WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:02.280 align:middle line:84% This poem is called "The Magellanic Clouds." 00:00:02.280 --> 00:00:06.640 align:middle line:90% 00:00:06.640 --> 00:00:11.230 align:middle line:84% Magellanic Clouds are the kind of cloudy formation 00:00:11.230 --> 00:00:15.790 align:middle line:84% in the sky can only be seen in the southern hemisphere 00:00:15.790 --> 00:00:19.590 align:middle line:84% and probably represent another galaxy. 00:00:19.590 --> 00:00:21.780 align:middle line:84% They're very beautiful in photographs, 00:00:21.780 --> 00:00:24.110 align:middle line:84% I've never seen anything like them. 00:00:24.110 --> 00:00:25.930 align:middle line:90% It was Magellan who named them. 00:00:25.930 --> 00:00:30.430 align:middle line:90% 00:00:30.430 --> 00:00:32.650 align:middle line:84% "The Magellanic Clouds," for Eleanor who 00:00:32.650 --> 00:00:36.630 align:middle line:90% liked to see her name in print. 00:00:36.630 --> 00:00:39.420 align:middle line:84% The photographic plate is blurred. 00:00:39.420 --> 00:00:42.600 align:middle line:84% That blurry area is where you laughed and breathed 00:00:42.600 --> 00:00:44.370 align:middle line:90% on the plate. 00:00:44.370 --> 00:00:48.360 align:middle line:84% Lizard skinned prickly pears roll out of your mouth. 00:00:48.360 --> 00:00:52.530 align:middle line:84% A purple bird twists your tongue with his beak and crazy cactus 00:00:52.530 --> 00:00:56.460 align:middle line:84% leaves of love pin you luckily to one man. 00:00:56.460 --> 00:00:58.650 align:middle line:84% You have a mouthful of stars when you laugh, 00:00:58.650 --> 00:01:01.770 align:middle line:84% when you fall over the Milky Way at your feet. 00:01:01.770 --> 00:01:04.680 align:middle line:84% Next door the Magellanic Clouds swirl 00:01:04.680 --> 00:01:07.920 align:middle line:84% and try to force themselves into your painting. 00:01:07.920 --> 00:01:11.640 align:middle line:84% But you are too happy painting little hearts and big hearts 00:01:11.640 --> 00:01:13.860 align:middle line:84% and sticking them all over your husband who 00:01:13.860 --> 00:01:17.910 align:middle line:84% is a river washing silver fish over you in the dark. 00:01:17.910 --> 00:01:19.380 align:middle line:90% Look carefully. 00:01:19.380 --> 00:01:22.980 align:middle line:84% My screen makes a silver line on the graph. 00:01:22.980 --> 00:01:25.560 align:middle line:84% The photographic plate is blurred. 00:01:25.560 --> 00:01:28.200 align:middle line:84% That blurry areas is the Magellanic Clouds 00:01:28.200 --> 00:01:30.510 align:middle line:90% from another galaxy. 00:01:30.510 --> 00:01:34.740 align:middle line:84% Inside me swirl something like the Magellanic Clouds. 00:01:34.740 --> 00:01:38.700 align:middle line:84% All the animals I ride are found in the Magellanic Clouds. 00:01:38.700 --> 00:01:43.380 align:middle line:84% My life is destined to be a cloud, galaxies, light years, 00:01:43.380 --> 00:01:44.670 align:middle line:90% removed. 00:01:44.670 --> 00:01:46.740 align:middle line:90% The dust storm on the desert. 00:01:46.740 --> 00:01:48.540 align:middle line:90% The fog over the river. 00:01:48.540 --> 00:01:51.930 align:middle line:84% A handful of dust with tiny shell fragments. 00:01:51.930 --> 00:01:55.910 align:middle line:90% A gold outline against the sky. 00:01:55.910 --> 00:02:01.250 align:middle line:84% How can I explain it to you and all the succulent women I know. 00:02:01.250 --> 00:02:04.160 align:middle line:84% Wives, mothers, loved, protected, 00:02:04.160 --> 00:02:07.280 align:middle line:84% by men they love, having the shoulder to curl 00:02:07.280 --> 00:02:09.500 align:middle line:90% their heads into at night. 00:02:09.500 --> 00:02:14.015 align:middle line:84% How can I explain to myself this dust cloud that is my life? 00:02:14.015 --> 00:02:18.290 align:middle line:84% I talk in my sleep, just as I talk when I'm awake. 00:02:18.290 --> 00:02:21.710 align:middle line:84% No one listens to me but strangers. 