WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:00.570 align:middle line:90% 00:00:00.570 --> 00:00:03.300 align:middle line:84% I read it because it came out of an experiment 00:00:03.300 --> 00:00:04.780 align:middle line:90% with other languages. 00:00:04.780 --> 00:00:07.530 align:middle line:84% It's a poem called The Young Ionia, which 00:00:07.530 --> 00:00:11.820 align:middle line:90% I think is also a mimeographed. 00:00:11.820 --> 00:00:19.620 align:middle line:84% And this poem was suggested by a rating of Euripides-- 00:00:19.620 --> 00:00:24.960 align:middle line:84% the Buckeye-- because one of the choruses in this play was 00:00:24.960 --> 00:00:32.040 align:middle line:84% written in a meter called ionic a minore which is 2 shorts 00:00:32.040 --> 00:00:33.120 align:middle line:90% and two longs-- 00:00:33.120 --> 00:00:38.010 align:middle line:84% T-D-D-D, T-D-D-D. And I just wondered if this could be used 00:00:38.010 --> 00:00:41.790 align:middle line:84% as the basis for a poem in English just for fun. 00:00:41.790 --> 00:00:44.850 align:middle line:84% It started as an experiment in metrics. 00:00:44.850 --> 00:00:48.120 align:middle line:90% You can see the title is a pun. 00:00:48.120 --> 00:00:49.920 align:middle line:84% Nobody has to know what it means. 00:00:49.920 --> 00:00:53.160 align:middle line:84% It's supposed to sound like the name of a girl I guess. 00:00:53.160 --> 00:00:56.010 align:middle line:84% But it's called The Young Ionia because the meter 00:00:56.010 --> 00:00:58.410 align:middle line:90% is ionic a minore-- 00:00:58.410 --> 00:00:59.370 align:middle line:90% minor ionic. 00:00:59.370 --> 00:01:01.920 align:middle line:90% 00:01:01.920 --> 00:01:05.280 align:middle line:84% It started, as I said, as an experiment in meter. 00:01:05.280 --> 00:01:09.720 align:middle line:84% Poem start in lots of ways and least often with ideas I 00:01:09.720 --> 00:01:10.650 align:middle line:90% suppose. 00:01:10.650 --> 00:01:13.800 align:middle line:84% They start with the way two words fit together. 00:01:13.800 --> 00:01:17.460 align:middle line:84% Dylan Thomas says, "They start with a mere cadence 00:01:17.460 --> 00:01:18.540 align:middle line:90% in the head." 00:01:18.540 --> 00:01:21.450 align:middle line:84% Elliot and Valerie have said, "They 00:01:21.450 --> 00:01:25.530 align:middle line:84% start with the way two images go together perhaps." 00:01:25.530 --> 00:01:28.050 align:middle line:84% Well, this happened to start with a cadence. 00:01:28.050 --> 00:01:30.270 align:middle line:84% But I don't think, at least I hope 00:01:30.270 --> 00:01:32.700 align:middle line:84% it isn't merely a metrical experiment 00:01:32.700 --> 00:01:35.820 align:middle line:90% because that's nothing. 00:01:35.820 --> 00:01:38.790 align:middle line:84% And I hope that this was just a starter that 00:01:38.790 --> 00:01:41.520 align:middle line:84% got something emotional going and it 00:01:41.520 --> 00:01:45.210 align:middle line:84% turned into a poem of unhappy love, 00:01:45.210 --> 00:01:49.410 align:middle line:84% love unhappy for one reason or another. 00:01:49.410 --> 00:01:55.740 align:middle line:84% Each line consists of three ionic a minore feet. 00:01:55.740 --> 00:01:57.840 align:middle line:84% But since that looks monotonous I 00:01:57.840 --> 00:02:00.930 align:middle line:84% broke up the lines by never having to break twice 00:02:00.930 --> 00:02:03.030 align:middle line:90% in the same place. 00:02:03.030 --> 00:02:06.160 align:middle line:84% I mean, by having an offbeat break in the lines. 