WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:03.420 align:middle line:84% Some people have asked me why, how come your palms 00:00:03.420 --> 00:00:05.760 align:middle line:90% changed so much? 00:00:05.760 --> 00:00:07.260 align:middle line:84% Well, I have a different typewriter. 00:00:07.260 --> 00:00:09.960 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHS] 00:00:09.960 --> 00:00:13.260 align:middle line:90% I have a new fountain pen. 00:00:13.260 --> 00:00:15.780 align:middle line:90% I don't know. 00:00:15.780 --> 00:00:19.710 align:middle line:84% It change because I told them to. 00:00:19.710 --> 00:00:24.120 align:middle line:84% Nothing I ever told to do anything did it. 00:00:24.120 --> 00:00:28.350 align:middle line:84% When I told my dog to be quiet, he bit me. 00:00:28.350 --> 00:00:31.110 align:middle line:90% My cat scratched me. 00:00:31.110 --> 00:00:32.400 align:middle line:90% My wife joined the Navy. 00:00:32.400 --> 00:00:36.510 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:00:36.510 --> 00:00:38.670 align:middle line:84% My kids smoked dope and won't drink with me. 00:00:38.670 --> 00:00:46.170 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:00:46.170 --> 00:00:46.980 align:middle line:90% It's so boring. 00:00:46.980 --> 00:00:49.680 align:middle line:84% Do they think everything's funny? 00:00:49.680 --> 00:00:54.512 align:middle line:84% Which is all right if it's funny, but it's not, you know. 00:00:54.512 --> 00:00:56.910 align:middle line:84% They're good boys, they're good boys. 00:00:56.910 --> 00:00:58.290 align:middle line:90% It's called your life. 00:00:58.290 --> 00:01:02.760 align:middle line:84% I think that what I assert in this poem 00:01:02.760 --> 00:01:07.672 align:middle line:84% and what I believe I mean, I believe what I'm saying this. 00:01:07.672 --> 00:01:09.630 align:middle line:84% I believe everything I'm saying in these poems, 00:01:09.630 --> 00:01:11.400 align:middle line:84% but I mean, a lot of the things that I 00:01:11.400 --> 00:01:14.040 align:middle line:84% said I don't believe anymore because the poems are old, 00:01:14.040 --> 00:01:16.740 align:middle line:84% and they just don't keep up with me. 00:01:16.740 --> 00:01:17.970 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHS] 00:01:17.970 --> 00:01:19.230 align:middle line:90% Or I fall behind them. 00:01:19.230 --> 00:01:19.945 align:middle line:90% I don't know. 00:01:19.945 --> 00:01:22.650 align:middle line:90% 00:01:22.650 --> 00:01:26.690 align:middle line:84% A guy at 30 isn't a guy at 50, you know. 00:01:26.690 --> 00:01:27.190 align:middle line:90% Alas. 00:01:27.190 --> 00:01:33.640 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:01:33.640 --> 00:01:37.120 align:middle line:84% I was in Steve Arlen's class the other day and I said you know, 00:01:37.120 --> 00:01:39.830 align:middle line:84% I said Steve had a headache and you could see it. 00:01:39.830 --> 00:01:40.330 align:middle line:90% I mean. 00:01:40.330 --> 00:01:43.120 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:01:43.120 --> 00:01:47.360 align:middle line:84% It was one of the biggest headaches I've ever seen. 00:01:47.360 --> 00:01:49.360 align:middle line:84% Here, we get a box from railway express and they 00:01:49.360 --> 00:01:50.710 align:middle line:90% got those bands around them. 00:01:50.710 --> 00:01:52.360 align:middle line:84% That's what his headache was like. 00:01:52.360 --> 00:01:54.220 align:middle line:84% He's like that man with that metal band 00:01:54.220 --> 00:01:57.670 align:middle line:84% that didn't know where you can get through it. 00:01:57.670 --> 00:01:59.530 align:middle line:84% And I said, how old are you, Steve? 00:01:59.530 --> 00:02:00.490 align:middle line:90% I think he said 35. 00:02:00.490 --> 00:02:02.887 align:middle line:90% I said, life gets better. 