And this kind of sound poem is sort of terribly popular
currently in England.
We are all sort of doing them.
And I'll try one on a different sort on you.
America is the last place in the world to read it, really.
Hands up all those who've heard of An-an and Chi-chi?
Anybody know who An-an and Chi-chi are?
No.
Somebody does.
Right, well there's one man.
I shall read it.
An-an and Chi-chi are giant pandas.
Chi-chi is the English panda, and An-an is the Russian panda.
Now for the last five years, there's
been no news of greater importance
in the British and Russian press than what's
happening between An-an and Chi-chi,
because in 1965 Chi-chi went to Moscow to meet An-an
to see whether a love affair might develop,
and nothing happened.
Well, alas, An-an has been back in London for the last year.
Nothing is going on happening, or not happening,
and it's really terribly tragic, because you know,
everybody wants the most expensive 10,000 pound
baby giant panda to be born.
Whether he'd go to Moscow or to London remains to be seen.
Well, I wrote this poem about the nothing that happened
between An-an and Chi-chi.
Incidentally, it's an untranslatable poem,
because it's entirely a permutation on their names,
An-an and Chi-chi.
And believe it or not, in every other language in the world,
An-an and Chi-chi are known as An-an and Chi-chi.
I know this, because I read the poem in Hungary
and people understood it.
Well, it's called "Pavan for an Unborn Infanta."
An-an, Chi-chi.
Chi-chi, An-an.
Chi-an.
An-chi.
An-chi-an.
An-chi.
An-chi-an.
Chi-chi.
An-an.
Chi-chi.
An-an.
Chi-chi.
An-an.
Chi-chi.
An-an.
An-an!
Chi-chi.
An-an.
Chi-chi.
It's very serious.
[APPLAUSE]
It's a serious poem about infertility, really.
You know, one of the major crises of the Western world,
and we see it mirrored in the face of these two sad black
and white beasts.