WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:00.540 align:middle line:90% 00:00:00.540 --> 00:00:02.571 align:middle line:90% OK, you guys, back to misery. 00:00:02.571 --> 00:00:04.455 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:00:04.455 --> 00:00:06.810 align:middle line:90% 00:00:06.810 --> 00:00:09.210 align:middle line:84% I'm going to read a few poems from my first book. 00:00:09.210 --> 00:00:14.310 align:middle line:90% 00:00:14.310 --> 00:00:18.170 align:middle line:84% This is going to be the French period of the reading. 00:00:18.170 --> 00:00:23.540 align:middle line:84% I'm going to read a poem called Seurat, which is a prose poem. 00:00:23.540 --> 00:00:26.300 align:middle line:84% And it's after Seurat's painting, La Grande Jatte, 00:00:26.300 --> 00:00:28.108 align:middle line:84% which is in the Chicago Institute, 00:00:28.108 --> 00:00:29.900 align:middle line:84% although there are studies for the painting 00:00:29.900 --> 00:00:31.910 align:middle line:90% all over the universe. 00:00:31.910 --> 00:00:36.680 align:middle line:84% Seurat is a pointillist and the particular painting 00:00:36.680 --> 00:00:39.660 align:middle line:84% that I chose to write about is a very famous painting. 00:00:39.660 --> 00:00:42.800 align:middle line:84% It's a Sunday Bourgeois stroll scene 00:00:42.800 --> 00:00:45.945 align:middle line:84% by a river, where people carry umbrellas 00:00:45.945 --> 00:00:47.570 align:middle line:84% and there's even a little monkey in it, 00:00:47.570 --> 00:00:50.150 align:middle line:84% although there's no monkey in my poem. 00:00:50.150 --> 00:00:51.590 align:middle line:84% I don't let monkeys into my poems. 00:00:51.590 --> 00:00:53.495 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:00:53.495 --> 00:00:54.650 align:middle line:90% Slight prejudice, I have. 00:00:54.650 --> 00:00:57.740 align:middle line:90% 00:00:57.740 --> 00:01:02.540 align:middle line:84% This prose poem is written from the point of view 00:01:02.540 --> 00:01:06.000 align:middle line:90% of a figure in the painting. 00:01:06.000 --> 00:01:07.400 align:middle line:90% So it's a persona prose poem. 00:01:07.400 --> 00:01:11.290 align:middle line:90% 00:01:11.290 --> 00:01:20.900 align:middle line:84% Seurat, it is a Sunday afternoon on the Grand Canal. 00:01:20.900 --> 00:01:23.630 align:middle line:84% We are watching the sailboats trying 00:01:23.630 --> 00:01:27.020 align:middle line:90% to sail along without wind. 00:01:27.020 --> 00:01:31.910 align:middle line:84% Small rowboats are making their incisions on the water, 00:01:31.910 --> 00:01:37.940 align:middle line:84% only to have the wounds seal up again soon after they pass. 00:01:37.940 --> 00:01:41.660 align:middle line:84% In the background, the smoke from the factories 00:01:41.660 --> 00:01:44.030 align:middle line:84% and the smoke from the steam boats 00:01:44.030 --> 00:01:49.970 align:middle line:84% merges into tiny clouds above us, then disappears. 00:01:49.970 --> 00:01:55.220 align:middle line:84% Our mothers and fathers walk arm in arm along the shore, 00:01:55.220 --> 00:01:59.600 align:middle line:84% clutching tightly their umbrellas and canes. 00:01:59.600 --> 00:02:03.080 align:middle line:84% We are sitting on a blanket in the foreground, 00:02:03.080 --> 00:02:06.890 align:middle line:84% but even if someone were to have taken a photograph of us, 00:02:06.890 --> 00:02:10.580 align:middle line:84% only our closest relatives would have noticed. 00:02:10.580 --> 00:02:15.650 align:middle line:84% We seem to be burying our head between our knees. 00:02:15.650 --> 00:02:19.850 align:middle line:84% I remember thinking, you were one of the most delicate women 00:02:19.850 --> 00:02:21.950 align:middle line:90% I'd ever seen. 00:02:21.950 --> 00:02:27.170 align:middle line:84% Your bones seem small and fragile as a rabbit. 