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Transcription: [00:16:24]
{SPEAKER name="Dia Bui"}
I'm gonna ask if we can give Gary another praise around and keep that energy up. Whoo!
[[Applause]]

[00:16:33]
{SPEAKER name="Dia Bui"}
Uh,
[[Applause]]
So, on the move and you're here on the national mall and I recognize that it's a bit warm and we're outdoors

[00:16:41]
{SPEAKER name="Dia Bui"}
and you probably had heard a slew of different topics

[00:16:45]
{SPEAKER name="Dia Bui"}
and you're hitting this one and it sounds like
'How does it make sense?'

[00:16:49]
{SPEAKER name="Dia Bui"}
So, I wanna share with you all in terms of my queerness and my journey in being queer

[00:16:53]
{SPEAKER name="Dia Bui"}
It has everything to do with being on the move.

[00:16:55]
{SPEAKER name="Dia Bui"}
It has everything to do with having to survive,

[00:16:58]
{SPEAKER name="Dia Bui"}
or making decisions that require you to move one place to the other

[00:17:01]
{SPEAKER name="Dia Bui"}
when sometimes home feels so far away,

[00:17:03]
{SPEAKER name="Dia Bui"}
or when it is the closest, it still doesn't feel like home,

[00:17:06]
{SPEAKER name="Dia Bui"}
because home is constantly a wonder of if is there safety?

[00:17:12]
{SPEAKER name="Dia Bui"}
Is there acceptance? Is there tolerance? Is there a way for anyone to embrace me?

[00:17:18]
{SPEAKER name="Dia Bui"}
and is in a way to love

[00:17:20]
{SPEAKER name="Dia Bui"}
And so, opening up with love, I want to share with you something that really made me think more deeply today.

[00:17:25]
{SPEAKER name="Dia Bui"}
Some of y'all might have heard this event happening, which is that Jay-Z dropped a new album.

[00:17:30]
{SPEAKER name="Dia Bui"}
Y'all heard that? yes, you did, yes. I'm gonna bring it up, yes.

[00:17:32]
{SPEAKER name="Dia Bui"}
Real quickly, I just wanna share that on one of his tracks, he featured his mother on the track

[00:17:37]
{SPEAKER name="Dia Bui"}
And I want to share this with you before I op--uh-- before I do my second poem,

[00:17:40]
{SPEAKER name="Dia Bui"}
which is called 'Survival', and so, in this song,

[00:17:44]
{SPEAKER name="Dia Bui"}
that they had collaborated together.

[00:17:47]
{SPEAKER name="Dia Bui"}
it was admission of her sexuality, of her queerness

[00:17:50]
{SPEAKER name="Dia Bui"}
his line goes 'Momma had four kids but she's a lesbian,

[00:17:54]
{SPEAKER name="Dia Bui"}
had to pretend so long that she's a thespian

[00:17:56]
{SPEAKER name="Dia Bui"}
had to hide in the closet so she medicate

[00:17:58]
{SPEAKER name="Dia Bui"}
society shame and the pain was too much to take

[00:18:01]
{SPEAKER name="Dia Bui"}
cried tears of joy when you fell in love

[00:18:03]
{SPEAKER name="Dia Bui"}
don't matter to me if it's him or her'

[00:18:05]
{SPEAKER name="Dia Bui"}
and in the track, this is her poem

[00:18:08]
{SPEAKER name="Dia Bui"}
'Living in the shadow can you imagine what kind of life it is to live

[00:18:12]
{SPEAKER name="Dia Bui"}
in the shadows, people see you as happy and free bu-because that's what you want them to see.

[00:18:17]
{SPEAKER name="Dia Bui"}
The world is changing and they say it's time to be free

[00:18:20]
{SPEAKER name="Dia Bui"}
but you live with fear of just being me

[00:18:22]
{SPEAKER name="Dia Bui"}
living in the shadow feels like a safe place to be

[00:18:24]
{SPEAKER name="Dia Bui"}
no harm for them, no harm for me

[00:18:25]
{SPEAKER name="Dia Bui"}
but life is short, and it's time to be free

[00:18:28]
{SPEAKER name="Dia Bui"}
love who you love because life isn't guaranteed'

[00:18:30]
{SPEAKER name="Dia Bui"}
so in this next poem, I'd like to share with you

[00:18:33]
{SPEAKER name="Dia Bui"}
is about my experience living in DC as a queer woman of colour,

[00:18:36]
{SPEAKER name="Dia Bui"}
and trying to survive every day as a queer woman of colour walking these streets.