WEBVTT

00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:00.990 align:middle line:90%


00:00:00.990 --> 00:00:10.170 align:middle line:84%
This is a poem remembered
by a man after he

00:00:10.170 --> 00:00:14.010 align:middle line:84%
and his wife have just
come back from a trip

00:00:14.010 --> 00:00:16.275 align:middle line:90%
and had an argument.

00:00:16.275 --> 00:00:19.290 align:middle line:90%


00:00:19.290 --> 00:00:21.615 align:middle line:84%
"After Returning
from Camden Harbor."

00:00:21.615 --> 00:00:25.150 align:middle line:90%


00:00:25.150 --> 00:00:29.680 align:middle line:84%
"With the idea of
water still in mind,

00:00:29.680 --> 00:00:33.100 align:middle line:84%
I say these words
out loud and know,

00:00:33.100 --> 00:00:37.060 align:middle line:90%
therefore that I am not sleep.

00:00:37.060 --> 00:00:41.470 align:middle line:84%
Furiously my mind
seizes on green things

00:00:41.470 --> 00:00:44.170 align:middle line:90%
to assert its wakefulness--

00:00:44.170 --> 00:00:48.640 align:middle line:84%
a plain, translucent
pitcher quiet with milk,

00:00:48.640 --> 00:00:54.100 align:middle line:84%
on a yellow tablecloth
brightened by morning sun.

00:00:54.100 --> 00:00:58.780 align:middle line:84%
I observe my lawn as if
asleep, hazy, and steaming

00:00:58.780 --> 00:01:03.250 align:middle line:84%
with dew like a white
sea sparkling green,

00:01:03.250 --> 00:01:08.390 align:middle line:84%
according to the soothing
words of my idea of water,

00:01:08.390 --> 00:01:13.990 align:middle line:84%
though thunder clouds gathered
furiously over Camden Harbor

00:01:13.990 --> 00:01:19.660 align:middle line:84%
with sailing boats rearing like
horses against the flat slap

00:01:19.660 --> 00:01:22.570 align:middle line:90%
of foaming waves.

00:01:22.570 --> 00:01:27.940 align:middle line:84%
What stirs my wakefulness
is my idea of you who

00:01:27.940 --> 00:01:33.130 align:middle line:84%
challenge me to break free
from my tightening mind that

00:01:33.130 --> 00:01:36.640 align:middle line:84%
furiously defends
itself with words--

00:01:36.640 --> 00:01:42.070 align:middle line:84%
on Saturday when water,
green is my anger slobbering

00:01:42.070 --> 00:01:47.020 align:middle line:84%
like horses, whinnied need and
surge from my mind's depths,

00:01:47.020 --> 00:01:52.960 align:middle line:84%
the nightmare sea where words
are forever awakening forever

00:01:52.960 --> 00:01:54.640 align:middle line:90%
asleep.

00:01:54.640 --> 00:01:58.570 align:middle line:84%
And though I spoke them,
they were not my words,

00:01:58.570 --> 00:02:02.620 align:middle line:84%
because my anger toward
you at Camden Harbor

00:02:02.620 --> 00:02:06.340 align:middle line:84%
snorted and roiled
like foaming water,

00:02:06.340 --> 00:02:10.330 align:middle line:84%
it seemed as if I stood
there still asleep

00:02:10.330 --> 00:02:16.540 align:middle line:84%
repeating an idea someone
else's green mind furiously

00:02:16.540 --> 00:02:18.670 align:middle line:90%
had brought forth.

00:02:18.670 --> 00:02:23.740 align:middle line:84%
I did not say what I wanted
then to choose to say.

00:02:23.740 --> 00:02:29.260 align:middle line:84%
And so I could not feel what
furiously I wanted to feel,

00:02:29.260 --> 00:02:34.090 align:middle line:84%
according to the idea
that love means choice

00:02:34.090 --> 00:02:36.610 align:middle line:90%
or that we live asleep--

00:02:36.610 --> 00:02:40.450 align:middle line:84%
as beside the water
shaking the dock

00:02:40.450 --> 00:02:45.400 align:middle line:84%
I failed to will to compose
the words that could free me

00:02:45.400 --> 00:02:50.770 align:middle line:84%
from the sea-dream of my anger
into a chosen yellow breakfast

00:02:50.770 --> 00:02:57.010 align:middle line:84%
scene with a floured cup and the
green pitcher of milk casting

00:02:57.010 --> 00:03:01.030 align:middle line:90%
its shadow as you pour for me.

00:03:01.030 --> 00:03:06.370 align:middle line:84%
Leaving next dawn, awed
from high Camden hill,

00:03:06.370 --> 00:03:09.850 align:middle line:84%
the stilled bay water
seemed to sleep.

00:03:09.850 --> 00:03:14.560 align:middle line:84%
And we drove on in sullen
silence homeward through

00:03:14.560 --> 00:03:20.440 align:middle line:84%
shifting sea-green light
of crowded pines until,

00:03:20.440 --> 00:03:25.570 align:middle line:84%
as if from nowhere, you
explained that a computer--

00:03:25.570 --> 00:03:29.560 align:middle line:84%
given six random
words and the idea

00:03:29.560 --> 00:03:33.040 align:middle line:84%
each sentence must
include them, all

00:03:33.040 --> 00:03:35.410 align:middle line:90%
repeating in the final line--

00:03:35.410 --> 00:03:40.630 align:middle line:84%
composed a poem that
furiously made sense.

00:03:40.630 --> 00:03:43.900 align:middle line:84%
Still angry, and yet
wanting to please

00:03:43.900 --> 00:03:48.730 align:middle line:84%
you, a picture on a
yellow tablecloth in mind,

00:03:48.730 --> 00:03:52.300 align:middle line:84%
I asked you what
this six words were.

00:03:52.300 --> 00:04:02.500 align:middle line:84%
You said, idea water asleep
furiously green words."

00:04:02.500 --> 00:04:03.000 align:middle line:90%