WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:05.640 align:middle line:84% I have a new book coming out in November, a new book of poems. 00:00:05.640 --> 00:00:07.800 align:middle line:84% And so I'd like to end by reading a few poems 00:00:07.800 --> 00:00:11.380 align:middle line:90% from that collection. 00:00:11.380 --> 00:00:13.860 align:middle line:84% It's quite different from my first book. 00:00:13.860 --> 00:00:15.960 align:middle line:84% My first book is, as you may have gathered, 00:00:15.960 --> 00:00:17.880 align:middle line:90% is a book of personal poems. 00:00:17.880 --> 00:00:22.230 align:middle line:84% They're love poems, or divorce poems, 00:00:22.230 --> 00:00:25.050 align:middle line:84% or poems that have, in some way, something 00:00:25.050 --> 00:00:27.510 align:middle line:84% to do with relationships and Eros. 00:00:27.510 --> 00:00:32.340 align:middle line:90% The new book is a series-- 00:00:32.340 --> 00:00:35.040 align:middle line:84% I think of it as a series of experiments in what's sometimes 00:00:35.040 --> 00:00:36.450 align:middle line:90% called public poetry-- 00:00:36.450 --> 00:00:42.960 align:middle line:84% poetry about public subjects, or themes, 00:00:42.960 --> 00:00:44.470 align:middle line:90% particularly American history. 00:00:44.470 --> 00:00:45.970 align:middle line:84% And there are a number of poems that 00:00:45.970 --> 00:00:50.462 align:middle line:84% are overtly about historical events, like the Civil War. 00:00:50.462 --> 00:00:52.170 align:middle line:84% They have a sequence about the Civil War. 00:00:52.170 --> 00:00:54.545 align:middle line:84% And so there's some of the poems that are research-based. 00:00:54.545 --> 00:00:57.480 align:middle line:84% And they're in persona poems in the voices 00:00:57.480 --> 00:01:01.770 align:middle line:90% of people who are not me. 00:01:01.770 --> 00:01:05.730 align:middle line:84% And there are also some family history poems that were-- 00:01:05.730 --> 00:01:10.710 align:middle line:84% in cases where my family history touches in some way on larger 00:01:10.710 --> 00:01:15.150 align:middle line:90% national history matters. 00:01:15.150 --> 00:01:18.000 align:middle line:84% And personal poems that have something 00:01:18.000 --> 00:01:22.410 align:middle line:84% to do with my relationship to our country. 00:01:22.410 --> 00:01:23.760 align:middle line:90% I mean, it's hard to explain. 00:01:23.760 --> 00:01:27.270 align:middle line:84% It's hard to describe, but hopefully, the poems 00:01:27.270 --> 00:01:29.610 align:middle line:84% will do a better job of it than I just did. 00:01:29.610 --> 00:01:32.040 align:middle line:84% The first poem is called "Bryant Park at Dusk." 00:01:32.040 --> 00:01:34.050 align:middle line:84% And this was written during a year when 00:01:34.050 --> 00:01:36.633 align:middle line:84% I had a fellowship in New York, and was spending a lot of time 00:01:36.633 --> 00:01:40.350 align:middle line:84% away from my family in New York, and finding 00:01:40.350 --> 00:01:45.330 align:middle line:84% that difficult in certain ways-- in very privileged ways, 00:01:45.330 --> 00:01:47.250 align:middle line:90% I guess. 00:01:47.250 --> 00:01:50.020 align:middle line:84% And it's Bryant Park, for those of you who don't know, 00:01:50.020 --> 00:01:51.630 align:middle line:84% it's a wonderful little park that's 00:01:51.630 --> 00:01:52.980 align:middle line:84% right behind the New York Public Library 00:01:52.980 --> 00:01:54.250 align:middle line:90% where I was spending my days. 00:01:54.250 --> 00:01:57.965 align:middle line:84% And so I spent a lot of time in this park behind the library. 00:01:57.965 --> 00:01:59.340 align:middle line:84% So it's partly about the library. 00:01:59.340 --> 00:02:03.020 align:middle line:90% 00:02:03.020 --> 00:02:06.170 align:middle line:90% And that's all. 00:02:06.170 --> 00:02:08.240 align:middle line:90% "Bryant Park at Dusk." 00:02:08.240 --> 00:02:13.100 align:middle line:84% Oh, and the other thing is, it's a park that's very used even 00:02:13.100 --> 00:02:14.300 align:middle line:90% in the evenings at night. 00:02:14.300 --> 00:02:16.907 align:middle line:84% And they have these enormous spotlights 00:02:16.907 --> 00:02:18.740 align:middle line:84% that are on top of these tall buildings that 00:02:18.740 --> 00:02:19.700 align:middle line:90% are adjacent to the park. 00:02:19.700 --> 00:02:21.492 align:middle line:84% And when it gets dark the spotlights on top 00:02:21.492 --> 00:02:23.210 align:middle line:84% of these buildings come on and illuminate 00:02:23.210 --> 00:02:25.310 align:middle line:90% the park very brightly. 