As I mentioned earlier, I was really not a very good student.
I was a terrible student.
And I always suffered for that publicly and privately.
And I also mentioned earlier that it
was a long time before any attention came to me as a poet.
I wasn't really sure I was a poet.
Although, I kept talking about it for years until suddenly
some things began to happen.
And I've always worked eight hours a day.
I've always worked in an office.
And I kind of write on my lunch hours and late at night
when the children are in bed.
But recently, I'm on my way now to be--
I was named poet in residence at Chico State
College in California.
And I'll be there for a few months.
And this business has been a source of great wonder to me.
I used to break out in a rash whenever
I got near a classroom.
I just don't know what's going to happen.
And there's been a source of great speculation for me.
And so I made this poem about it.
And it's a sonnet.
It's called "Zimmer Imagines Himself
Being Poet in Residence".
"There was so much to look forward to.
I will reside in a house that is chanted, in rooms
that are quoted by echoes.
The faucets were run with metaphor
and the toilets will flush down prose.
The beds will be for headlong dreaming
and all flat surfaces will spell the purest
and most honest sentences.
I will not eat or drink in the residence.
My veins will flow with art and truth.
Outdoors, the sunlight will flash and bend enchanted,
rain will break it down to purest colors.
The students will ask, who resides in that house?
And the wind and stars will answer, Zimmer."
[LAUGHTER]
[APPLAUSE]
Thank you Thank you.