whether the youth have power to lessen the hope of the residents. This time around, the policies from the past leaders have been there. What we see there is a worry with something because it's not going to work and that it will stop the insecurity in the country. But what we, so people are not talking about hope, I don't know whether we can also hope or believe because to me all these policies have been there and they have been always failure. So we are in a serious dilemma. Thank you. I know very well that don't need to build a building and don't see its performance anyway. And the fact that the other candidate are not popular because they are, they cannot perform better than the people who are to be. Thank you so much. We are in a serious dilemma. That is the thing, you know. Thank you. We are in a serious dilemma. Let me hear your thoughts. I'll make reference to the last thing you responded to Utsi saying this is where we are now. We are at a place where we have three candidates and we have to make a choice, right? So we are trying to solve why thinking for the future. Where are we now? How do we handle this course? Yes, solve the problem.  I've been having conversation whether you like it or not, right? You find people talking about politics.  There is still a rigging of elections so people still have that mentality and that's the reason why conversations like this is very important. It's sort of an empowerment for the youth to know that you guys are in the right direction, right? And to know that you have a voice and if you are united and you have one voice, right? It will count for something. So that's the angle where I'm coming from to say that yes, we know the system currently brings makes these choices and we have to make the fight just like choosing among what the system has brought for us but that's where we are now. So, let's let's do what we have now. Okay, let me do what we have now. We have someone from Abuja as well. Hi, you're live. Uti, sorry I'll come to you Uti. Let me take a beti from Abuja. Go ahead please. Okay, good evening. Good evening. Yes, my name is Uti from Abuja. Go ahead. Uti from Abuja because he's from 31 and if you, if you if you look at the way we are going on now from your from the perspective we are looking at the youth are actually ready to put up power even if it doesn't happen in the 323 it hasn't been so clear that the angelic purpose that the youth are actually ready the thing is that this all the class are taking the youth back for so long and it is right time the youth to put up the right means this governance because if you see the youth are being born by their header or the header it is frustrating we have an angelic and then it is made in class of youth that are copying to the youth countries perfectly without any progress that if you look at the way we are again that is why the youth are being taken back that if people are if the youth are really serious they can take up this power to the youth. Thank you so much. because if you see the class of the older the older from those in the day now who among them that you think that can fit into to take us to the next level it is a big which the youth are following there now Thank you so much Abhichi so let's try to keep our conversations within a minute so we can have more people calling Uti you are going to interrupt or interject while what's it called Glory was talking you want to come in here okay so so what I was trying to say that again it's dangerous when we say that people are having conversations don't forget that the conversations are happening now if you don't have the right context to those conversations bad information still spreads and that is just dangerous so it's great that these conversations are happening that you say wherever you go people are talking about politics but people need to talk about the right things or even though because it's not just it's about the outcome right what are you looking for what is the outcome that you're looking for so yes people are talking but it's just like we've all been taught by a teacher that doesn't know what they are teaching then we don't feel the exam who do we blame this is what I mean so it's great that conversations are happening and that's what I keep hearing and that's why I say that narrative is dangerous because we keep saying oh it's good that people are talking it's good that people are passionate it's a passionate that we want or we want change or we want a result so that's that's why I said that when people are listening please let's make sure that we are listening right I get you I mean I get you so it's not enough for us to just be having the conversation is that we are so I think where I hear Uti you know speaking I'm just thinking strategy because you see do you have the power to install the next president yes you have the power but you have the strategy to do that the answer is no because we are not really there yet pro-activism is different from being reactive what we see now with the youth is a reaction to a pain a reaction to something so when Uti is saying join the political party it is you being actually very proactive saying that you know what before we even get to where the point where we will be reacting to anything let me just go 10 steps ahead and go and wait for them in front which is the strategy that we do not have but I think we have a caller hello you are live Austin good evening hi good evening happy new year to you yes so happy new year okay so right to say Labour Party is a party for the youth specifically because it is black bearer it is over 65 now it is 61 it is over it is over a youth you look at the other political parties you have a lot of youth there if you look at PDP and the EVPT you have so many youths who are in those parties