WEBVTT

00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:01.320 align:middle line:90%


00:00:01.320 --> 00:00:06.150 align:middle line:84%
When Lucinda turned
40, we went to a haka

00:00:06.150 --> 00:00:11.220 align:middle line:84%
for a birthday celebration,
and this is a poem

00:00:11.220 --> 00:00:12.630 align:middle line:90%
that came out of that trip.

00:00:12.630 --> 00:00:20.390 align:middle line:84%
And I had fun messing
with the end words,

00:00:20.390 --> 00:00:21.680 align:middle line:90%
varying the end words.

00:00:21.680 --> 00:00:24.590 align:middle line:84%
Most of you know the
sestina has six end

00:00:24.590 --> 00:00:28.010 align:middle line:84%
words that repeat in a different
pattern in each stanza.

00:00:28.010 --> 00:00:31.280 align:middle line:84%
The six original words are
"house", "tourists", "cans",

00:00:31.280 --> 00:00:34.400 align:middle line:84%
"marigolds",
"bugs", and "range".

00:00:34.400 --> 00:00:39.830 align:middle line:90%
But they go a little postal.

00:00:39.830 --> 00:00:44.030 align:middle line:84%
And I should say, the guardian,
formal guardian, of this poem

00:00:44.030 --> 00:00:46.460 align:middle line:84%
is Elizabeth Bishop--
her beautiful "Sestina"

00:00:46.460 --> 00:00:49.580 align:middle line:84%
about the little girl in
the house in Nova Scotia.

00:00:49.580 --> 00:00:51.170 align:middle line:90%
"Sestina."

00:00:51.170 --> 00:00:54.410 align:middle line:84%
"March sunlight falls
on the weaver's house,

00:00:54.410 --> 00:00:58.820 align:middle line:84%
the glare too much for tourists
who rub their brows with Coke

00:00:58.820 --> 00:01:02.900 align:middle line:84%
cans while the merchant
explains marigolds

00:01:02.900 --> 00:01:07.010 align:middle line:84%
for yellow, acacia
seed for black, bugs

00:01:07.010 --> 00:01:11.870 align:middle line:84%
off a cactus, crushed to
make a range of colors--

00:01:11.870 --> 00:01:16.610 align:middle line:90%
purple, rose, gold, and orange.

00:01:16.610 --> 00:01:20.810 align:middle line:84%
We'd come to get away from
our houses, two artists barely

00:01:20.810 --> 00:01:25.220 align:middle line:84%
containing what bugs
us about domestic life,

00:01:25.220 --> 00:01:29.660 align:middle line:84%
feeling like tourists in
our own houses, the demands,

00:01:29.660 --> 00:01:33.650 align:middle line:84%
gold standard of stability,
but making us ask,

00:01:33.650 --> 00:01:35.960 align:middle line:90%
can we stick it out?

00:01:35.960 --> 00:01:39.680 align:middle line:84%
So we left for a week, canceled
the shopping and chores

00:01:39.680 --> 00:01:42.380 align:middle line:84%
to range around the
Valley of Oaxaca,

00:01:42.380 --> 00:01:45.410 align:middle line:90%
eat marigold flavored chicken--

00:01:45.410 --> 00:01:49.610 align:middle line:84%
the locals souse the birds
by feeding them flowers--

00:01:49.610 --> 00:01:52.880 align:middle line:84%
tourists savoring
the new, though we

00:01:52.880 --> 00:01:56.210 align:middle line:84%
drew the line at
bugs, giant bowls

00:01:56.210 --> 00:01:59.840 align:middle line:84%
of fresh-fried,
chili red chapulines

00:01:59.840 --> 00:02:02.630 align:middle line:90%
women taunted us to buy.

00:02:02.630 --> 00:02:06.410 align:middle line:84%
Can we just elbow our way
through the tourist throng,

00:02:06.410 --> 00:02:10.160 align:middle line:84%
we'd say with our
eyes, ranging glances

00:02:10.160 --> 00:02:14.030 align:middle line:84%
through the crowded
market for an exit plan.

00:02:14.030 --> 00:02:18.800 align:middle line:84%
House hungry, we retired
to Las Golondrinas,

00:02:18.800 --> 00:02:22.220 align:middle line:84%
where marigolds and
bougainvillea flavored

00:02:22.220 --> 00:02:24.150 align:middle line:90%
our sleep.

00:02:24.150 --> 00:02:28.950 align:middle line:84%
Gold can even be leeched
from onion skins, a bag

00:02:28.950 --> 00:02:30.690 align:middle line:90%
I saved and boiled--

00:02:30.690 --> 00:02:34.650 align:middle line:84%
yarn like copper--
in our Vermont house,

00:02:34.650 --> 00:02:39.540 align:middle line:84%
years back when you were
small and I your 'can I do

00:02:39.540 --> 00:02:44.730 align:middle line:84%
this' mother, uncertain I was
fit for any range of maternal

00:02:44.730 --> 00:02:49.740 align:middle line:84%
duties, but certain I wouldn't
act the tourist in taking

00:02:49.740 --> 00:02:51.600 align:middle line:90%
on the task.

00:02:51.600 --> 00:02:55.200 align:middle line:84%
By tourist I mean one
who dabbles and gawks,

00:02:55.200 --> 00:02:59.070 align:middle line:84%
gold digging for
sensations and souvenirs;

00:02:59.070 --> 00:03:04.410 align:middle line:84%
no range rider in the open
country of love would I be.

00:03:04.410 --> 00:03:09.480 align:middle line:84%
Begs the question of what I am
now at sixty, candling myself

00:03:09.480 --> 00:03:15.090 align:middle line:84%
like an egg to see what's
housed inside the shell.

00:03:15.090 --> 00:03:21.180 align:middle line:84%
I can boast that both of us
are a whole, a gold star or two

00:03:21.180 --> 00:03:24.720 align:middle line:84%
for women who take
art into their homes

00:03:24.720 --> 00:03:30.550 align:middle line:84%
and find it doesn't
tear them apart or up.

00:03:30.550 --> 00:03:32.830 align:middle line:90%
Still working out the bugs.

00:03:32.830 --> 00:03:35.250 align:middle line:90%
Life is strange."

00:03:35.250 --> 00:03:36.000 align:middle line:90%