WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:00.540 align:middle line:90% 00:00:00.540 --> 00:00:05.940 align:middle line:84% I think I'll read some small little poems. 00:00:05.940 --> 00:00:11.140 align:middle line:84% There's a marvelous poet, who is a Japanese poet, 00:00:11.140 --> 00:00:15.460 align:middle line:84% whose name is Issa who lived at the time of Wordsworth. 00:00:15.460 --> 00:00:18.290 align:middle line:90% 00:00:18.290 --> 00:00:23.853 align:middle line:84% And Issa wrote poems mainly that were haikus. 00:00:23.853 --> 00:00:26.020 align:middle line:84% Haikus are beginning to be written now in the United 00:00:26.020 --> 00:00:32.299 align:middle line:84% States for the first time, and it's a marvelous thing, 00:00:32.299 --> 00:00:35.990 align:middle line:84% because most of the emotions that we 00:00:35.990 --> 00:00:40.240 align:middle line:90% have are very short and swift. 00:00:40.240 --> 00:00:41.740 align:middle line:84% And that's the advantage of a haiku. 00:00:41.740 --> 00:00:43.230 align:middle line:90% It's only three lines long. 00:00:43.230 --> 00:00:45.580 align:middle line:90% It's only 17 syllables long. 00:00:45.580 --> 00:00:48.550 align:middle line:84% So the Japanese poets don't have to have an emotion 00:00:48.550 --> 00:00:53.370 align:middle line:84% as long as a sonnet, as long as Paradise Lost. 00:00:53.370 --> 00:00:56.620 align:middle line:84% They can have tiny emotions and make poems out of those. 00:00:56.620 --> 00:00:59.970 align:middle line:84% But in the United States, where we respect Paradise Lost, 00:00:59.970 --> 00:01:01.310 align:middle line:90% and all of that sort of thing. 00:01:01.310 --> 00:01:03.660 align:middle line:84% When I was in college, I had the impression 00:01:03.660 --> 00:01:06.150 align:middle line:84% that the way they judge poems is by their length. 00:01:06.150 --> 00:01:08.200 align:middle line:90% You just measure them. 00:01:08.200 --> 00:01:15.210 align:middle line:84% And an important poem, you know, a poem was at least 14 lines 00:01:15.210 --> 00:01:16.710 align:middle line:90% long, was that was the form. 00:01:16.710 --> 00:01:20.940 align:middle line:84% And a significant poem was at least 70 lines long. 00:01:20.940 --> 00:01:24.480 align:middle line:84% An important poem would be 200 or 300 lines long. 00:01:24.480 --> 00:01:26.640 align:middle line:90% A great poem, at least 500. 00:01:26.640 --> 00:01:28.080 align:middle line:90% You couldn't remember 500. 00:01:28.080 --> 00:01:30.960 align:middle line:84% So the Japanese don't think about that way at all. 00:01:30.960 --> 00:01:33.780 align:middle line:84% Issa wrote nothing, really, but these small, little poems, 00:01:33.780 --> 00:01:36.335 align:middle line:84% and they're considered all to be great. 00:01:36.335 --> 00:01:38.460 align:middle line:84% One of his little poems that I love the best was he 00:01:38.460 --> 00:01:43.890 align:middle line:84% was wandering around one day in his little house, a very 00:01:43.890 --> 00:01:49.830 align:middle line:84% poor man with no maids to come and clean up, 00:01:49.830 --> 00:01:53.470 align:middle line:84% and his bed was full of fleas and things of that nature. 00:01:53.470 --> 00:01:56.760 align:middle line:84% As Jonathan Winters says, "Crocodiles and things 00:01:56.760 --> 00:01:58.350 align:middle line:90% of that nature." 00:01:58.350 --> 00:02:00.840 align:middle line:90% And he saw a cricket in there. 00:02:00.840 --> 00:02:02.760 align:middle line:90% And he was going to go to sleep. 00:02:02.760 --> 00:02:05.460 align:middle line:84% He wrote this little poem, "Cricket, be careful, 00:02:05.460 --> 00:02:06.450 align:middle line:90% I'm rolling over." 00:02:06.450 --> 00:02:10.322 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:02:10.322 --> 00:02:15.660 align:middle line:90% 00:02:15.660 --> 00:02:21.870 align:middle line:84% And everybody laughs when you read a haiku, 00:02:21.870 --> 00:02:24.990 align:middle line:90% and even the Japanese laughed. 