WEBVTT

00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:00.560 align:middle line:90%


00:00:00.560 --> 00:00:02.310 align:middle line:84%
This poem is called
"My Mother's Milkman."

00:00:02.310 --> 00:00:05.900 align:middle line:90%


00:00:05.900 --> 00:00:07.340 align:middle line:84%
These poems that
I've been reading

00:00:07.340 --> 00:00:10.300 align:middle line:84%
are all part of a
new collection called

00:00:10.300 --> 00:00:13.070 align:middle line:84%
The Cap of Darkness,
which Black Sparrow will

00:00:13.070 --> 00:00:14.960 align:middle line:90%
publish in February.

00:00:14.960 --> 00:00:18.860 align:middle line:84%
And many of them
either use memory

00:00:18.860 --> 00:00:24.350 align:middle line:84%
or are responding
to memory and trying

00:00:24.350 --> 00:00:26.840 align:middle line:84%
to understand the
function of memory

00:00:26.840 --> 00:00:29.180 align:middle line:84%
as a way of thinking
about things.

00:00:29.180 --> 00:00:34.130 align:middle line:90%


00:00:34.130 --> 00:00:35.390 align:middle line:90%
"My Mother's Milkman"--

00:00:35.390 --> 00:00:38.430 align:middle line:90%


00:00:38.430 --> 00:00:43.500 align:middle line:84%
"Cloyce Hamilton, a slender,
tan man in white uniform,

00:00:43.500 --> 00:00:46.740 align:middle line:84%
with gold teeth,
the truck stopping

00:00:46.740 --> 00:00:50.670 align:middle line:84%
with foot-clack suddenness
on the gravel road,

00:00:50.670 --> 00:00:54.300 align:middle line:84%
the carrier holding four
glass bottles of whole milk

00:00:54.300 --> 00:00:58.920 align:middle line:84%
with their little paper
caps crimped over the tops.

00:00:58.920 --> 00:01:02.760 align:middle line:84%
my mother in her navy
blue wool bathrobe

00:01:02.760 --> 00:01:06.570 align:middle line:84%
standing by the blue and
white tile kitchen sink,

00:01:06.570 --> 00:01:10.530 align:middle line:84%
drinking her first
morning cup of coffee.

00:01:10.530 --> 00:01:15.690 align:middle line:84%
She opens the door for Cloyce,
and they stand talking.

00:01:15.690 --> 00:01:18.930 align:middle line:84%
For eight years,
three days a week,

00:01:18.930 --> 00:01:22.920 align:middle line:84%
the Pellissier Dairy truck
stops with its standing milkman

00:01:22.920 --> 00:01:29.130 align:middle line:84%
driver, Cloyce Hamilton, dressed
in white, his tan, long wrists

00:01:29.130 --> 00:01:33.960 align:middle line:84%
and hands emerging from white,
starched sleeves, my mother's

00:01:33.960 --> 00:01:36.480 align:middle line:90%
King of Spain.

00:01:36.480 --> 00:01:39.030 align:middle line:84%
Sometimes, my mother
ironing in the kitchen

00:01:39.030 --> 00:01:43.470 align:middle line:84%
or just drinking her coffee,
waiting to exchange a few words

00:01:43.470 --> 00:01:46.290 align:middle line:84%
or to catch a glimpse
of Cloyce Hamilton,

00:01:46.290 --> 00:01:48.570 align:middle line:84%
or sometimes to give
him a cup of coffee

00:01:48.570 --> 00:01:51.150 align:middle line:84%
and listen to the
story of his life--

00:01:51.150 --> 00:01:54.690 align:middle line:84%
she loved to hear how a
man suffered, and longed

00:01:54.690 --> 00:01:58.080 align:middle line:90%
beyond his milkman's life.

00:01:58.080 --> 00:02:00.990 align:middle line:84%
My mother and sister and
I visited the Hamiltons

00:02:00.990 --> 00:02:02.520 align:middle line:90%
sometimes.

00:02:02.520 --> 00:02:07.050 align:middle line:84%
Their house was carpeted,
dark, and had a gold-framed oil

00:02:07.050 --> 00:02:11.670 align:middle line:84%
painting of a California
desert seen over the mantel.

00:02:11.670 --> 00:02:16.080 align:middle line:84%
Vera wore her dark hair
in a bun, was handsome.

00:02:16.080 --> 00:02:20.730 align:middle line:84%
Their house smelled like
mothballs, and I envied them.

00:02:20.730 --> 00:02:25.290 align:middle line:84%
They were the typical,
average American family--

00:02:25.290 --> 00:02:28.920 align:middle line:84%
handsome father who drove
his milk truck every day,

00:02:28.920 --> 00:02:32.310 align:middle line:84%
beautiful mother who had her
dining room table polished,

00:02:32.310 --> 00:02:36.510 align:middle line:84%
and a gold-framed oil
over the mantel, two plump

00:02:36.510 --> 00:02:43.800 align:middle line:84%
girls who wore, and how I envied
them, patent leather shoes.

