WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:02.940 align:middle line:84% I think I'll read some new poems before my voice goes 00:00:02.940 --> 00:00:03.651 align:middle line:90% completely. 00:00:03.651 --> 00:00:04.151 align:middle line:90% Right. 00:00:04.151 --> 00:00:11.530 align:middle line:90% 00:00:11.530 --> 00:00:15.940 align:middle line:84% "I think I came close to being insane a few months ago. 00:00:15.940 --> 00:00:19.390 align:middle line:84% It didn't happen the way I thought it would at all. 00:00:19.390 --> 00:00:22.420 align:middle line:84% It wasn't from love, or from some horrible perversity 00:00:22.420 --> 00:00:26.240 align:middle line:84% suddenly rising in me or from politics. 00:00:26.240 --> 00:00:27.700 align:middle line:90% It was just in a butcher shop. 00:00:27.700 --> 00:00:31.180 align:middle line:84% I was waiting in line in and one of the butchers 00:00:31.180 --> 00:00:32.680 align:middle line:90% was trimming a leg of lamb. 00:00:32.680 --> 00:00:34.870 align:middle line:84% And I was leaning on top of the counter, 00:00:34.870 --> 00:00:37.390 align:middle line:84% not thinking about anything in particular. 00:00:37.390 --> 00:00:40.090 align:middle line:84% Keeping one eye on my daughter, who was playing around 00:00:40.090 --> 00:00:41.470 align:middle line:90% with a shopping cart. 00:00:41.470 --> 00:00:43.360 align:middle line:84% Watching how the butcher was carefully 00:00:43.360 --> 00:00:46.030 align:middle line:90% paring slices of gristle off. 00:00:46.030 --> 00:00:49.070 align:middle line:84% And all of a sudden, I felt frightened. 00:00:49.070 --> 00:00:51.860 align:middle line:84% It's hard to explain, but it was as 00:00:51.860 --> 00:00:53.930 align:middle line:84% though the light that was in the room we were in 00:00:53.930 --> 00:00:55.220 align:middle line:90% didn't quite fit right. 00:00:55.220 --> 00:00:57.740 align:middle line:84% As though the space was going to tilt, 00:00:57.740 --> 00:00:59.690 align:middle line:84% and the light was going to pour out of it 00:00:59.690 --> 00:01:02.540 align:middle line:90% into the street like water. 00:01:02.540 --> 00:01:05.630 align:middle line:84% Whatever it was, I looked away fast at Jessie, 00:01:05.630 --> 00:01:08.720 align:middle line:84% bumping her cart into the sides of the meat cases 00:01:08.720 --> 00:01:09.735 align:middle line:90% and it stopped. 00:01:09.735 --> 00:01:11.360 align:middle line:84% But when I looked at the butcher again, 00:01:11.360 --> 00:01:13.950 align:middle line:84% it happened again even more strongly. 00:01:13.950 --> 00:01:16.220 align:middle line:84% I felt everything slipping as though we were all 00:01:16.220 --> 00:01:18.380 align:middle line:84% balanced on the very tip of a mountain, 00:01:18.380 --> 00:01:21.650 align:middle line:84% and something had moved and we were going to all fall. 00:01:21.650 --> 00:01:23.402 align:middle line:90% I looked at the meat. 00:01:23.402 --> 00:01:24.860 align:middle line:84% If I could have thought of some way 00:01:24.860 --> 00:01:27.200 align:middle line:84% that it represented pain or death to me, 00:01:27.200 --> 00:01:29.930 align:middle line:84% I'd have felt better, but it was just meat. 00:01:29.930 --> 00:01:32.810 align:middle line:84% And the butcher, he was old, heavy, 00:01:32.810 --> 00:01:36.230 align:middle line:84% with a large head that came out of his chest at a peculiar 00:01:36.230 --> 00:01:38.900 align:middle line:90% angle, like a horse's. 00:01:38.900 --> 00:01:41.270 align:middle line:90% He was very methodical. 00:01:41.270 --> 00:01:44.210 align:middle line:84% I held Jessie's hand, closed my eyes. 00:01:44.210 --> 00:01:46.460 align:middle line:84% Opened them again, and looked back at him again 00:01:46.460 --> 00:01:48.680 align:middle line:84% and this time I was really afraid. 00:01:48.680 --> 00:01:51.380 align:middle line:84% It was still going on, even worse. 