00:02:02.887 --> 00:02:04.470 align:middle line:84% And I turned to the woman next to him. 00:02:04.470 --> 00:02:05.137 align:middle line:90% How old are you? 00:02:05.137 --> 00:02:05.790 align:middle line:90% She said, 28. 00:02:05.790 --> 00:02:07.560 align:middle line:84% It's all life gets a lot better than that. 00:02:07.560 --> 00:02:09.000 align:middle line:84% There's a woman sitting across from me, 00:02:09.000 --> 00:02:11.580 align:middle line:84% who I think was older than I. I hope she was older than I. 00:02:11.580 --> 00:02:13.605 align:middle line:84% And she said, you have a life gets worse. 00:02:13.605 --> 00:02:17.660 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:02:17.660 --> 00:02:21.020 align:middle line:84% And there was a silence, and she said, I mean, 00:02:21.020 --> 00:02:23.930 align:middle line:90% it really gets worse. 00:02:23.930 --> 00:02:25.730 align:middle line:90% And I said OK, I heard you. 00:02:25.730 --> 00:02:29.570 align:middle line:84% Don't say it was so goddamn much conviction. 00:02:29.570 --> 00:02:30.920 align:middle line:90% Well, my life has gotten better. 00:02:30.920 --> 00:02:33.170 align:middle line:84% And I don't know what tomorrow morning I could wake up 00:02:33.170 --> 00:02:38.250 align:middle line:90% a zebra in a zoo, you know. 00:02:38.250 --> 00:02:40.740 align:middle line:84% I have no idea what tomorrow will bring in. 00:02:40.740 --> 00:02:44.040 align:middle line:84% I don't want-- if you know, don't tell me 00:02:44.040 --> 00:02:46.590 align:middle line:84% because I want it to be a nice surprise. 00:02:46.590 --> 00:02:49.170 align:middle line:84% I might be dead, I won't wake up at all. 00:02:49.170 --> 00:02:51.330 align:middle line:90% Now, it is called your life. 00:02:51.330 --> 00:02:54.930 align:middle line:84% I did not know your life was mine. 00:02:54.930 --> 00:02:59.700 align:middle line:84% I had seen you walking sadly by, your head down, 00:02:59.700 --> 00:03:01.170 align:middle line:90% your hands still and hidden. 00:03:01.170 --> 00:03:06.210 align:middle line:84% And I thought I could go to you and ask what the years had done 00:03:06.210 --> 00:03:09.030 align:middle line:90% that couldn't be forgotten. 00:03:09.030 --> 00:03:12.330 align:middle line:90% Instead, I turned inward. 00:03:12.330 --> 00:03:17.580 align:middle line:84% I found along still hours of silence that were childhood. 00:03:17.580 --> 00:03:21.990 align:middle line:84% Once my aunt went away at dawn, and I sat in an empty house 00:03:21.990 --> 00:03:26.220 align:middle line:84% until the front windows darkened and I fell asleep. 00:03:26.220 --> 00:03:29.250 align:middle line:90% That boy never awakened. 00:03:29.250 --> 00:03:33.280 align:middle line:84% The one who did was tall and stronger than I am now. 00:03:33.280 --> 00:03:35.610 align:middle line:90% And he spoke to no one. 00:03:35.610 --> 00:03:39.270 align:middle line:84% He smoked, spit, drove with his eyes closed. 00:03:39.270 --> 00:03:43.540 align:middle line:84% And by himself, he built the road from Gary to Hammond. 00:03:43.540 --> 00:03:48.180 align:middle line:84% That was 30 years ago when a single man was something. 00:03:48.180 --> 00:03:51.840 align:middle line:84% Now I will turn outward to the little clearing 00:03:51.840 --> 00:03:54.060 align:middle line:84% in the woods, where you at last have 00:03:54.060 --> 00:03:58.840 align:middle line:84% kneeled to find the Earth is all the home you need. 00:03:58.840 --> 00:04:00.810 align:middle line:90% I'm beside you. 00:04:00.810 --> 00:04:03.540 align:middle line:90% Feel the warm air at your ear. 00:04:03.540 --> 00:04:07.290 align:middle line:84% It's not the dreaded land wind or the word of God. 00:04:07.290 --> 00:04:12.060 align:middle line:84% It's the breath of one man, a man like any other, 00:04:12.060 --> 00:04:18.800 align:middle line:84% fallen to this Earth as all men have to say your life is mine. 00:04:18.800 --> 00:04:20.102 align:middle line:90%