WEBVTT

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I'll read maybe two more
poems from this book

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and then I'll read
through some stuff.

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A poem about Florida, I
was reading in an airplane

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today a thing about Florida.

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Miami would be a great
city in the future based

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on this and that.

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You wake, you know,
I haven't seen--

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It's like Reagan talking
about the turnaround.

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Sort of the same thing.

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You know, everything's fine now.

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There's only 14
million unemployed.

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And I have a series of
poems about Florida.

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This one's called
"Visiting Florida Again."

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I take walks early
in the morning

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while my mother, who
I visit, is asleep,

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and I walk into the Miami
Beach into the Cuban section

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and get cafe cubana and so on.

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And here I passed one day
a terrifying experience.

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I passed, heard this
noise in the bushes,

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and I thought it was a giant
insect coming to get me.

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And it turned out only
to be an air conditioner.

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And for the first
time I realized

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that I'd been making a mistake
for about 25 years teaching

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English 1 and
English 2 and such,

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teaching that technology
was the enemy,

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you know, and at first it being
taught to me then teaching it,

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I realized I didn't
believe that at all.

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So this poem is a revival of my
first simple, stupid, socialist

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belief that technology
would save us

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when I used to sit in the
Carnegie Library in Pittsburgh

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reading Thomas Paine and those
other guys Kropotkin and Blake.

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That's what this poem is about.

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It's called "Visiting
Florida Again."

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At 11th and Euclid I stood in
front of an air conditioner

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and listened to it whir.

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For just a second,
I thought it was

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an insect screaming in
anger before it sucked up

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its enemies.

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I ran into the
hibiscus to brood.

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For the first
time, I gave thanks

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to my brother, the
machine, my little friend,

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so out of place in the
tropics, so close now

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compared to the hideous
ichneumon waving

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its long needle or the velvet
ant searching for babies,

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so misunderstood and abused.

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Shivering in the heat,
I wanted to touch

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some great yellow steam shovel
or biplane, something so oily

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and awkward that it coughed
and groaned for hours

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before it moved its
huge body into position.

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I felt as pure as Mayakovsky
climbing into his aluminum

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vest, as dear as
Pico della Mirandola

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watching his Jewish soul rise.

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I joined the Shakers at their
sweet stations, the anarchists

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sitting in the sun.

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For just one second
I was in London again

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in the Iron Palace.

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I was in Pittsburgh sitting
in the old reference room

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reading Thomas Paine and William
Blake and Peter Kropotkin

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creating my first dream.

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