WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:01.140 align:middle line:90% 00:00:01.140 --> 00:00:02.760 align:middle line:90% Yes, questions? 00:00:02.760 --> 00:00:06.850 align:middle line:90% We're open to questions. 00:00:06.850 --> 00:00:09.670 align:middle line:90% We have about five minutes. 00:00:09.670 --> 00:00:13.677 align:middle line:84% You can raise your hands or shout. 00:00:13.677 --> 00:00:14.760 align:middle line:90% Please do raise your hand. 00:00:14.760 --> 00:00:16.052 align:middle line:90% And I'll come to you with this. 00:00:16.052 --> 00:00:19.400 align:middle line:90% 00:00:19.400 --> 00:00:22.070 align:middle line:84% Oh you've got a microphone there, cool. 00:00:22.070 --> 00:00:25.700 align:middle line:90% Even get on the mic. 00:00:25.700 --> 00:00:36.340 align:middle line:90% 00:00:36.340 --> 00:00:40.157 align:middle line:84% Thank you very much for your reading. 00:00:40.157 --> 00:00:41.740 align:middle line:84% Would you speak a little bit about how 00:00:41.740 --> 00:00:47.800 align:middle line:84% the process of being in recovery has informed your writing? 00:00:47.800 --> 00:00:53.710 align:middle line:90% 00:00:53.710 --> 00:00:58.030 align:middle line:84% I think one of the disasters and of course, 00:00:58.030 --> 00:01:05.489 align:middle line:84% maybe overall destruction of the disease of alcoholism 00:01:05.489 --> 00:01:11.040 align:middle line:84% is really a loss of selfhood and loss 00:01:11.040 --> 00:01:18.660 align:middle line:84% of certainty about yourself, about oneself, 00:01:18.660 --> 00:01:28.230 align:middle line:84% in terms of, I guess self-esteem is one of those words, 00:01:28.230 --> 00:01:33.900 align:middle line:84% sense of maybe value, self-worth. 00:01:33.900 --> 00:01:38.880 align:middle line:84% And so I think that even though say, 00:01:38.880 --> 00:01:48.330 align:middle line:84% I wrote even when I was in that time of drinking, using, 00:01:48.330 --> 00:01:58.500 align:middle line:84% I don't think that I felt really the value of what a sober, 00:01:58.500 --> 00:02:02.880 align:middle line:90% stable, balanced person was. 00:02:02.880 --> 00:02:06.660 align:middle line:84% But really upon, I think, recovery 00:02:06.660 --> 00:02:12.570 align:middle line:84% and in that process of recovery, I think that you're a person, 00:02:12.570 --> 00:02:22.230 align:middle line:84% or me, as myself, I'm much more aware of I guess 00:02:22.230 --> 00:02:28.740 align:middle line:84% what self-respect and love of oneself, 00:02:28.740 --> 00:02:34.650 align:middle line:84% not just self, but of others, of responsibilities 00:02:34.650 --> 00:02:38.050 align:middle line:90% that a person has, that I have. 00:02:38.050 --> 00:02:42.900 align:middle line:84% So it's a recovery that's not just personal, I believe. 00:02:42.900 --> 00:02:46.770 align:middle line:84% But because when you're falling apart 00:02:46.770 --> 00:02:49.740 align:middle line:84% and you're living self destructively, 00:02:49.740 --> 00:02:54.040 align:middle line:84% it's as if you lose really, a connection to others. 00:02:54.040 --> 00:03:00.360 align:middle line:84% And so recovery is reconnection and restructuring 00:03:00.360 --> 00:03:07.350 align:middle line:84% and re-strengthening and really reliving yourself, 00:03:07.350 --> 00:03:15.720 align:middle line:84% even the history that you know back through the years. 