00:02:24.990 --> 00:02:28.800 align:middle line:84% But one of the reasons you laugh is that it's a little funny, 00:02:28.800 --> 00:02:33.340 align:middle line:84% but also you laugh out of astonishment, 00:02:33.340 --> 00:02:38.460 align:middle line:84% that how much unselfishness was in Issa to make 00:02:38.460 --> 00:02:41.070 align:middle line:84% him think of the cricket that way. 00:02:41.070 --> 00:02:43.830 align:middle line:84% It's this little shoot of unselfishness coming out 00:02:43.830 --> 00:02:49.050 align:middle line:84% from him, like a light ray that's so surprising. 00:02:49.050 --> 00:02:52.632 align:middle line:84% And another time, oh, yes, he had some fleas in his bed 00:02:52.632 --> 00:02:54.840 align:middle line:84% one night, and he wrote another little poem for them. 00:02:54.840 --> 00:02:58.440 align:middle line:84% "Fleas, oh, yes, for you, too, the night 00:02:58.440 --> 00:03:00.767 align:middle line:84% is probably just as long, long, long." 00:03:00.767 --> 00:03:04.510 align:middle line:90% 00:03:04.510 --> 00:03:07.160 align:middle line:90% And he saw, one time. 00:03:07.160 --> 00:03:10.310 align:middle line:84% Oh yes, this poem about the flies is marvelous. 00:03:10.310 --> 00:03:11.780 align:middle line:90% "Don't kill the fly. 00:03:11.780 --> 00:03:14.270 align:middle line:84% Don't you see him there, wringing his hands, 00:03:14.270 --> 00:03:15.260 align:middle line:90% wringing his feet?" 00:03:15.260 --> 00:03:17.900 align:middle line:90% 00:03:17.900 --> 00:03:20.390 align:middle line:84% So how many people, how many poets, 00:03:20.390 --> 00:03:22.910 align:middle line:84% have seen a fly washing his hands 00:03:22.910 --> 00:03:25.700 align:middle line:90% with his little black feet? 00:03:25.700 --> 00:03:30.380 align:middle line:84% And no one ever thought that he was begging for mercy 00:03:30.380 --> 00:03:31.700 align:middle line:90% until Issa came along. 00:03:31.700 --> 00:03:34.360 align:middle line:90% 00:03:34.360 --> 00:03:36.650 align:middle line:84% So and here's another wonderful poem. 00:03:36.650 --> 00:03:37.730 align:middle line:90% It goes like this. 00:03:37.730 --> 00:03:42.320 align:middle line:84% "One human being, one fly, in the large sitting room." 00:03:42.320 --> 00:03:45.410 align:middle line:90% 00:03:45.410 --> 00:03:49.250 align:middle line:90% That's got a little punch, too. 00:03:49.250 --> 00:03:50.600 align:middle line:90% Because what he is saying. 00:03:50.600 --> 00:03:53.600 align:middle line:84% You know, people say, don't you believe in the dignity of man? 00:03:53.600 --> 00:03:56.900 align:middle line:84% And he is saying, yes, of course the man, human beings, 00:03:56.900 --> 00:04:01.460 align:middle line:84% are very important, just as important as the fly. 00:04:01.460 --> 00:04:03.380 align:middle line:84% Flies are not unimportant either, 00:04:03.380 --> 00:04:05.270 align:middle line:84% just as important as a human being. 00:04:05.270 --> 00:04:08.360 align:middle line:84% So therefore, if you have a fly and a human being in a room, 00:04:08.360 --> 00:04:11.290 align:middle line:90% there's two. 00:04:11.290 --> 00:04:14.950 align:middle line:90% And this is not really unusual. 00:04:14.950 --> 00:04:16.940 align:middle line:84% Or whether-- we can't say it that way. 00:04:16.940 --> 00:04:21.610 align:middle line:84% We have to say that he used his forms to express ideas. 00:04:21.610 --> 00:04:24.280 align:middle line:90% He was a devout Buddhist. 00:04:24.280 --> 00:04:27.760 align:middle line:84% And for a Buddhist, all preachers 00:04:27.760 --> 00:04:30.310 align:middle line:84% are divine and not to be killed, because there 00:04:30.310 --> 00:04:32.530 align:middle line:90% is something in them. 00:04:32.530 --> 00:04:38.980 align:middle line:84% Gary Snyder and I gave a reading at Houston a few days ago, 00:04:38.980 --> 00:04:43.910 align:middle line:84% for a bunch of 6,000 English teachers, to be exact. 