I'm going to read a series of poems
from the manuscript I'm working on.
More or less, I can read the middle section.
I have maybe 23 poems in manuscript,
and I've been reading about a third of that--
third of it, just stop almost when it's read.
The manuscript still doesn't have a name,
but it's had several along the way.
At one point, I'm kind of obsessed
with the color blue [PHONE RINGS] I'll get it.
[LAUGHTER]
Vibrate setting.
I was obsessed with the color blue,
and I was also obsessed with the idea of erasing part.
So I thought I would call it B-L-U-E,
but then the U would be erased.
So it would be called "Ble," which is also
the French word for wheat, which I'm also
interested in as it happens.
[LAUGHTER]
But not a very good title for a book, so I ditched that one.
And I thought I would call it at that point, "Gloire".
G-L-O-I-R-E. This is actually an important concept for me.
It's just, it's the French word for glory.
And I've been looking-- while I was writing, especially
the section that I'm going to read this evening,
I wrote a lot of it in Paris.
I had been going to museums a lot and looking at Renaissance
and pre-Renaissance paintings--
almost entirely religious paintings--
and the glory of God or statue of the Christ or the Virgin
is always represented.
It's like it's always called gloire,
so it's like you know Jesus rising
into gloire, or like the gloire of the Virgin.
And it's always represented this with gold leaf,
you know they lay gold leaf on the painting
like a motherfucker, and that's just
to let you know that the spirit of the Lord is there
and that it's very important and valuable.
And in fact-- I mean, I find this deeply--
if I was a cynical person I would think that was stupid.
But I'm not.
I mean, I find it deeply moving.
I am amazed by painters and jealous of the--
what some in teaching would call an indexical relationship.
It's like it's really clear to them.
Gold leaf, glory of God, bang.
[LAUGHTER]
And you recognized the system.
It works.
You see it.
And you're like [PUTS HANDS IN AIR]
it's quite astonishing I think, and I'm really
moved by the paintings.
So Gloire is--
I mean, the paintings come up a lot and gold paint comes up
a lot, museums come up a lot.
So it seemed like a good title but then, my friends,
explained to you that if you have a book titled in French,
that's pretentious.
[LAUGHTER]
I take their point.
So I abandoned Gloire, and I moved on to --
I was looking around for cover art,
and I was really fascinated by this sort of drawing/painting
by El Lissitzky from 1920 in the --
the brand new Soviet Republic.
I think it was a great painting.
I thought it would make a great piece of cover art
and easy to reproduce, and it's called Communications Workers,
Remember the Year.
And OK, that's a title for my book.
And I held on to that for several months
and I actually gave up on that.
It's being unwieldy.
So we're back down to the--
what I'm saying is I'm looking for suggestions.
But that's the history of the manuscript which currently
is back to being untitled.
And I'm now going to read some poems from.