This poem is called "Giving Myself Up."
Now I think before I read that, I'll
read another poem, which has a little story behind it,
a poem called "Letter."
I have a friend in New York, where I live most of the time,
and we're in the habit of having lunch at the Eighth Street Deli
maybe once, sometimes twice a week.
Once, when I was about to have lunch with him,
he saw a pen in my pocket and he said, where'd you get that pen?
And I answered in a rather fanciful way,
as I'm apt to do sometimes.
I said, well, I was walking over here,
and I saw a bunch of men running across a field,
and all of a sudden, the pens started
flying from their pockets.
And I stooped down and picked one up,
and that's how I got this.
And he said-- well, he really was
going to accuse me of stealing his pen,
but he said, gee, you ought to write a poem about that.
So I said that I would, and if I really did,
I'd dedicate it to him.
If you buy my book, you can find out
who I dedicated the poem to.
[LAUGHTER]
It's banned in Arizona.
"Letter."
Men are running across a field.
Pens fall from their pockets.
People out walking will pick them up.
It is one of the ways letters are written.
How things fall to others, the self no longer belonging to me,
but asleep in a stranger's shadow,
now clothing the stranger, now leading him off.
It is noon as I write to you.
Someone's life has come into my hands.
The sun whitens the buildings.
It is all I have.
I give it all to you, yours.
The real reason I wrote that poem, I think, is I
wanted to write a sentence that wasn't a sentence.
And there's a glaring example of that right
in the middle of this poem.