WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:01.920 align:middle line:84% I think since I'm reading water poems, 00:00:01.920 --> 00:00:04.322 align:middle line:84% I'll read this old water poem of mine. 00:00:04.322 --> 00:00:06.180 align:middle line:90% It's called Choosing. 00:00:06.180 --> 00:00:13.140 align:middle line:84% It's a poem about swimming in a river, the Tennessee River, 00:00:13.140 --> 00:00:16.830 align:middle line:84% right where I grew up there on a bluff above the river, 00:00:16.830 --> 00:00:18.390 align:middle line:90% and this is about that. 00:00:18.390 --> 00:00:21.780 align:middle line:84% It's about swimming in the river with my head back and my ears 00:00:21.780 --> 00:00:23.820 align:middle line:84% underwater and my eyes out of the water, 00:00:23.820 --> 00:00:30.930 align:middle line:84% so that you're aware of a whole level of knowledge, perception, 00:00:30.930 --> 00:00:32.729 align:middle line:90% or a double level of perception. 00:00:32.729 --> 00:00:35.100 align:middle line:84% The image I think is appeals to me 00:00:35.100 --> 00:00:40.410 align:middle line:84% because I think it's accurate to the way I am a lot of times. 00:00:40.410 --> 00:00:45.550 align:middle line:84% A little out of it or a little into something else. 00:00:45.550 --> 00:00:48.590 align:middle line:84% And I had a nickname in college, it was Cloudy. 00:00:48.590 --> 00:00:50.910 align:middle line:90% It seems fuzzy [INAUDIBLE]. 00:00:50.910 --> 00:00:53.990 align:middle line:90% 00:00:53.990 --> 00:00:56.140 align:middle line:84% So there's a dream in this poem that 00:00:56.140 --> 00:01:00.040 align:middle line:84% comes up in the middle of it about a child. 00:01:00.040 --> 00:01:02.980 align:middle line:84% I used to have it a lot, about a child that was in danger, 00:01:02.980 --> 00:01:06.040 align:middle line:84% and he was crawling off a ledge, a very high ledge, 00:01:06.040 --> 00:01:07.160 align:middle line:90% and I tried to get to him. 00:01:07.160 --> 00:01:08.860 align:middle line:90% He was falling in slow motion. 00:01:08.860 --> 00:01:12.970 align:middle line:84% And I couldn't get there, but my imagination 00:01:12.970 --> 00:01:16.330 align:middle line:84% or whatever it is you dream with supplied a pile of mattresses 00:01:16.330 --> 00:01:18.790 align:middle line:90% for the child to land on. 00:01:18.790 --> 00:01:20.380 align:middle line:90% So there's that in here. 00:01:20.380 --> 00:01:25.480 align:middle line:84% It's about relaxing into having children. 00:01:25.480 --> 00:01:28.360 align:middle line:90% Choosing for Kitsu. 00:01:28.360 --> 00:01:32.320 align:middle line:84% Floating with your head back, up to the ears and a river, 00:01:32.320 --> 00:01:35.440 align:middle line:84% you can hear a lot of lives you didn't expect. 00:01:35.440 --> 00:01:38.650 align:middle line:84% An outboard motor starting up beyond your sight, 00:01:38.650 --> 00:01:42.880 align:middle line:84% somebody's sinker taps against the drum, two kids 00:01:42.880 --> 00:01:47.060 align:middle line:84% are yelling mouthfuls, and the general flow or sound 00:01:47.060 --> 00:01:50.560 align:middle line:84% you might make yourself, and ones you can only imagine. 00:01:50.560 --> 00:01:52.960 align:middle line:84% Gar fish moving along the bottom, 00:01:52.960 --> 00:01:56.800 align:middle line:84% water moccasins curling into tree roots, Chickamauga Dam 00:01:56.800 --> 00:02:00.340 align:middle line:84% upstream imperceptibly giving way. 00:02:00.340 --> 00:02:03.670 align:middle line:84% Half in air, half in water, your eyes awake, 00:02:03.670 --> 00:02:05.890 align:middle line:84% your ears a dream with soundings, 00:02:05.890 --> 00:02:08.800 align:middle line:84% the mind can bob and understand where 00:02:08.800 --> 00:02:13.660 align:middle line:84% it is, alone on the shining surface, buoyed up 00:02:13.660 --> 00:02:15.280 align:middle line:90% with creatures. 00:02:15.280 --> 00:02:19.240 align:middle line:84% In such a dangerous sleep, I have created children 00:02:19.240 --> 00:02:21.880 align:middle line:84% taking chances underwater at night, 00:02:21.880 --> 00:02:25.300 align:middle line:84% edging with their fingers along the bluff above the river, 00:02:25.300 --> 00:02:28.900 align:middle line:84% jumping barefooted into a cellar full of broken glass. 00:02:28.900 --> 00:02:32.890 align:middle line:84% And one recurring child, too young to know what's risky, 00:02:32.890 --> 00:02:37.330 align:middle line:84% on a ledge, curious only about me down here, too far away 00:02:37.330 --> 00:02:40.120 align:middle line:84% to reach him, where he turns like a dummy falling, 00:02:40.120 --> 00:02:42.340 align:middle line:84% lands flat on his back each night 00:02:42.340 --> 00:02:46.090 align:middle line:84% on the mattress pile of my choice, safer in my dreams 00:02:46.090 --> 00:02:49.060 align:middle line:84% than in his, and falling more certain 00:02:49.060 --> 00:02:53.620 align:middle line:84% of love than the tiny fish-like fact he was when both of us 00:02:53.620 --> 00:02:58.300 align:middle line:84% forgot he might exist, a strange bit of marine life sticking 00:02:58.300 --> 00:03:02.230 align:middle line:84% there on its own, bringing up questions of free will 00:03:02.230 --> 00:03:06.100 align:middle line:84% and time, and the possibilities that we broke against the motel 00:03:06.100 --> 00:03:11.350 align:middle line:84% mirror, in plain water glasses thrown to curse and celebrate 00:03:11.350 --> 00:03:13.240 align:middle line:90% our combining image. 00:03:13.240 --> 00:03:18.520 align:middle line:84% Wide awake, you chose, I chose, crash following crash, not him, 00:03:18.520 --> 00:03:21.580 align:middle line:84% not them, but to lie there accepting, 00:03:21.580 --> 00:03:23.740 align:middle line:84% floating as we used to in river water filled 00:03:23.740 --> 00:03:28.750 align:middle line:84% with silt and muskrats and sunken boats and boys swimming. 00:03:28.750 --> 00:03:31.930 align:middle line:84% For nothing comes of choosing, really, in this bed 00:03:31.930 --> 00:03:33.415 align:middle line:90% we have fallen into. 00:03:33.415 --> 00:03:36.760 align:middle line:84% To lay back your head and listen to whatever 00:03:36.760 --> 00:03:41.140 align:middle line:84% will be with us, to the waters, pressing only to eardrum, 00:03:41.140 --> 00:03:43.230 align:middle line:90% for the life inside.