00:04:43.910 --> 00:04:46.120 align:middle line:84% And then we gave a benefit reading at El Paso 00:04:46.120 --> 00:04:49.150 align:middle line:84% two nights ago, which was a very sweet thing for the Committee 00:04:49.150 --> 00:04:52.270 align:middle line:84% for the Advancement of Culture in El Paso. 00:04:52.270 --> 00:04:55.540 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:04:55.540 --> 00:05:03.850 align:middle line:84% We had an abandoned Baptist church, 00:05:03.850 --> 00:05:07.180 align:middle line:84% and it had a marvelous feeling about it, 00:05:07.180 --> 00:05:12.310 align:middle line:84% exactly like an old fundamentalist services 00:05:12.310 --> 00:05:14.020 align:middle line:90% of the 1890s. 00:05:14.020 --> 00:05:19.360 align:middle line:84% And Gary Snyder himself is a devout Buddhist, as he 00:05:19.360 --> 00:05:20.170 align:middle line:90% Issa was. 00:05:20.170 --> 00:05:24.910 align:middle line:84% And so it took on more of that tone, because Gary Snyder began 00:05:24.910 --> 00:05:27.760 align:middle line:84% to talk about what Buddhism meant, and these things. 00:05:27.760 --> 00:05:29.440 align:middle line:90% And he started to help. 00:05:29.440 --> 00:05:32.710 align:middle line:84% And he lives in Japan, in a Zen monastery, 00:05:32.710 --> 00:05:35.590 align:middle line:84% or participates in the work of a Zen monastery. 00:05:35.590 --> 00:05:37.390 align:middle line:84% And of course, they asked him questions. 00:05:37.390 --> 00:05:39.880 align:middle line:84% And so he was saying one of the questions 00:05:39.880 --> 00:05:42.940 align:middle line:84% that you're asked to answer is, "Does the dog 00:05:42.940 --> 00:05:43.885 align:middle line:90% have a Buddha nature?" 00:05:43.885 --> 00:05:47.270 align:middle line:90% 00:05:47.270 --> 00:05:49.100 align:middle line:84% And of course, the answer is "no-oof." 00:05:49.100 --> 00:05:57.075 align:middle line:90% 00:05:57.075 --> 00:05:57.575 align:middle line:90% Anyway. 00:05:57.575 --> 00:06:01.670 align:middle line:90% 00:06:01.670 --> 00:06:06.500 align:middle line:90% So that says the same thing. 00:06:06.500 --> 00:06:08.460 align:middle line:84% You think you're very different than the dogs? 00:06:08.460 --> 00:06:08.960 align:middle line:90% You're not. 00:06:08.960 --> 00:06:14.240 align:middle line:90% 00:06:14.240 --> 00:06:17.030 align:middle line:84% But imagine how English poetry would express this. 00:06:17.030 --> 00:06:18.590 align:middle line:84% When he's saying one human being, 00:06:18.590 --> 00:06:20.000 align:middle line:90% one fly in a large sitting room. 00:06:20.000 --> 00:06:22.880 align:middle line:84% Howard Pope says he'd go on and on and on. 00:06:22.880 --> 00:06:24.710 align:middle line:84% A proper study of mankind as man. 00:06:24.710 --> 00:06:27.080 align:middle line:84% When I was...and so on, and so on, and so on. 00:06:27.080 --> 00:06:29.480 align:middle line:84% They express things by direct statement, 00:06:29.480 --> 00:06:32.120 align:middle line:84% by throwing out the words as the newspaper does. 00:06:32.120 --> 00:06:36.560 align:middle line:84% And it took a lot of them, a lot of them, to express. 00:06:36.560 --> 00:06:38.150 align:middle line:90% But notice what Issa says. 00:06:38.150 --> 00:06:41.540 align:middle line:84% He just presents a single tiny picture, one human being, 00:06:41.540 --> 00:06:43.960 align:middle line:84% one fly in a large sitting room, and he doesn't 00:06:43.960 --> 00:06:47.430 align:middle line:90% waste all of those words. 00:06:47.430 --> 00:06:50.725 align:middle line:84% And he's got something that you'll never forget the thing. 00:06:50.725 --> 00:06:52.100 align:middle line:84% I've forgotten everything of Pope 00:06:52.100 --> 00:06:56.090 align:middle line:84% except that one line, which I profoundly 00:06:56.090 --> 00:06:59.370 align:middle line:84% hate, "The proper study of mankind is man." 00:06:59.370 --> 00:07:03.140 align:middle line:84% The proper study of mankind is not man. 00:07:03.140 --> 00:07:07.670 align:middle line:90% 00:07:07.670 --> 00:07:09.740 align:middle line:90% Well, anyway. 00:07:09.740 --> 00:07:11.630 align:middle line:84% So Henry, here's a couple other poems of his. 00:07:11.630 --> 00:07:12.140 align:middle line:90% He was writing. 