WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:01.200 align:middle line:90% 00:00:01.200 --> 00:00:04.000 align:middle line:84% I'm reading from a new book manuscript. 00:00:04.000 --> 00:00:06.330 align:middle line:84% And the book will be called Rising and Falling. 00:00:06.330 --> 00:00:10.350 align:middle line:84% It presumably will be available next year. 00:00:10.350 --> 00:00:11.880 align:middle line:84% But I want to interrupt it before I 00:00:11.880 --> 00:00:16.340 align:middle line:84% read the very last poems and read a poem. 00:00:16.340 --> 00:00:18.090 align:middle line:84% This is a poem called "Sticks and Stones." 00:00:18.090 --> 00:00:22.185 align:middle line:84% And I'm reading it for my colleagues on this trip. 00:00:22.185 --> 00:00:24.690 align:middle line:90% 00:00:24.690 --> 00:00:27.150 align:middle line:84% If you've been around literary people 00:00:27.150 --> 00:00:32.940 align:middle line:84% when they gather together, you understand that they often 00:00:32.940 --> 00:00:34.470 align:middle line:90% behave poorly in that format. 00:00:34.470 --> 00:00:35.820 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:00:35.820 --> 00:00:38.340 align:middle line:84% And yet, I've been with a group of other writers 00:00:38.340 --> 00:00:41.940 align:middle line:84% for seven days, where in an atmosphere with no jealousy, 00:00:41.940 --> 00:00:46.710 align:middle line:84% no jockeying for ego position, no bickering, or goodwill, 00:00:46.710 --> 00:00:51.000 align:middle line:84% and kindliness toward each other's privacy 00:00:51.000 --> 00:00:53.250 align:middle line:84% and as well as our mutual enterprises. 00:00:53.250 --> 00:00:54.750 align:middle line:90% And I was impressed. 00:00:54.750 --> 00:00:59.970 align:middle line:84% And in honor of that, I thought we were all good. 00:00:59.970 --> 00:01:00.510 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:01:00.510 --> 00:01:03.945 align:middle line:84% In honor of that, in honor of our continuing virtue-- 00:01:03.945 --> 00:01:06.030 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:01:06.030 --> 00:01:06.600 align:middle line:90% No. 00:01:06.600 --> 00:01:08.550 align:middle line:84% In honor of these eight days, I want 00:01:08.550 --> 00:01:10.592 align:middle line:84% to read a little poem called "Sticks and Stones." 00:01:10.592 --> 00:01:14.070 align:middle line:84% It's a poem I wrote for myself as a charm, 00:01:14.070 --> 00:01:17.820 align:middle line:84% thinking in a rather depressed manner-- 00:01:17.820 --> 00:01:21.030 align:middle line:84% as you'll discover when the poem gets on its black way-- 00:01:21.030 --> 00:01:25.320 align:middle line:84% about how poorly literate people can sometimes behave. 00:01:25.320 --> 00:01:28.440 align:middle line:90% "Sticks and Stones." 00:01:28.440 --> 00:01:31.380 align:middle line:84% "Because I have lived by poetry, lines 00:01:31.380 --> 00:01:36.330 align:middle line:84% nagged me lovingly, like these, from [? Rutge's ?] notebooks-- 00:01:36.330 --> 00:01:37.380 align:middle line:90% I'm sick of women. 00:01:37.380 --> 00:01:38.440 align:middle line:90% I want God. 00:01:38.440 --> 00:01:38.940 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:01:38.940 --> 00:01:44.370 align:middle line:84% And does God want all this attention? 00:01:44.370 --> 00:01:46.830 align:middle line:90% Or Margaret Atwood's lines-- 00:01:46.830 --> 00:01:48.870 align:middle line:90% you become slowly more public. 00:01:48.870 --> 00:01:51.600 align:middle line:84% In a year, there will be nothing left of you but a megaphone. 