Page 11

By Jack Joseph Smith

The Other Song That is as close as you get Cause your an American you think hatred is somehow sculpured, worked on While you got it all wrong Tit for tat remember that They don't give shit to a Palistiani The Arabs know we are not them Funny how we end up like the Jews All interpertuped and feared At the same time; hold it; don't start thinking, I mean this instant, the same Know I know what it is not religion Been trying to figer; its the colors, that's it isn't it, yeah, the colors I can't hear any other place to go... There it is -

Original Scan

AI Interpretation

GPT

The speaker questions American assumptions about hatred through references to Palestinians, Arabs, Jews and color.

The speaker interrupts the listener to demand attention to this instant, adds not religion, then names colors before There it is -. The text does not explain whether color means race, appearance or another sensory distinction.

Claude

'The Other Song' tells a listener 'your an American you think / hatred is somehow sculpured, worked on / While you got it all wrong', then moves through 'Tit for tat', 'a Palistiani', 'The Arabs' and 'Funny how we end up like the Jews / All interpertuped and feared'. The speaker halts himself ('hold it; don't start / thinking') and lands on 'what it is not religion' and 'its the colors,', ending with the handwritten 'There it is -'.

The poem argues with an assumed listener in a talking, self-interrupting voice, and its source spellings ('figer', 'interpertuped') keep that rough spoken texture. It strips hatred of its grand explanations and settles on something as plain as 'the colors', while the final dash leaves the discovery hanging rather than resolved.