00:03:15.720 --> 00:03:17.580 align:middle line:84% In a sense, everything, even though you 00:03:17.580 --> 00:03:24.570 align:middle line:84% may not remember everything, but you remember what it was 00:03:24.570 --> 00:03:28.570 align:middle line:90% and how you want it to be. 00:03:28.570 --> 00:03:34.020 align:middle line:84% So I think that in general and in a positive feeling 00:03:34.020 --> 00:03:46.080 align:middle line:84% for what I do as a writer, as a thinker, as a professor, that 00:03:46.080 --> 00:03:53.770 align:middle line:84% having a sense of self-respect and value, that's what works, 00:03:53.770 --> 00:03:54.970 align:middle line:90% really. 00:03:54.970 --> 00:03:56.920 align:middle line:90% Thank you for the question. 00:03:56.920 --> 00:03:58.500 align:middle line:90% Yes? 00:03:58.500 --> 00:04:07.790 align:middle line:90% There's a mic here, mic person. 00:04:07.790 --> 00:04:10.670 align:middle line:84% Yeah, in your epic, are you going 00:04:10.670 --> 00:04:13.220 align:middle line:90% to have both prose and poetry? 00:04:13.220 --> 00:04:15.380 align:middle line:84% And I was thinking in particular, 00:04:15.380 --> 00:04:17.659 align:middle line:90% of more than just a river. 00:04:17.659 --> 00:04:20.209 align:middle line:90% 00:04:20.209 --> 00:04:21.980 align:middle line:90% More than just a river-- 00:04:21.980 --> 00:04:26.420 align:middle line:84% yeah, that's of course, in verse. 00:04:26.420 --> 00:04:29.000 align:middle line:84% But sometimes I have to say that I 00:04:29.000 --> 00:04:33.050 align:middle line:84% don't know the difference between verse and prose 00:04:33.050 --> 00:04:33.920 align:middle line:90% at moments. 00:04:33.920 --> 00:04:37.760 align:middle line:84% I think they're both work as poetry. 00:04:37.760 --> 00:04:45.610 align:middle line:84% And because I find that my prose is poetry and prose, 00:04:45.610 --> 00:04:47.410 align:middle line:90% I would say they're both. 00:04:47.410 --> 00:04:55.150 align:middle line:84% I did a film treatment for a documentary that was made 00:04:55.150 --> 00:04:57.880 align:middle line:90% called, Surviving Columbus. 00:04:57.880 --> 00:05:03.910 align:middle line:84% And I wrote it as a poem, 110 pages long. 00:05:03.910 --> 00:05:05.290 align:middle line:90% That's a film treatment. 00:05:05.290 --> 00:05:08.600 align:middle line:84% It wasn't the script, but they used it as a script. 00:05:08.600 --> 00:05:13.720 align:middle line:84% And it was both verse and prose forms. 00:05:13.720 --> 00:05:14.485 align:middle line:90% So it worked. 00:05:14.485 --> 00:05:18.880 align:middle line:90% 00:05:18.880 --> 00:05:20.870 align:middle line:90% Thank you very much. 00:05:20.870 --> 00:05:23.860 align:middle line:84% I'm here with a group of students, the Native American 00:05:23.860 --> 00:05:26.740 align:middle line:84% Student Association, and a school for the blind. 00:05:26.740 --> 00:05:30.220 align:middle line:84% And one of my students, several of them are poets. 00:05:30.220 --> 00:05:34.480 align:middle line:84% And they want to know why you chose poetry. 00:05:34.480 --> 00:05:36.640 align:middle line:84% With this mid-prose and other things to write, 00:05:36.640 --> 00:05:38.240 align:middle line:90% why did you choose poetry? 00:05:38.240 --> 00:05:39.790 align:middle line:90% Why did I choose poetry? 00:05:39.790 --> 00:05:45.280 align:middle line:84% I think I chose language, really self-expression. 00:05:45.280 --> 00:05:49.240 align:middle line:84% And I think that self-expression and language in general, 00:05:49.240 --> 00:05:53.350 align:middle line:84% is actually more poetry than prose. 00:05:53.350 --> 00:06:04.300 align:middle line:84% Poetry is like natural expression, natural, reflexive, 00:06:04.300 --> 00:06:07.000 align:middle line:90% and self-expression. 