00:02:43.800 --> 00:02:46.170 align:middle line:84%
In my early adolescence,
I remembered

00:02:46.170 --> 00:02:50.160 align:middle line:84%
long, murmured conversations
between my mother and Cloyce

00:02:50.160 --> 00:02:51.330 align:middle line:90%
Hamilton.

00:02:51.330 --> 00:02:53.370 align:middle line:84%
And then one day,
she said we were

00:02:53.370 --> 00:02:56.250 align:middle line:84%
going to visit Cloyce that
he was no longer living

00:02:56.250 --> 00:02:58.440 align:middle line:90%
with Vera and the girls.

00:02:58.440 --> 00:03:02.100 align:middle line:84%
We went to a tiny house
by the railroad tracks.

00:03:02.100 --> 00:03:07.320 align:middle line:84%
Inside was handsome Cloyce
and a big teenage boy.

00:03:07.320 --> 00:03:09.780 align:middle line:90%
I don't remember his name.

00:03:09.780 --> 00:03:12.870 align:middle line:84%
But Cloyce wanted to adopt
the boy, said my mother,

00:03:12.870 --> 00:03:14.460 align:middle line:90%
and bring him home.

00:03:14.460 --> 00:03:17.280 align:middle line:84%
And I gathered the whispered
conversations had been

00:03:17.280 --> 00:03:19.680 align:middle line:90%
about his struggle with Vera.

00:03:19.680 --> 00:03:21.720 align:middle line:84%
How my mother
loved to sympathize

00:03:21.720 --> 00:03:24.480 align:middle line:84%
with men about their
struggles with their wives,

00:03:24.480 --> 00:03:29.490 align:middle line:84%
my poor, sad, husband-less
mother, the closest

00:03:29.490 --> 00:03:32.430 align:middle line:84%
she ever came to
seduction in her life,

00:03:32.430 --> 00:03:36.990 align:middle line:84%
listening to the whispers
of angry and frustrated men

00:03:36.990 --> 00:03:41.250 align:middle line:84%
about their own
sad, faithful wives.

00:03:41.250 --> 00:03:43.890 align:middle line:84%
Cloyce finally left
his wife and daughters

00:03:43.890 --> 00:03:48.270 align:middle line:84%
to live with this
tough homeless boy.

00:03:48.270 --> 00:03:51.430 align:middle line:84%
None of it quite
made sense to me.

00:03:51.430 --> 00:03:53.910 align:middle line:84%
I questioned and
questioned my mother,

00:03:53.910 --> 00:03:57.450 align:middle line:84%
who was a scorpion-like
listener with her secrets,

00:03:57.450 --> 00:04:02.100 align:middle line:84%
dark pools in which
undetermined creatures swam.

00:04:02.100 --> 00:04:05.580 align:middle line:84%
Now, in retrospect, the
story of my mother's milkman

00:04:05.580 --> 00:04:13.890 align:middle line:84%
still seems veiled and sad,
she, such a lonely woman,

00:04:13.890 --> 00:04:17.610 align:middle line:84%
getting up each morning for
her handsome milkman, who

00:04:17.610 --> 00:04:20.130 align:middle line:84%
lived the family
life she yearned for,

00:04:20.130 --> 00:04:24.570 align:middle line:84%
and he, tortured,
bent soul, wanting

00:04:24.570 --> 00:04:27.780 align:middle line:90%
the love of a young boy.

00:04:27.780 --> 00:04:31.440 align:middle line:84%
What I remember
often is this scene--

00:04:31.440 --> 00:04:35.670 align:middle line:84%
the Hamiltons' dark house,
the gold-framed painting

00:04:35.670 --> 00:04:38.370 align:middle line:84%
of the California desert
glowing in the room

00:04:38.370 --> 00:04:40.710 align:middle line:84%
across from the
polished dining room

00:04:40.710 --> 00:04:45.570 align:middle line:84%
table, the smell of
mothballs, the dark Vera,

00:04:45.570 --> 00:04:49.440 align:middle line:84%
like a Spanish lady, and
the smell of darkness

00:04:49.440 --> 00:04:53.760 align:middle line:84%
in the house, my mother
believing to the end

00:04:53.760 --> 00:04:57.600 align:middle line:84%
that Cloyce only wanted
a son, never admitting

00:04:57.600 --> 00:05:00.810 align:middle line:84%
her handsome milkman,
King of Spain,

00:05:00.810 --> 00:05:05.670 align:middle line:84%
loved boys after all
those years of waiting

00:05:05.670 --> 00:05:09.570 align:middle line:84%
in the kitchen at dawn
for the thick milk which

00:05:09.570 --> 00:05:16.530 align:middle line:84%
she put in her German coffee,
drinking 14 cups a day,

00:05:16.530 --> 00:05:21.270 align:middle line:84%
relieving the black caffeine
bitterness with cream

00:05:21.270 --> 00:05:25.100 align:middle line:84%
from California's
Pellissier Dairy."

00:05:25.100 --> 00:05:34.000 align:middle line:90%