00:01:51.600 --> 00:01:53.190 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:01:53.190 --> 00:01:56.370 align:middle line:84% Soon, will I be reciting these lines? 00:01:56.370 --> 00:01:58.420 align:middle line:84% Will there be a party after the reading? 00:01:58.420 --> 00:01:59.100 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:01:59.100 --> 00:02:00.900 align:middle line:90% Who will be there? 00:02:00.900 --> 00:02:02.520 align:middle line:90% Moon rock, the anthologist. 00:02:02.520 --> 00:02:05.550 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:02:05.550 --> 00:02:08.850 align:middle line:84% A woman poet, afraid of living on her looks-- 00:02:08.850 --> 00:02:10.620 align:middle line:90% may she grow older. 00:02:10.620 --> 00:02:12.300 align:middle line:90% There will be groupies. 00:02:12.300 --> 00:02:15.030 align:middle line:84% May their pubic hair clog the teeth of bad poets. 00:02:15.030 --> 00:02:16.620 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:02:16.620 --> 00:02:18.870 align:middle line:84% There will be the poet whose marriage poems are really 00:02:18.870 --> 00:02:20.130 align:middle line:90% about his writing students. 00:02:20.130 --> 00:02:22.473 align:middle line:90% May his divorce poems be better. 00:02:22.473 --> 00:02:23.260 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:02:23.260 --> 00:02:25.540 align:middle line:84% There will be the poet overlooked by moon rock. 00:02:25.540 --> 00:02:28.800 align:middle line:84% May he turn in his sleep like a lottery drama. 00:02:28.800 --> 00:02:32.520 align:middle line:84% The Dark Prince will be there in a dusk jacket, sexual strip 00:02:32.520 --> 00:02:36.810 align:middle line:84% minor, and dust Midas, a love only a mother could face. 00:02:36.810 --> 00:02:40.710 align:middle line:84% Someone will know a cruel joke so funny he'll tell it anyhow. 00:02:40.710 --> 00:02:43.470 align:middle line:84% We'll twitch the ironists to be there. 00:02:43.470 --> 00:02:46.980 align:middle line:84% Best young poet in America be there. 00:02:46.980 --> 00:02:48.270 align:middle line:90% Dervish will be there. 00:02:48.270 --> 00:02:51.580 align:middle line:84% May his disciples return to him the gift of himself. 00:02:51.580 --> 00:02:53.440 align:middle line:90% We don't need each other. 00:02:53.440 --> 00:02:57.660 align:middle line:84% We need ceremonies of self-love performed without witnesses. 00:02:57.660 --> 00:03:00.060 align:middle line:84% We need to leave the party like a car 00:03:00.060 --> 00:03:02.130 align:middle line:90% starting across the fields. 00:03:02.130 --> 00:03:04.020 align:middle line:90% It is time to be lost again-- 00:03:04.020 --> 00:03:07.020 align:middle line:84% weeping into the trenches of our palms until the hands 00:03:07.020 --> 00:03:07.950 align:middle line:90% are flooded. 00:03:07.950 --> 00:03:09.990 align:middle line:84% And the need begins to grow like rice 00:03:09.990 --> 00:03:12.670 align:middle line:90% in a paddy to hold something. 00:03:12.670 --> 00:03:15.390 align:middle line:84% Then, if I pick up a pen and write a poem, 00:03:15.390 --> 00:03:16.870 align:middle line:84% I will want to read it to someone. 00:03:16.870 --> 00:03:20.700 align:middle line:84% And the poem will be the party to honor whomever I read it to. 00:03:20.700 --> 00:03:23.730 align:middle line:84% A fallen apple branch, cut into firewood. 00:03:23.730 --> 00:03:25.560 align:middle line:90% Cold milk in the morning. 00:03:25.560 --> 00:03:27.920 align:middle line:90% A long walk at night." 00:03:27.920 --> 00:03:29.352 align:middle line:90%