the other two political parties PDP and the EVPT you see then you see then gravitation towards the Labour Party thank you sir we should not call the Labour Party as the party for the youth thank you so I think when we say Labour Party is the party for the youth it is not particularly about the candidate it is more that the majority of young people are tilting towards a Labour Party based on the candidate we have not said Peter will be the youth before they will they will call and quote us but hey we are trying to wrap up the conversation but Uti I think I hear your conversation and I hear you clearly but I wanted to touch a little bit on what William said that yes okay right now we actually do have not three we have four very good because I've listened to the presidential candidate what am I saying even five I've listened to the presidential candidate of YPP I think AMPP that's them and the guy is brilliant the guy has done so much in impacting young people based on the what's it called scholarship that he does for education right you know so but I think we have Loma from Abia okay so we lost the call so I'm saying to you that based on what William's chamber was saying about okay let us spread all the cards on our table can we vote based on XYZ is it possible for us to truly pick the right candidates basing off of the three seas he talked about character competence you know and you know I mean if you go by that seas I was saying Brian Tracy is the owner of these seas there are so many seas that makes for success character, competence, confidence, compassion common sense right curiosity, collaboration, courtesy, courage, calm creativity, consideration consistency, commitment how many of those leaders can we point to to say these are the seas and we can see them in them but I think we have Loma his back please keep it within a minute go ahead hi good evening oh shoot you have to call back Loma your line is moppled up you have to call back we have to call back we have to call that so based on those seas that are ruled out right Uti let me come back to you Jenes that do you think it's possible that if we want to say okay yes we already have these cards this is the choice that we have right now we can't throw the baby on the bath water this is what we have you know is it possible that if we truly look deep into what he was saying like the message around the seas can we truly find the right person emerge well we hope so that's what I would say we hope so but what I still say is on what basis are you making the decisions right it's on the basis of what you've been told so how many people are close enough to the camps of any of these candidates to really say that they know the character of the man you know the character that has been presented to you in the media you know the competency that has been presented you know the capacity so it is still a shot in the dark when you have chosen which is why everybody say vote your conscience don't collect money at least if you make the decision yourself and you say bad decision you can host yourself accountable you can't say somebody made you do it but it is and that is with anything where campaigning is involved I paint a picture I come and promise you the world whether you will get it on the other end of it we don't have a history of it so we can't say that we have any historical data to show us that if you look for A, B, C, D E will pop out we don't have so what you have right now even the PTOBs the core councils it is what media has told you it is what people have told you it is do you know how things it is just like we say when you are on the internet be careful when you are on social media be careful how do you know what is true is true right it is collective of people come together today and decide something is true and start to spread it you will believe it because you have no other way to validate it unless you have somebody in the circle that said I know the day these 50 people made a decision then they have a bigger task of even trying to convince you that those 50 people came together in in dark rooms somewhere and decided that this was the truth absolutely so it is a bit of a crap we don't have enough we haven't had success in that space to say that there is a formula which why I say that in truth devote your conscience you can do as much as you can to gather information and try and make an informed decision for yourself but don't let your decision be influenced by today's money or a bribe or an incentive that's all I can say absolutely but if you have enough to say you can make a form of it and then tomorrow you won't be disappointed I'm not good you know it's so interesting I was going to say that as we are right now in all honesty voting your conscience is the best remedy because when you vote your conscience you can slap yourself if you vote the wrong person you know let's quickly take comments majority of the youth supporting Labour Party are the elite and urban majority of them in Lagos the old people of today were the youth of yesterday that's what this person has said this person says yes the youth are having power to do it but it may not be automatic now I would like to suggest that picture of contestants be soon oh sorry about this maybe they should add the ballot paper thanks because again there has been some propaganda and all of that so this person should be pictures on ballot paper so you know who it is that you are voting well that one is a communication problem but I am voting your comments okay give me one second so it says good evening my beautiful sisters of ways so I take you that this is from Daniel Illum so it says good evening my beautiful sisters of what are you saying hashtag ways do the youth have the power to install the next president the