00:07:12.140 --> 00:07:14.390 align:middle line:84% He'd love to write poems for frogs and all sorts of animals. 00:07:14.390 --> 00:07:16.140 align:middle line:84% One day, he was walking through the woods, 00:07:16.140 --> 00:07:18.322 align:middle line:84% and he saw frogs leaping around on all sides. 00:07:18.322 --> 00:07:20.280 align:middle line:84% You've all seen them, when they jump like this. 00:07:20.280 --> 00:07:22.910 align:middle line:84% And so he said, "Leaping for the river, 00:07:22.910 --> 00:07:25.220 align:middle line:84% the frog said, excuse me for going first." 00:07:25.220 --> 00:07:27.830 align:middle line:90% 00:07:27.830 --> 00:07:31.220 align:middle line:84% Well, that's a very polite Japanese frog. 00:07:31.220 --> 00:07:32.750 align:middle line:84% But he had another wonderful poem. 00:07:32.750 --> 00:07:36.860 align:middle line:84% He saw two frogs fighting, a skinny frog and a fat frog. 00:07:36.860 --> 00:07:40.310 align:middle line:84% And Issa was very poor and very skinny, 00:07:40.310 --> 00:07:42.680 align:middle line:84% and he associated himself with the skinny frog, 00:07:42.680 --> 00:07:45.020 align:middle line:90% and so he wrote this poem. 00:07:45.020 --> 00:07:47.250 align:middle line:90% "Lanky frog, hold your ground. 00:07:47.250 --> 00:07:48.350 align:middle line:90% Issa is coming." 00:07:48.350 --> 00:07:52.134 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:07:52.134 --> 00:07:55.920 align:middle line:90% 00:07:55.920 --> 00:08:00.952 align:middle line:84% So don't tell me that he is not a great poet. 00:08:00.952 --> 00:08:05.254 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:08:05.254 --> 00:08:07.660 align:middle line:90% 00:08:07.660 --> 00:08:10.743 align:middle line:84% And in some of his other poems we're a little different. 00:08:10.743 --> 00:08:12.910 align:middle line:84% One time, he saw a line of black ants on the ground. 00:08:12.910 --> 00:08:14.950 align:middle line:84% He said, "This line of black ants, 00:08:14.950 --> 00:08:18.901 align:middle line:84% maybe it goes all the way back to that white cloud." 00:08:18.901 --> 00:08:22.410 align:middle line:84% And that's a little different, because he suggests-- 00:08:22.410 --> 00:08:24.780 align:middle line:84% because the purpose of Pope is to tell you what 00:08:24.780 --> 00:08:26.370 align:middle line:90% you already know, 00:08:26.370 --> 00:08:28.050 align:middle line:84% "The proper study of mankind is man." 00:08:28.050 --> 00:08:31.060 align:middle line:84% Everybody has said that for 100 years before Pope said it. 00:08:31.060 --> 00:08:31.560 align:middle line:90% That's all. 00:08:31.560 --> 00:08:34.110 align:middle line:84% The secularization of Western culture. 00:08:34.110 --> 00:08:36.240 align:middle line:84% And maybe you wouldn't express it quite that way. 00:08:36.240 --> 00:08:37.530 align:middle line:90% Maybe you'd take a paragraph. 00:08:37.530 --> 00:08:39.030 align:middle line:90% Pope only took a line. 00:08:39.030 --> 00:08:41.070 align:middle line:84% But what Issa is trying to get you to think 00:08:41.070 --> 00:08:43.320 align:middle line:84% is thought you've never thought before. 00:08:43.320 --> 00:08:45.807 align:middle line:84% So Issa, what this poem suggests is possibly 00:08:45.807 --> 00:08:47.640 align:middle line:84% there is a connection between the black ants 00:08:47.640 --> 00:08:49.370 align:middle line:90% and the white clouds. 00:08:49.370 --> 00:08:52.360 align:middle line:84% Maybe there isn't any difference between those two things. 00:08:52.360 --> 00:08:54.980 align:middle line:84% Maybe there's no difference between black and white. 00:08:54.980 --> 00:08:57.970 align:middle line:90% Try thinking that sometime. 00:08:57.970 --> 00:09:00.400 align:middle line:84% Anyways, that's the purpose of the poem, 00:09:00.400 --> 00:09:03.280 align:middle line:84% is to nudge you towards little thoughts that you 00:09:03.280 --> 00:09:05.670 align:middle line:90% haven't thought before. .