00:02:25.310 --> 00:02:29.810 align:middle line:84% So that figures in here, as well. 00:02:29.810 --> 00:02:31.040 align:middle line:90% "Bryant Park at Dusk." 00:02:31.040 --> 00:02:33.810 align:middle line:90% 00:02:33.810 --> 00:02:36.060 align:middle line:84% Floodlights have come on behind and above 00:02:36.060 --> 00:02:38.820 align:middle line:90% where I sit in my public chair. 00:02:38.820 --> 00:02:41.610 align:middle line:84% The lawn that had gradually darkened has brightened. 00:02:41.610 --> 00:02:44.550 align:middle line:90% The library windows stare. 00:02:44.550 --> 00:02:46.260 align:middle line:90% I'm alone in a crowd-- 00:02:46.260 --> 00:02:48.360 align:middle line:90% e pluribus plures. 00:02:48.360 --> 00:02:50.910 align:middle line:90% I'm far from a family I miss. 00:02:50.910 --> 00:02:53.400 align:middle line:84% I'd almost say I'm lonely, but lonely is worse, I know, 00:02:53.400 --> 00:02:54.810 align:middle line:90% than this. 00:02:54.810 --> 00:02:57.960 align:middle line:90% Loneliness is a genuine poverty. 00:02:57.960 --> 00:03:00.360 align:middle line:84% I'm like a man who is flush, but forgot his wallet 00:03:00.360 --> 00:03:03.000 align:middle line:84% on the nightstand when he left for work in a rush, 00:03:03.000 --> 00:03:06.390 align:middle line:84% And now must go without food and coffee for a few hours more 00:03:06.390 --> 00:03:08.220 align:middle line:90% than he'd wish. 00:03:08.220 --> 00:03:09.030 align:middle line:90% That's all. 00:03:09.030 --> 00:03:10.690 align:middle line:90% He still has a wallet. 00:03:10.690 --> 00:03:11.910 align:middle line:90% It's bulging. 00:03:11.910 --> 00:03:16.050 align:middle line:84% It floats through his brain like a fish... 00:03:16.050 --> 00:03:19.080 align:middle line:84% Money for love: a terrible simile, but maybe 00:03:19.080 --> 00:03:21.810 align:middle line:84% it's fitting here, a couple of blocks from Madison Avenue 00:03:21.810 --> 00:03:23.640 align:middle line:90% where commodities are dear, 00:03:23.640 --> 00:03:26.280 align:middle line:84% Where all around me, rich skyscrapers 00:03:26.280 --> 00:03:29.130 align:middle line:84% woo the impoverished sky, having sent 00:03:29.130 --> 00:03:33.480 align:middle line:84% on their way to spent commuters who stream, uncertain, by-- 00:03:33.480 --> 00:03:35.850 align:middle line:84% And as for this whole splurge of a city, 00:03:35.850 --> 00:03:39.050 align:middle line:90% isn't money at its heart? 00:03:39.050 --> 00:03:40.030 align:middle line:90% But I'm blathering now. 00:03:40.030 --> 00:03:41.380 align:middle line:90% Forgetting my subject. 00:03:41.380 --> 00:03:43.180 align:middle line:90% What I meant to say at the start 00:03:43.180 --> 00:03:46.720 align:middle line:84% Is that I noticed a woman reading in a chair 00:03:46.720 --> 00:03:48.550 align:middle line:90% not far from mine. 00:03:48.550 --> 00:03:54.250 align:middle line:84% Silver-haired, calm, she stirred a hunger hard for me to define, 00:03:54.250 --> 00:03:57.280 align:middle line:84% Perhaps because she doesn't seem lonely. 00:03:57.280 --> 00:03:59.860 align:middle line:84% And what I loved was this: the way, when 00:03:59.860 --> 00:04:04.120 align:middle line:84% dusk had darkened her pages, as if expecting a kiss, 00:04:04.120 --> 00:04:06.940 align:middle line:84% She closed her eyes and threw her head back, 00:04:06.940 --> 00:04:09.760 align:middle line:90% book open on her lap. 00:04:09.760 --> 00:04:12.640 align:middle line:84% I guess she was thinking about her story, or the fall 00:04:12.640 --> 00:04:15.220 align:middle line:90% air, or a nap. 00:04:15.220 --> 00:04:18.430 align:middle line:84% And I thought she'd leave me then for pastimes more suited 00:04:18.430 --> 00:04:20.810 align:middle line:90% to the dark. 00:04:20.810 --> 00:04:23.720 align:middle line:84% But she is on intimate terms, it seems, with the rhythms 00:04:23.720 --> 00:04:24.530 align:middle line:90% of Bryant Park, 00:04:24.530 --> 00:04:28.940 align:middle line:84% For that's when the floodlights came on, slowly, somewhere far 00:04:28.940 --> 00:04:33.530 align:middle line:84% above my need, and the grass grew green again, 00:04:33.530 --> 00:04:37.810 align:middle line:84% and the woman reopened her eyes to read. 00:04:37.810 --> 00:04:39.000 align:middle line:90%