00:06:07.000 --> 00:06:11.530 align:middle line:84% And when we're learning to speak, 00:06:11.530 --> 00:06:16.930 align:middle line:84% I think that the beginning of our infantile communications 00:06:16.930 --> 00:06:25.480 align:middle line:84% is murmurs and crying and sort of unstructured speech. 00:06:25.480 --> 00:06:29.080 align:middle line:84% But in any case, it's still communication. 00:06:29.080 --> 00:06:31.390 align:middle line:90% And I would say that's poetry. 00:06:31.390 --> 00:06:37.060 align:middle line:84% I would say that the best and finest of self-expression 00:06:37.060 --> 00:06:43.300 align:middle line:84% as human beings who communicate is really poetry and poetic 00:06:43.300 --> 00:06:45.670 align:middle line:90% in nature. 00:06:45.670 --> 00:06:46.990 align:middle line:90% I like prose as well. 00:06:46.990 --> 00:06:57.110 align:middle line:84% But I still think prose is poetry. 00:06:57.110 --> 00:06:57.740 align:middle line:90% Thank you. 00:06:57.740 --> 00:07:01.200 align:middle line:90% 00:07:01.200 --> 00:07:03.100 align:middle line:84% I appreciate your beautiful words. 00:07:03.100 --> 00:07:07.120 align:middle line:84% And I was just curious if you've ever collaborated with dancers 00:07:07.120 --> 00:07:09.320 align:middle line:90% to express your emotions. 00:07:09.320 --> 00:07:12.680 align:middle line:90% 00:07:12.680 --> 00:07:15.200 align:middle line:84% Could you explain that a bit more? 00:07:15.200 --> 00:07:17.450 align:middle line:90% Sure. 00:07:17.450 --> 00:07:20.120 align:middle line:90% Just I have a friend who-- 00:07:20.120 --> 00:07:22.850 align:middle line:84% it just made me think of this-- who 00:07:22.850 --> 00:07:30.020 align:middle line:84% has a group who has expressed water movement, flow. 00:07:30.020 --> 00:07:33.200 align:middle line:84% I think some folks here have seen the dancing. 00:07:33.200 --> 00:07:36.230 align:middle line:84% Katie Isley-- I don't know if she's here. 00:07:36.230 --> 00:07:39.620 align:middle line:84% But it just made me think when I was listening to your words 00:07:39.620 --> 00:07:45.998 align:middle line:84% that dancers, they could help express another dimension. 00:07:45.998 --> 00:07:48.290 align:middle line:84% I'm just curious if you've ever collaborated or thought 00:07:48.290 --> 00:07:50.255 align:middle line:84% of collaborating with performing arts. 00:07:50.255 --> 00:07:54.170 align:middle line:90% 00:07:54.170 --> 00:08:00.380 align:middle line:84% Never with a dancer, but poetry and language in general, 00:08:00.380 --> 00:08:04.910 align:middle line:84% but poetry in specific, requires motion, movement. 00:08:04.910 --> 00:08:10.970 align:middle line:84% And that's what really makes it more real and realistic 00:08:10.970 --> 00:08:15.350 align:middle line:90% in both the reception-- 00:08:15.350 --> 00:08:16.820 align:middle line:90% that is when you hear it. 00:08:16.820 --> 00:08:25.190 align:middle line:90% 00:08:25.190 --> 00:08:30.620 align:middle line:84% We see motion and we may even be inspired or motivated 00:08:30.620 --> 00:08:35.750 align:middle line:84% to be moving with poems, with the sound of language 00:08:35.750 --> 00:08:46.450 align:middle line:84% and the sound of what the verbs may start or may inspire. 00:08:46.450 --> 00:08:51.400 align:middle line:84% So in that respect, poetry is much like dance. 00:08:51.400 --> 00:08:53.350 align:middle line:90% I like dancing. 00:08:53.350 --> 00:08:55.480 align:middle line:84% When I was a kid, we used to dance. 00:08:55.480 --> 00:08:58.870 align:middle line:84% My dad would get out his drum and sing to us. 00:08:58.870 --> 00:09:03.880 align:middle line:84% And we would dance whatever songs that might be. 00:09:03.880 --> 00:09:08.080 align:middle line:90% It was a family activity. 