WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:01.860 align:middle line:90% What a beautiful introduction. 00:00:01.860 --> 00:00:03.587 align:middle line:90% I ask for a copy of that one. 00:00:03.587 --> 00:00:04.920 align:middle line:90% I'd like to know what I'm doing. 00:00:04.920 --> 00:00:08.039 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:00:08.039 --> 00:00:10.530 align:middle line:84% I want to thank the Poetry Center so much 00:00:10.530 --> 00:00:12.960 align:middle line:90% for inviting me to read here. 00:00:12.960 --> 00:00:18.120 align:middle line:84% In some ways, coming back-- coming to Tucson 00:00:18.120 --> 00:00:23.550 align:middle line:84% brings me back full circle to family roots. 00:00:23.550 --> 00:00:26.730 align:middle line:84% Both my grandfathers were part Native American and part 00:00:26.730 --> 00:00:29.940 align:middle line:90% Mexican and were from Arizona. 00:00:29.940 --> 00:00:32.520 align:middle line:84% And one grandfather, when his own father 00:00:32.520 --> 00:00:36.660 align:middle line:84% died, my maternal grandfather-- father's father died, 00:00:36.660 --> 00:00:40.200 align:middle line:84% ended up at age 10 living as a mission Indian 00:00:40.200 --> 00:00:42.930 align:middle line:84% at the San Xavier mission for two years 00:00:42.930 --> 00:00:45.750 align:middle line:84% until his mother remarried and he 00:00:45.750 --> 00:00:49.110 align:middle line:84% was able to go-- to return to his family. 00:00:49.110 --> 00:00:52.560 align:middle line:84% And he also worked in the mines as a sweeper at age 00:00:52.560 --> 00:00:55.320 align:middle line:90% 12 down in Bisbee. 00:00:55.320 --> 00:00:57.720 align:middle line:84% So for me, when I was given my choice of where 00:00:57.720 --> 00:01:00.090 align:middle line:84% I'd like to read when I came to Arizona 00:01:00.090 --> 00:01:03.160 align:middle line:84% and I saw Bisbee on there, I thought, well, 00:01:03.160 --> 00:01:05.940 align:middle line:84% if I'm coming to Tucson, then I must go to Bisbee. 00:01:05.940 --> 00:01:08.430 align:middle line:84% So, at many different levels, I want 00:01:08.430 --> 00:01:12.750 align:middle line:84% to thank you for inviting me and for all of you who were 00:01:12.750 --> 00:01:14.530 align:middle line:90% instrumental in my coming here. 00:01:14.530 --> 00:01:15.630 align:middle line:90% Thank you very much. 00:01:15.630 --> 00:01:20.440 align:middle line:84% I can't tell you how much I appreciate this opportunity. 00:01:20.440 --> 00:01:23.325 align:middle line:90% I have a cold. 00:01:23.325 --> 00:01:26.760 align:middle line:84% I've been told that my voice just sounds nice and husky, 00:01:26.760 --> 00:01:33.240 align:middle line:84% so we'll go with that huskiness right now, won't we? 00:01:33.240 --> 00:01:36.480 align:middle line:84% I'm going to read the first poem called "Cotton Rows, Cotton 00:01:36.480 --> 00:01:40.230 align:middle line:84% Blankets," and for those of you who are students of the sonnet, 00:01:40.230 --> 00:01:43.320 align:middle line:84% I'll have you know that it's the very first sonnet I ever 00:01:43.320 --> 00:01:46.140 align:middle line:84% wrote that I felt was a successful sonnet. 00:01:46.140 --> 00:01:49.020 align:middle line:84% And one of the reasons I'm so proud of it 00:01:49.020 --> 00:01:51.960 align:middle line:84% was because when I was first ordered to write sonnets 00:01:51.960 --> 00:01:56.220 align:middle line:84% as a graduate student, my first sonnet was basically an ode 00:01:56.220 --> 00:01:58.980 align:middle line:84% to the tortilla, and I was told that that 00:01:58.980 --> 00:02:02.310 align:middle line:90% wasn't a proper topic-- 00:02:02.310 --> 00:02:05.760 align:middle line:84% [INAUDIBLE]---- that that wasn't an appropriate topic-- 00:02:05.760 --> 00:02:08.710 align:middle line:84% a classical topic for the sonnet. 00:02:08.710 --> 00:02:11.340 align:middle line:84% And I remember thinking but you said love poem, 00:02:11.340 --> 00:02:15.930 align:middle line:84% and I don't know anything I love more than corn tortillas. 00:02:15.930 --> 00:02:18.160 align:middle line:84% But he wouldn't accept that as a sonnet. 00:02:18.160 --> 00:02:20.790 align:middle line:84% So when I started writing this poem, 00:02:20.790 --> 00:02:25.440 align:middle line:84% it began with 13 lines and a lot of internal rhyme. 00:02:25.440 --> 00:02:28.630 align:middle line:84% And I thought I tweak this sucker a little bit, 00:02:28.630 --> 00:02:30.670 align:middle line:84% I could turn this one into a sonnet. 00:02:30.670 --> 00:02:33.030 align:middle line:84% And when I got it, I immediately sent a copy 00:02:33.030 --> 00:02:36.150 align:middle line:84% off to the professor who didn't approve of my sonnet 00:02:36.150 --> 00:02:37.920 align:middle line:90% to the tortilla. 00:02:37.920 --> 00:02:41.460 align:middle line:84% He says this one is one of his favorites. 00:02:41.460 --> 00:02:45.330 align:middle line:84% "Cotton Rows, Cotton Blankets" Sprawled 00:02:45.330 --> 00:02:47.640 align:middle line:84% on the back of a flatbed truck, we 00:02:47.640 --> 00:02:51.180 align:middle line:84% cradled hoes, our minds parceling rows of cotton 00:02:51.180 --> 00:02:53.400 align:middle line:90% to be chopped by noon. 00:02:53.400 --> 00:02:55.680 align:middle line:90% Dawn stuck in the air. 00:02:55.680 --> 00:02:59.370 align:middle line:90% Blackbirds rang the willows. 00:02:59.370 --> 00:03:03.630 align:middle line:84% Ahead, a horse trailer stretched across the road. 00:03:03.630 --> 00:03:06.720 align:middle line:84% Braced by youth and lengths of summer breeze, 00:03:06.720 --> 00:03:08.700 align:middle line:90% we didn't give a damn. 00:03:08.700 --> 00:03:13.140 align:middle line:84% We'd be late, we joked, stalled by a pregnant mare draped 00:03:13.140 --> 00:03:14.970 align:middle line:90% in sheets. 00:03:14.970 --> 00:03:18.690 align:middle line:84% Later, backs to the sun, bandanas 00:03:18.690 --> 00:03:25.530 align:middle line:84% tied to shade our brows, hands laced with tiny cuts, later, 00:03:25.530 --> 00:03:30.660 align:middle line:84% when the labor contractor worked us through lunch without water, 00:03:30.660 --> 00:03:34.920 align:middle line:84% our dried tongues cursed that mare in cotton blankets, 00:03:34.920 --> 00:03:39.170 align:middle line:84% brought to full in the outlines of summer. 00:03:39.170 --> 00:03:41.000 align:middle line:90%