00:02:27.170 --> 00:02:30.620 align:middle line:84% Even so, beads of perspiration begin 00:02:30.620 --> 00:02:34.460 align:middle line:84% to form on your wrist and your forehead. 00:02:34.460 --> 00:02:37.070 align:middle line:84% If we were to live long enough, I'm 00:02:37.070 --> 00:02:40.640 align:middle line:84% sure we would have been amazed at how many clothes we 00:02:40.640 --> 00:02:43.470 align:middle line:90% forced ourselves to wear. 00:02:43.470 --> 00:02:48.530 align:middle line:84% At this time, I'd never seen you without your petticoats. 00:02:48.530 --> 00:02:51.530 align:middle line:84% And if I ever gave thought to such a possibility, 00:02:51.530 --> 00:02:57.440 align:middle line:84% I would chastise myself for not offering you enough respect. 00:02:57.440 --> 00:03:00.290 align:middle line:90% The sun is very hot. 00:03:00.290 --> 00:03:05.720 align:middle line:84% Why is it no one complains of the heat in France? 00:03:05.720 --> 00:03:10.340 align:middle line:84% There are women doing their needlework, men reading, a man 00:03:10.340 --> 00:03:13.670 align:middle line:90% in a bowler hat smoking a pipe. 00:03:13.670 --> 00:03:18.200 align:middle line:84% The noise of the children is absorbed by the trees. 00:03:18.200 --> 00:03:21.140 align:middle line:90% The air is full of idleness. 00:03:21.140 --> 00:03:26.720 align:middle line:84% There is the faint aroma of lilies coming from somewhere. 00:03:26.720 --> 00:03:31.560 align:middle line:84% We discuss what we want for ourselves abstractly. 00:03:31.560 --> 00:03:35.870 align:middle line:84% It seems only right on a day like this. 00:03:35.870 --> 00:03:39.500 align:middle line:84% I have ambitions to be a painter, 00:03:39.500 --> 00:03:44.000 align:middle line:84% and you want a small family and a cottage in the country. 00:03:44.000 --> 00:03:46.760 align:middle line:84% We make everything sound so simple 00:03:46.760 --> 00:03:51.500 align:middle line:84% because we believe everything is still possible. 00:03:51.500 --> 00:03:54.110 align:middle line:84% The small tragedies of our parents 00:03:54.110 --> 00:03:57.950 align:middle line:84% have not yet made an impression on us. 00:03:57.950 --> 00:04:00.630 align:middle line:90% We should be grateful for this. 00:04:00.630 --> 00:04:05.160 align:middle line:84% But we are too young to think hard about very much. 00:04:05.160 --> 00:04:07.790 align:middle line:84% I throw a scaling rock into the water. 00:04:07.790 --> 00:04:11.780 align:middle line:84% I have strong arms and before the rock sinks, 00:04:11.780 --> 00:04:15.710 align:middle line:84% it seems to have nearly reached the other side. 00:04:15.710 --> 00:04:20.450 align:middle line:84% When we get up, we have a sense of our own importance. 00:04:20.450 --> 00:04:25.010 align:middle line:84% We could not know, taking a step back, looking 00:04:25.010 --> 00:04:28.880 align:middle line:84% at the total picture that we would occupy such 00:04:28.880 --> 00:04:31.760 align:middle line:90% a small corner of the canvas. 00:04:31.760 --> 00:04:34.400 align:middle line:84% And that even then, we are no more 00:04:34.400 --> 00:04:40.220 align:middle line:84% than tiny clusters of dots, carefully placed together 00:04:40.220 --> 00:04:43.164 align:middle line:90% without touching. 00:04:43.164 --> 00:04:51.830 align:middle line:90% [APPLAUSE] 00:04:51.830 --> 00:04:53.322 align:middle line:90% Pretty good, huh? 00:04:53.322 --> 00:04:56.178 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:04:56.178 --> 00:04:59.510 align:middle line:90% [APPLAUSE] 00:04:59.510 --> 00:05:04.250 align:middle line:84% My best audience is between two and three. 00:05:04.250 --> 00:05:07.330 align:middle line:84% Or is it in the oral stage, I don't know.