God, what an introduction.
I don't think I've ever had any introduction like that.
I'm afraid to read.
What can I--
God, can we just hear that again?
[LAUGHTER]
I'll get a copy, I hope.
God, that's very beautiful.
And Cybele well, thank you.
Thank Gail and everyone here.
I'm having a--
I left New York in a northeaster, where
the guy driving me was so afraid that because of the rain,
he pulled off the side of the road.
And I wondered if we would make our--
I would get to my plane and make it here.
And then, well, it's all been well, well worth it.
I'm going to read from the selected poems.
And I'll read a few early poems.
It's so funny to read early poems.
And then, I find myself, it's like, the reverse
of the portrait of Dorian Gray.
I mean, I feel myself aging and the portrait is just fine,
thank you.
[LAUGHTER]
The poems seem to be doing OK.
They don't seem-- like not a wrinkle.
And I highly resent that, actually.
From my first book back, which was written in, I guess,
in my 20s, "San Francisco Remembered."
In summer, the polleny light bounces off
the white buildings, and you can see their spines, and nerves,
and where the joints knot.
You've never seen such polleny light.
The whole city shining, and the women wearing dresses so thin,
you see their wing-tipped hips, and their tall silvery legs
alone can knock your eye out.
But this isn't about women.
It's about the city of blue waters and fog so thick,
it wraps around your legs, and leaves glistening trails
along the dark winding streets.
Once I followed such a trail and wound up
beside this redheaded woman who looked up and smiled.
And let me tell you, you don't see smiles
like that in Jersey City.
I was a young man when I wrote this.
She was wearing a black raincoat with 200 pockets
and I wanted to put my hands in each one.
But forget about her.
I was talking about the fog, which steps up
and taps your shoulder like a panhandler who wants bus fare
to a joint called The Paradise.
And where else could this happen?
On Sundays, Golden Gate Park is filled
with young girls strolling the transplanted palms and imported
rhododendron beds.
You should see the sunset in their eyes,
and the sway, the proud sway of their young shoulders.
Believe me, it takes a day or two to recover.
Or the trolleys clanking down the steep hills-
while you see legs flashing like mirrors.
Please, Lord, please let me talk about San Francisco.
How that gorilla of a bridge twists in the ocean wind,
and the Earth turns under your feet, and at any moment,
the whole works can crack and slip back
into the sea like a giant being kicked off his raft.
And now, if it's all right, I would like to talk about women.
[LAUGHTER]
I try for a couple of years to write
a poem about San Francisco.
And every time I did this, other elements got in there.
And finally, I decided to let the poem be about the conflict.