answer is yes but on one condition the condition is that the youths want to change and someone to create that change but with the desperation of the people that are contesting for an office is where the main problem is in a nutshell nobody has respect and regard for the people nobody has respect and regard for people that are coming out for presidency and are desperate and cannot deliver only one is honest and sincere to deliver let us be very careful my own dear beautiful sister oh thank you so much Daniel okay so someone says the passion of youth are proof of that it's a both strategy are behind the score what I was going to add to what they are saying you know when Uti was talking about the narrative you've heard the narrative you've heard these people in politics today they have been building the narrative for 20 years 16 years 25 years they've been building a specific narrative so it's even difficult for you to identify the truth because guess what politics is a long game politics is not a game that as you have said for four years so that's why the structure the strategy is what we need do you have the power do you have the numbers yes but strategically you're not ready you're not ready because you do not understand that this is a game that has been say they decided the presidency 20 years ago who is going to be installed as president that's why some people can make some statements yes with the approaches from the confidence they can say that so I mean if you understand this you don't understand that okay we're in this for the long run and what I'm saying this specifically is that a lot of youth are saying that if Peter Orbe does not become president they're going to leave Nigeria blah blah blah it means you're not ready if you understand the game you will know that this is not a game of four years I'm agitated and I don't get a leader no we need to be you that tenacity you need to stay power you need to keep the fire burning regardless of whether an election is coming in 37 days or not so you have to know this is a long game I am ready to wait it out 50 years down the line and they would install the right person for Nigeria so we have to be ready for that and I hope we are on that note I have said my piece we should be optimistic like I said optimism does not give you precedence that is you right most of us are on the right path if we continue this way in another eight years trust me this is the other kind of energy we need we just need to sustain it and like you said be strategic so that sustenance is the word I'm looking for we don't have that sustainability so hope God we help us so let's hope let's see after the election we know that we have the sustainable capacity we have the capacity to sustain thank you Uti thank you Glory thank you Chinelo we had a fantastic conversation now before we go and show you follow us on all our social media handles that way to Africa you can interact with us further drop a comment and more importantly follow all our engagements on social media like share invite your families and friends to watch and follow the conversation so if you missed our quote for the day here it is again if you have come to help me we are wasting your time but if you have come because your liberation is bound up in mind we can work together I will see you guys tomorrow at 8pm live as we bring another great conversation to your screen enjoy


Chamber 1000 here. Today I want to talk a little bit about the new terms YouTube terms. I'm just now finding out about it because I just got the email today but apparently people's known about it for months. Let's get into this. Okay guys so in a nutshell YouTube is going to start running ads on non monetized channels. I'll show you the email I got today which I don't know why it's so late for me but a lot of people has got it. It says you're receiving this email because we're updating the YouTube terms of service and then right right below that it has terms and parentheses and quotations and I kid you not. Right there. See it? Terms. To clarify our terms and provide transparency to our users. Excuse me. The terms were similarly updated in the United States in November 2020. These changes shouldn't shouldn't significantly alter your access or use of the YouTube service. A summary of the changes. Okay like facial recognition restrictions. The terms of service already state that you cannot collect any information that might identify a person without their permission. While this has always included facial recognition information the new terms make that explicitly clear. Now YouTube's right to monetize. Okay YouTube has the right to monetize all content on the platform and ads may appear on videos from channels not in the YouTube partner program. Okay right there. Now I'm YouTube partner so but this this could could affect me here. Royalty payments and tax withholding. For creators entitled to revenue payments such payments will be treated as royalties from a US tax representative and Google will withhold taxes where required by law. So they're not earnings anymore they're uh they're royalties. Okay but what's really bothering me the most is that YouTube for channels like monkey for non-monetized channels they're going to start running ads on them. They're going to be making money. The creator is not. They will not get a dime from the ads that they're putting on your videos. So I've watched a couple videos myself on this and one British guy or whatever the hell he was. He's he's all for. He says this this could help you and how can it help you? Well he says because if they're running ads on this certain video then you know that's the content you're going to want to create. You don't need them running ads on your video to figure that out. All you got to do is look at views.