00:09:08.080 --> 00:09:09.920 align:middle line:90% Thank you. 00:09:09.920 --> 00:09:11.860 align:middle line:84% There's a question way back there. 00:09:11.860 --> 00:09:13.660 align:middle line:84% While reading Sand Creek, I can tell 00:09:13.660 --> 00:09:18.100 align:middle line:84% that justice was one of the big main ideas, themes of the book. 00:09:18.100 --> 00:09:23.770 align:middle line:84% I was wondering what role blame has to do in justice, if any. 00:09:23.770 --> 00:09:26.860 align:middle line:90% 00:09:26.860 --> 00:09:33.350 align:middle line:84% What role does blame have in anything? 00:09:33.350 --> 00:09:38.170 align:middle line:84% I think that blame has a limited role. 00:09:38.170 --> 00:09:46.540 align:middle line:84% Blame is like to me, blaming others or putting all faults 00:09:46.540 --> 00:09:55.540 align:middle line:84% onto other people, on other beings that are not really 00:09:55.540 --> 00:09:58.700 align:middle line:90% looking at oneself. 00:09:58.700 --> 00:10:04.060 align:middle line:84% So blame, is also like tactic, sometimes. 00:10:04.060 --> 00:10:11.710 align:middle line:84% And blame is also sort of not willing to accept 00:10:11.710 --> 00:10:15.460 align:middle line:90% responsibility for oneself. 00:10:15.460 --> 00:10:17.170 align:middle line:90% It's easy to blame others. 00:10:17.170 --> 00:10:22.840 align:middle line:84% It's easy to blame people for your misery, for your lack 00:10:22.840 --> 00:10:26.030 align:middle line:90% of say, ability. 00:10:26.030 --> 00:10:30.700 align:middle line:84% And I think that in Sand Creek, I 00:10:30.700 --> 00:10:38.380 align:middle line:84% try to matters in a forthright way 00:10:38.380 --> 00:10:46.090 align:middle line:84% so that it's evident that something is taking place. 00:10:46.090 --> 00:10:53.920 align:middle line:84% But I try not to just simply cite or graphically 00:10:53.920 --> 00:10:58.630 align:middle line:84% put images out there, so that someone must take 00:10:58.630 --> 00:11:00.670 align:middle line:90% the blame for what happened. 00:11:00.670 --> 00:11:05.320 align:middle line:90% That's not the point, I believe. 00:11:05.320 --> 00:11:07.990 align:middle line:84% I think that the best communication really 00:11:07.990 --> 00:11:11.530 align:middle line:84% is an assumption of responsibilities 00:11:11.530 --> 00:11:16.720 align:middle line:84% for our own ways of thinking, ways of feeling, 00:11:16.720 --> 00:11:19.795 align:middle line:90% and ways of acting. 00:11:19.795 --> 00:11:20.920 align:middle line:90% Thank you for the question. 00:11:20.920 --> 00:11:23.590 align:middle line:90% 00:11:23.590 --> 00:11:27.600 align:middle line:84% We've got time for one more and for me to run across the room. 00:11:27.600 --> 00:11:32.790 align:middle line:84% Way on across to the other side, there you go. 00:11:32.790 --> 00:11:35.100 align:middle line:84% Thank you for being with us once more. 00:11:35.100 --> 00:11:39.420 align:middle line:84% And Sand Creek is some of the clearly one 00:11:39.420 --> 00:11:42.370 align:middle line:90% of the favorites of many of us. 00:11:42.370 --> 00:11:44.950 align:middle line:90% I'm wondering two things. 00:11:44.950 --> 00:11:47.820 align:middle line:84% One-- and I think they're related-- 00:11:47.820 --> 00:11:50.670 align:middle line:84% would you be willing to talk about water? 00:11:50.670 --> 00:11:55.950 align:middle line:84% And two-- would you be willing to read that lovely 00:11:55.950 --> 00:11:59.640 align:middle line:84% transforming little poem from Sand Creek that says something 00:11:59.640 --> 00:12:03.120 align:middle line:84% about this America and mad blood and death. 