00:02:21.710 --> 00:02:25.040 align:middle line:84% Once a blue vein of electricity came to me in the Magellanic 00:02:25.040 --> 00:02:30.510 align:middle line:84% Clouds and said, there is a price on everyone's life. 00:02:30.510 --> 00:02:33.170 align:middle line:84% Uncurling my ears like new leaves, 00:02:33.170 --> 00:02:38.390 align:middle line:84% I looked at my world, my scarred body, my missing children, 00:02:38.390 --> 00:02:42.500 align:middle line:84% separation from the men who spoke my language. 00:02:42.500 --> 00:02:46.940 align:middle line:84% The prices to walk alone up the stairs, alone every night 00:02:46.940 --> 00:02:52.400 align:middle line:84% with your candle, and alone down the stairs alone every morning 00:02:52.400 --> 00:02:55.850 align:middle line:84% with white footsteps and teacups with tears. 00:02:55.850 --> 00:02:58.100 align:middle line:84% In your day dreams, you must carry the bodies 00:02:58.100 --> 00:03:00.860 align:middle line:84% of your children wrapped in white and strapped 00:03:00.860 --> 00:03:02.600 align:middle line:90% to stiff boards. 00:03:02.600 --> 00:03:05.600 align:middle line:84% People will chase you and accuse you of murder. 00:03:05.600 --> 00:03:07.460 align:middle line:84% The children will sing in your ears 00:03:07.460 --> 00:03:11.000 align:middle line:84% and cut you with the sharp corners of their smile. 00:03:11.000 --> 00:03:13.910 align:middle line:84% Your songs will be bled out of you every day, 00:03:13.910 --> 00:03:17.910 align:middle line:84% as you are cut with different tools, razor blades, knives, 00:03:17.910 --> 00:03:21.890 align:middle line:90% scissors, grass, paper, glass. 00:03:21.890 --> 00:03:24.170 align:middle line:84% One day the words will come out of your elbows 00:03:24.170 --> 00:03:26.570 align:middle line:90% and one day out of your knees. 00:03:26.570 --> 00:03:29.960 align:middle line:84% Scars and holes and craters will cover you. 00:03:29.960 --> 00:03:33.230 align:middle line:84% When people look at you they will run away but words, 00:03:33.230 --> 00:03:35.180 align:middle line:84% the words you've bought will creep out 00:03:35.180 --> 00:03:39.470 align:middle line:84% of holes like beautiful skeins of thread. 00:03:39.470 --> 00:03:43.190 align:middle line:84% Some day I will vanish in the Magellanic Clouds 00:03:43.190 --> 00:03:47.120 align:middle line:84% but will wait waiting rooms to get inside of paintings. 00:03:47.120 --> 00:03:50.690 align:middle line:84% Even the electricity, the fire tells me 00:03:50.690 --> 00:03:54.770 align:middle line:84% I will not have to spend all my time in the sky. 00:03:54.770 --> 00:03:57.020 align:middle line:84% Someday it will be my breath blurring 00:03:57.020 --> 00:03:59.780 align:middle line:84% the photographic plates and the astronomers 00:03:59.780 --> 00:04:03.260 align:middle line:84% will say, see that cloudy spot on the the plate? 00:04:03.260 --> 00:04:05.690 align:middle line:84% We once thought it was the Magellanic Clouds, 00:04:05.690 --> 00:04:08.600 align:middle line:84% but they have moved farther out into space. 00:04:08.600 --> 00:04:11.210 align:middle line:84% It is something new, another enormous cloud 00:04:11.210 --> 00:04:14.840 align:middle line:84% made up of strange gases and foreign particles. 00:04:14.840 --> 00:04:18.890 align:middle line:84% It is something new, and we have no name for it yet, 00:04:18.890 --> 00:04:21.560 align:middle line:84% and I will breathe harder, will blow harder, 00:04:21.560 --> 00:04:23.960 align:middle line:84% will blur more and more of the plate, 00:04:23.960 --> 00:04:27.740 align:middle line:84% will pass through rooms and rooms and rooms of memories 00:04:27.740 --> 00:04:32.600 align:middle line:84% in the shape of apples, birds iron wheels. 00:04:32.600 --> 00:04:36.150 align:middle line:84% The clouds, the clouds, the Magellanic Clouds, 00:04:36.150 --> 00:04:39.140 align:middle line:84% the clouds in my heart, the clouds I ride on, 00:04:39.140 --> 00:04:42.650 align:middle line:84% the clouds under my bed, the clouds of my life, 00:04:42.650 --> 00:04:47.690 align:middle line:84% the clouds always in the next room seeping under the door. 00:04:47.690 --> 00:04:51.140 align:middle line:84% I am a cloud, dust on the desert, 00:04:51.140 --> 00:04:55.600 align:middle line:84% fog over the water, gases in the sky. 00:04:55.600 --> 00:05:00.610 align:middle line:84% Can there be any sadness, once I am named? 00:05:00.610 --> 00:05:04.000 align:middle line:90%