WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:00.570 align:middle line:90% 00:00:00.570 --> 00:00:03.550 align:middle line:84% This is my newest book, it just came out last month. 00:00:03.550 --> 00:00:08.080 align:middle line:84% It's called They-- it's got an ungrammatical title, 00:00:08.080 --> 00:00:10.050 align:middle line:90% it's called They Feed They Lion. 00:00:10.050 --> 00:00:14.220 align:middle line:84% I'll read the title poem in a minute, 00:00:14.220 --> 00:00:17.970 align:middle line:84% and perhaps make some sense out of the title. 00:00:17.970 --> 00:00:24.460 align:middle line:90% 00:00:24.460 --> 00:00:26.470 align:middle line:84% It's got a lot of poems about living in Detroit, 00:00:26.470 --> 00:00:29.530 align:middle line:84% and growing up there and coming of age, 00:00:29.530 --> 00:00:33.190 align:middle line:84% and I'd like to read one first called 00:00:33.190 --> 00:00:36.280 align:middle line:84% "Saturday Sweeping," which is a poem about the worst 00:00:36.280 --> 00:00:38.620 align:middle line:90% time in my life. 00:00:38.620 --> 00:00:41.260 align:middle line:84% When I lived in Detroit during the Korean War, 00:00:41.260 --> 00:00:44.140 align:middle line:84% I think that was probably the worst time of anybody's life 00:00:44.140 --> 00:00:45.610 align:middle line:90% who was alive then. 00:00:45.610 --> 00:00:49.550 align:middle line:90% 00:00:49.550 --> 00:00:53.160 align:middle line:84% I felt enormously alone and isolated, 00:00:53.160 --> 00:00:58.500 align:middle line:84% and I was trying to be a poet and I 00:00:58.500 --> 00:01:02.770 align:middle line:90% had very little encouragement. 00:01:02.770 --> 00:01:05.140 align:middle line:84% And I didn't go to the war, I didn't choose to, 00:01:05.140 --> 00:01:08.290 align:middle line:90% and I felt a little bit-- 00:01:08.290 --> 00:01:11.230 align:middle line:84% the way your culture makes you feel whenever 00:01:11.230 --> 00:01:15.125 align:middle line:84% you do something decent in America, 00:01:15.125 --> 00:01:16.750 align:middle line:84% you feel like a real shit and a coward. 00:01:16.750 --> 00:01:20.740 align:middle line:90% 00:01:20.740 --> 00:01:24.010 align:middle line:84% You know, like Huck Finn when he takes Jim 00:01:24.010 --> 00:01:32.020 align:middle line:84% across to the free territories, it feels like a betrayer. 00:01:32.020 --> 00:01:34.430 align:middle line:84% Well, I didn't do anything that difficult or brave. 00:01:34.430 --> 00:01:37.973 align:middle line:90% 00:01:37.973 --> 00:01:39.390 align:middle line:84% And it's a thing that young people 00:01:39.390 --> 00:01:42.300 align:middle line:90% do today, young men do today. 00:01:42.300 --> 00:01:44.970 align:middle line:84% I think with a lot more ease and a lot more 00:01:44.970 --> 00:01:48.593 align:middle line:84% intelligence and understanding, and they 00:01:48.593 --> 00:01:50.010 align:middle line:84% give each other a lot more support 00:01:50.010 --> 00:01:52.230 align:middle line:90% than we gave each other then. 00:01:52.230 --> 00:01:59.193 align:middle line:90% We were all so isolated. 00:01:59.193 --> 00:02:01.110 align:middle line:84% It's called "Saturday Sweeping," and it's just 00:02:01.110 --> 00:02:04.643 align:middle line:90% about living alone at that time. 00:02:04.643 --> 00:02:06.060 align:middle line:84% It was written much later, though. 00:02:06.060 --> 00:02:09.150 align:middle line:84% It was written just after the riots in Detroit, 00:02:09.150 --> 00:02:12.900 align:middle line:90% the more recent ones of '67. 00:02:12.900 --> 00:02:14.040 align:middle line:90% It was written in '67. 00:02:14.040 --> 00:02:17.260 align:middle line:90% 00:02:17.260 --> 00:02:18.760 align:middle line:90% And I sort of look forward-- 00:02:18.760 --> 00:02:21.310 align:middle line:84% I'm sitting there in 1967 and looking back 00:02:21.310 --> 00:02:24.895 align:middle line:84% and seeing what's happened, but it's mainly about then. 00:02:24.895 --> 00:02:28.860 align:middle line:90% 00:02:28.860 --> 00:02:34.170 align:middle line:84% "Saturday sweeping with an old broom counting the strokes 00:02:34.170 --> 00:02:35.205 align:middle line:90% back and forth. 