00:02:06.160 --> 00:02:09.880 align:middle line:84% It's in effect you may not hear but can see on the page. 00:02:09.880 --> 00:02:12.210 align:middle line:84% And by having a lot of rhyme in the poem. 00:02:12.210 --> 00:02:15.090 align:middle line:90% I don't know why. 00:02:15.090 --> 00:02:18.240 align:middle line:90% Sounded pretty. 00:02:18.240 --> 00:02:22.440 align:middle line:84% There's too much rhyme, I think, somewhat to be taken out. 00:02:22.440 --> 00:02:25.530 align:middle line:84% But the rhythm is this two shorts two longs-- 00:02:25.530 --> 00:02:32.370 align:middle line:84% T-D-D-D, T-D-D-D. If you could come on the late train 00:02:32.370 --> 00:02:37.500 align:middle line:84% for the same walk or a hush talk by the fireplace when the ash 00:02:37.500 --> 00:02:39.870 align:middle line:90% flares as a heart could-- 00:02:39.870 --> 00:02:42.840 align:middle line:90% if a heart would to recall you. 00:02:42.840 --> 00:02:46.050 align:middle line:90% To recall all a long look. 00:02:46.050 --> 00:02:48.540 align:middle line:84% To enwrap you as it once had when 00:02:48.540 --> 00:02:52.440 align:middle line:84% the rain streamed on the fall air and we knew, 00:02:52.440 --> 00:02:54.580 align:middle line:90% then, it was all wrong. 00:02:54.580 --> 00:02:57.870 align:middle line:84% It was love lost and a year lost. 00:02:57.870 --> 00:03:01.020 align:middle line:84% Of the few years we account most. 00:03:01.020 --> 00:03:03.690 align:middle line:84% But the boughs blew and the cloud blew 00:03:03.690 --> 00:03:08.160 align:middle line:84% and the sky fell from its rose ledge on the wood's rim 00:03:08.160 --> 00:03:10.230 align:middle line:90% to the wan brook. 00:03:10.230 --> 00:03:14.580 align:middle line:84% And the clock read to the half-dead, a profound page 00:03:14.580 --> 00:03:19.740 align:middle line:84% as the cloud broke and the moon spoke and the door shook. 00:03:19.740 --> 00:03:23.790 align:middle line:84% If you could come, and it meant come at the steep price. 00:03:23.790 --> 00:03:27.960 align:middle line:84% We regret yet as the debt swells in the night time. 00:03:27.960 --> 00:03:32.790 align:middle line:84% And the could come if you could hum in the skull's drum. 00:03:32.790 --> 00:03:39.300 align:middle line:84% And the limbs writhe until the bed cries like a hurt thing. 00:03:39.300 --> 00:03:43.920 align:middle line:84% If you could-- but the moon is dead and the clock is dead. 00:03:43.920 --> 00:03:48.570 align:middle line:84% For we know now we can give all but it won't do. 00:03:48.570 --> 00:03:52.950 align:middle line:84% Not the day's length nor the black strength or the blood's 00:03:52.950 --> 00:03:54.540 align:middle line:90% flush. 00:03:54.540 --> 00:03:59.010 align:middle line:84% What we took once for a sure thing, for delight's right, 00:03:59.010 --> 00:04:03.900 align:middle line:84% for the clear eve with its wild star in the sunset 00:04:03.900 --> 00:04:08.640 align:middle line:84% we would have back at the old cost, at the old grief. 00:04:08.640 --> 00:04:13.065 align:middle line:84% And we begged love for the same pain, for a last chance. 00:04:13.065 --> 00:04:16.829 align:middle line:90% 00:04:16.829 --> 00:04:19.440 align:middle line:84% Then the God turns with a low laugh-- 00:04:19.440 --> 00:04:21.060 align:middle line:90% as the leaves hush-- 00:04:21.060 --> 00:04:24.840 align:middle line:84% but the eyes ice and there's no twice. 00:04:24.840 --> 00:04:29.940 align:middle line:84% The benign gaze upon some woe but on ours no. 00:04:29.940 --> 00:04:32.570 align:middle line:90% And the leaves rush.