00:12:03.120 --> 00:12:06.870 align:middle line:84% And then it turns to what's happening at Sand Creek. 00:12:06.870 --> 00:12:09.990 align:middle line:84% Would you be willing to read that for us? 00:12:09.990 --> 00:12:11.850 align:middle line:84% I think it's at the very beginning. 00:12:11.850 --> 00:12:15.750 align:middle line:90% At the beginning, or at the end? 00:12:15.750 --> 00:12:16.920 align:middle line:90% I always forget too. 00:12:16.920 --> 00:12:18.630 align:middle line:84% It's the beginning and the end, maybe. 00:12:18.630 --> 00:12:26.080 align:middle line:90% 00:12:26.080 --> 00:12:30.280 align:middle line:84% Because it seems like I have something 00:12:30.280 --> 00:12:36.220 align:middle line:90% at the end with this America. 00:12:36.220 --> 00:12:46.550 align:middle line:90% 00:12:46.550 --> 00:12:55.100 align:middle line:90% At the very last poem is this-- 00:12:55.100 --> 00:12:58.490 align:middle line:90% "I have always loved America. 00:12:58.490 --> 00:13:06.680 align:middle line:84% It is something precious in the memory in blood and cells, 00:13:06.680 --> 00:13:13.790 align:middle line:84% which insist on story, poetry, song, life, life. 00:13:13.790 --> 00:13:18.470 align:middle line:84% And the poem-- in the day room the Oklahoma boy 00:13:18.470 --> 00:13:24.260 align:middle line:84% sits sunken into the arms of a wooden and leather couch 00:13:24.260 --> 00:13:26.930 align:middle line:90% that has become his body. 00:13:26.930 --> 00:13:31.310 align:middle line:84% The structure of his life and the swirl of his mind 00:13:31.310 --> 00:13:33.680 align:middle line:90% have become lead. 00:13:33.680 --> 00:13:37.280 align:middle line:84% There is beauty in his American face. 00:13:37.280 --> 00:13:43.790 align:middle line:84% But the dread implanted by the explosive in Asia denies it. 00:13:43.790 --> 00:13:48.380 align:middle line:84% The life he now matters by is pushed away without pity 00:13:48.380 --> 00:13:52.880 align:middle line:84% by the janitor's broom, which strikes his shoe. 00:13:52.880 --> 00:13:57.140 align:middle line:84% Only the corners of his eyes and the edge of his shoe 00:13:57.140 --> 00:14:01.670 align:middle line:84% know the quality of the couch he has become. 00:14:01.670 --> 00:14:08.060 align:middle line:84% It is the life he has submerged into, a dream needing a name. 00:14:08.060 --> 00:14:10.580 align:middle line:90% He has become the American-- 00:14:10.580 --> 00:14:15.545 align:middle line:84% vengeful and a wasteland of fortunes for now." 00:14:15.545 --> 00:14:18.800 align:middle line:90% 00:14:18.800 --> 00:14:24.010 align:middle line:84% And then the very last, of course, is the epilogue poem. 00:14:24.010 --> 00:14:26.860 align:middle line:84% "That dreams shall have the name, after all. 00:14:26.860 --> 00:14:30.070 align:middle line:84% And it will not be vengeful, but wealthy 00:14:30.070 --> 00:14:33.670 align:middle line:84% with love and compassion and knowledge. 00:14:33.670 --> 00:14:40.610 align:middle line:84% And it will rise in this heart, which is our America. 00:14:40.610 --> 00:14:47.820 align:middle line:84% It will rise in this heart, which is our America." 00:14:47.820 --> 00:14:50.100 align:middle line:84% Thank you for asking me about that poem. 00:14:50.100 --> 00:14:53.652 align:middle line:90% 00:14:53.652 --> 00:14:54.360 align:middle line:90% Thank you, Simon. 00:14:54.360 --> 00:14:56.600 align:middle line:90% And good night. 00:14:56.600 --> 00:15:01.376 align:middle line:90%