00:02:35.205 --> 00:02:37.860 align:middle line:90% 00:02:37.860 --> 00:02:42.690 align:middle line:84% The dust sprays up silver in the February sun 00:02:42.690 --> 00:02:46.290 align:middle line:90% and comes down gray. 00:02:46.290 --> 00:02:50.610 align:middle line:84% Soft straw muzzle poking in, bringing out 00:02:50.610 --> 00:02:56.880 align:middle line:84% scraps of news, little fingers and signatures. 00:02:56.880 --> 00:03:01.140 align:middle line:84% Everybody's had this room one time or another 00:03:01.140 --> 00:03:04.500 align:middle line:90% and never thought to sweep. 00:03:04.500 --> 00:03:10.260 align:middle line:84% Outside the snows stiffen, the roofs loosen their last teeth 00:03:10.260 --> 00:03:12.900 align:middle line:90% into the streets. 00:03:12.900 --> 00:03:19.710 align:middle line:84% Outside it's 1952, Detroit, unburned, 00:03:19.710 --> 00:03:24.390 align:middle line:84% stumbles away from my window over the drained roofs 00:03:24.390 --> 00:03:26.970 align:middle line:84% toward the river to scold its useless hands. 00:03:26.970 --> 00:03:29.610 align:middle line:90% 00:03:29.610 --> 00:03:31.800 align:middle line:84% Half the men in this town are crying 00:03:31.800 --> 00:03:36.690 align:middle line:84% in the snow, their eyes blackened 00:03:36.690 --> 00:03:38.130 align:middle line:90% like Chinese soldiers. 00:03:38.130 --> 00:03:41.250 align:middle line:90% 00:03:41.250 --> 00:03:46.590 align:middle line:84% The gates are closing at Dodge Main and Wyandotte Chemical; 00:03:46.590 --> 00:03:51.480 align:middle line:84% they must go home to watch the kids scrub their brown faces 00:03:51.480 --> 00:03:53.670 align:middle line:84% or grease cartridges for the showdown. 00:03:53.670 --> 00:03:57.240 align:middle line:90% 00:03:57.240 --> 00:04:02.010 align:middle line:84% If anyone knocks on your door he will 00:04:02.010 --> 00:04:04.710 align:middle line:90% be oil flecked or seaborne. 00:04:04.710 --> 00:04:08.280 align:middle line:84% He'll be bringing word from the people of the ice drifts, 00:04:08.280 --> 00:04:11.490 align:middle line:84% or the great talking dogs that save the Jews. 00:04:11.490 --> 00:04:14.370 align:middle line:90% 00:04:14.370 --> 00:04:18.480 align:middle line:84% Meanwhile our masters will come on television 00:04:18.480 --> 00:04:19.785 align:middle line:90% to ask for our help. 00:04:19.785 --> 00:04:22.290 align:middle line:90% 00:04:22.290 --> 00:04:32.430 align:middle line:84% Here, the radiator's working, stove says don't touch, 00:04:32.430 --> 00:04:38.220 align:middle line:84% and the radio's crying, I don't get enough. 00:04:38.220 --> 00:04:44.010 align:middle line:84% I'm my keeper, the only thing I've got, 00:04:44.010 --> 00:04:49.830 align:middle line:84% sweeping out my one-room life while the sun's still up." 00:04:49.830 --> 00:04:57.540 align:middle line:90% 00:04:57.540 --> 00:04:59.520 align:middle line:84% Last time I read that poem, I remember 00:04:59.520 --> 00:05:02.370 align:middle line:90% a woman asked me what-- 00:05:02.370 --> 00:05:04.860 align:middle line:84% who were the great talking dogs that saved the Jews? 00:05:04.860 --> 00:05:08.490 align:middle line:84% I realized it was immensely obscure. 00:05:08.490 --> 00:05:12.180 align:middle line:84% When I was a little boy my grandfather told 00:05:12.180 --> 00:05:18.120 align:middle line:84% me folk tales of dogs, they were about dogs 00:05:18.120 --> 00:05:27.420 align:middle line:84% that would come to the ghettos in imperialist Russia 00:05:27.420 --> 00:05:30.330 align:middle line:84% and warn the Jews that the Kazakhs were coming, 00:05:30.330 --> 00:05:31.980 align:middle line:84% or some hostile force to kill them. 00:05:31.980 --> 00:05:34.425 align:middle line:84% Never people would come, only animals. 00:05:34.425 --> 00:05:37.610 align:middle line:90% 00:05:37.610 --> 00:05:43.460 align:middle line:84% And I thought later on what a wonderful irony there was.