00:01:51.380 --> 00:01:53.780 align:middle line:84% I tried to do something with my mind. 00:01:53.780 --> 00:01:55.880 align:middle line:84% I tried to remember what had happened today, 00:01:55.880 --> 00:01:57.650 align:middle line:90% that could have caused this. 00:01:57.650 --> 00:02:00.390 align:middle line:84% I tried to make believe I was in love with the butcher, 00:02:00.390 --> 00:02:01.550 align:middle line:90% or that he was my father. 00:02:01.550 --> 00:02:04.100 align:middle line:84% That he was going to turn and come at us with his knife, 00:02:04.100 --> 00:02:07.940 align:middle line:84% to cut my eyes out, but nothing worked. 00:02:07.940 --> 00:02:10.410 align:middle line:84% All there was, was the feeling that the whole reality 00:02:10.410 --> 00:02:13.610 align:middle line:84% we were in was going to wink out of existence. 00:02:13.610 --> 00:02:15.980 align:middle line:84% As though somehow the limits of this dimension 00:02:15.980 --> 00:02:18.350 align:middle line:84% had been reached, and it was going to switch off 00:02:18.350 --> 00:02:21.680 align:middle line:90% like a channel changing. 00:02:21.680 --> 00:02:23.960 align:middle line:90% I left and went home. 00:02:23.960 --> 00:02:26.690 align:middle line:84% I've been back, but it's funny that butcher never 00:02:26.690 --> 00:02:30.560 align:middle line:84% was there again and all this never happened to me again. 00:02:30.560 --> 00:02:31.760 align:middle line:90% I've thought about it. 00:02:31.760 --> 00:02:33.560 align:middle line:90% Was I sick? 00:02:33.560 --> 00:02:35.810 align:middle line:90% No, I felt fine otherwise. 00:02:35.810 --> 00:02:38.150 align:middle line:90% Something to do with God? 00:02:38.150 --> 00:02:41.360 align:middle line:90% I don't think so. 00:02:41.360 --> 00:02:43.730 align:middle line:90% What about that butcher? 00:02:43.730 --> 00:02:48.650 align:middle line:84% What if everybody who looked at him felt the same thing? 00:02:48.650 --> 00:02:51.940 align:middle line:84% Here's a story that doesn't have anything to do with all this, 00:02:51.940 --> 00:02:54.070 align:middle line:90% it's by Isaac Babel. 00:02:54.070 --> 00:02:56.290 align:middle line:84% There is a young soldier, a farmer. 00:02:56.290 --> 00:02:57.670 align:middle line:90% He can't go on anymore. 00:02:57.670 --> 00:02:58.870 align:middle line:90% He's too afraid. 00:02:58.870 --> 00:03:00.760 align:middle line:84% He gets into a trench and trench, 00:03:00.760 --> 00:03:02.320 align:middle line:90% and starts masturbating. 00:03:02.320 --> 00:03:05.260 align:middle line:84% And even when his captain screams at him to get up, 00:03:05.260 --> 00:03:07.280 align:middle line:84% he sits there saying, I can't help it. 00:03:07.280 --> 00:03:09.190 align:middle line:90% I can't help it. 00:03:09.190 --> 00:03:12.340 align:middle line:84% Finally, the captain pisses into his face and he jumps up 00:03:12.340 --> 00:03:17.800 align:middle line:84% and bolts, crying for the front, killed before he gets halfway. 00:03:17.800 --> 00:03:20.650 align:middle line:90% Things like that happen too. 00:03:20.650 --> 00:03:24.760 align:middle line:84% Things like putting a sign on your door, go away. 00:03:24.760 --> 00:03:27.040 align:middle line:84% Things like standing in the middle of the street, 00:03:27.040 --> 00:03:30.250 align:middle line:90% screaming at nothing. 00:03:30.250 --> 00:03:33.670 align:middle line:84% Isaac Babel also said, no steel can 00:03:33.670 --> 00:03:35.950 align:middle line:84% pierce the human heart so chillingly 00:03:35.950 --> 00:03:39.100 align:middle line:90% as a period at the right moment. 00:03:39.100 --> 00:03:44.290 align:middle line:84% Things like screams that have no sound and no ending, 00:03:44.290 --> 00:03:48.690 align:middle line:84% that you just stumble through like an odor." 00:03:48.690 --> 00:04:00.066 align:middle line:90%