WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:05.580 align:middle line:84% Thanks to everybody who's responsible for having us here, 00:00:05.580 --> 00:00:07.710 align:middle line:84% and thanks to you guys for coming to listen. 00:00:07.710 --> 00:00:11.790 align:middle line:84% I'm going to start with a couple of poems from my latest book 00:00:11.790 --> 00:00:13.605 align:middle line:90% and then read some newer stuff. 00:00:13.605 --> 00:00:16.500 align:middle line:90% 00:00:16.500 --> 00:00:21.150 align:middle line:84% And the first one's called "Idioms for Rain." 00:00:21.150 --> 00:00:23.460 align:middle line:84% I think idioms, idiomatic expressions 00:00:23.460 --> 00:00:27.030 align:middle line:84% in different cultures just tell you a lot about the culture. 00:00:27.030 --> 00:00:30.510 align:middle line:84% And so I went down the rabbit hole of reading a bunch of them 00:00:30.510 --> 00:00:32.640 align:middle line:90% online and wrote this. 00:00:32.640 --> 00:00:34.770 align:middle line:90% And a few words here. 00:00:34.770 --> 00:00:39.270 align:middle line:84% "Fallon" is Old English for "to fall." 00:00:39.270 --> 00:00:41.760 align:middle line:84% And then there's a run of words-- 00:00:41.760 --> 00:00:44.490 align:middle line:84% "fission," which is nuclear fission, which, of course, is 00:00:44.490 --> 00:00:48.150 align:middle line:84% splitting the atom which was the bomb that was dropped 00:00:48.150 --> 00:00:50.100 align:middle line:90% on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. 00:00:50.100 --> 00:00:53.220 align:middle line:84% And then "fusion," which, instead of splitting the atom, 00:00:53.220 --> 00:00:56.110 align:middle line:84% is putting the nuclei of atoms together, 00:00:56.110 --> 00:00:58.650 align:middle line:90% which was the hydrogen bomb. 00:00:58.650 --> 00:01:00.600 align:middle line:90% And then the third reference-- 00:01:00.600 --> 00:01:02.970 align:middle line:84% well, actually, I referenced "thermonuclear," 00:01:02.970 --> 00:01:05.970 align:middle line:90% which is a fusion bomb. 00:01:05.970 --> 00:01:08.160 align:middle line:84% And then the last one is the cobalt bomb, 00:01:08.160 --> 00:01:12.150 align:middle line:84% which they're developing, and the cobalt bomb basically 00:01:12.150 --> 00:01:19.470 align:middle line:84% can spread its joy everywhere and end all life on Earth. 00:01:19.470 --> 00:01:22.380 align:middle line:84% And then the other thing that's mentioned in here that you 00:01:22.380 --> 00:01:25.980 align:middle line:84% might not be familiar with is Walther, 00:01:25.980 --> 00:01:27.540 align:middle line:84% I think it is in German actually. 00:01:27.540 --> 00:01:32.490 align:middle line:84% And the Walther was a German semi-automatic weapon 00:01:32.490 --> 00:01:35.520 align:middle line:84% that was used during the Nazi era 00:01:35.520 --> 00:01:38.790 align:middle line:84% by the police and the Luftwaffe, German Air Force, 00:01:38.790 --> 00:01:42.210 align:middle line:84% and it's also the gun that Hitler killed himself with, 00:01:42.210 --> 00:01:44.440 align:middle line:90% so there's hope. 00:01:44.440 --> 00:01:44.940 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:01:44.940 --> 00:01:49.470 align:middle line:84% Dictators may sometimes kill themselves. 00:01:49.470 --> 00:01:52.357 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:01:52.357 --> 00:01:53.940 align:middle line:84% Because it's a dark poem, but I'd like 00:01:53.940 --> 00:01:56.830 align:middle line:90% to think that there's hope. 00:01:56.830 --> 00:02:01.300 align:middle line:90% So this is "Idioms for Rain." 00:02:01.300 --> 00:02:04.570 align:middle line:84% Wheelbarrows are falling in the Czech Republic, 00:02:04.570 --> 00:02:07.990 align:middle line:84% but in Wales, old ladies and sticks 00:02:07.990 --> 00:02:12.310 align:middle line:84% are landing on the farms not yet carried off by owls. 00:02:12.310 --> 00:02:16.000 align:middle line:84% Knives and forks are clattering on the barns. 00:02:16.000 --> 00:02:18.310 align:middle line:90% In the sky above New York City-- 00:02:18.310 --> 00:02:22.430 align:middle line:84% one dark cloud of dogs, one of feral cats, 00:02:22.430 --> 00:02:27.820 align:middle line:84% one of lawn gnomes lined up with buckets, more clouds erupting 00:02:27.820 --> 00:02:30.610 align:middle line:84% from their corncob pipes, the storm 00:02:30.610 --> 00:02:34.150 align:middle line:84% getting ready to hammer the rooftop gardens and drive 00:02:34.150 --> 00:02:37.030 align:middle line:84% pigeons into the arms of gargoyles. 00:02:37.030 --> 00:02:39.670 align:middle line:90% Gurgle, gargle. 00:02:39.670 --> 00:02:42.710 align:middle line:84% Some dragon is down with the flu asking, 00:02:42.710 --> 00:02:45.490 align:middle line:84% who am I without my Kundalini breath? 00:02:45.490 --> 00:02:47.500 align:middle line:90% Why don't I have any friends? 00:02:47.500 --> 00:02:51.730 align:middle line:84% As soon as I'm better, I'm going to torch an elementary school. 00:02:51.730 --> 00:02:54.790 align:middle line:84% In Union Square, the vendors are packing up 00:02:54.790 --> 00:02:57.280 align:middle line:90% peaches and artisanal cheeses. 00:02:57.280 --> 00:03:00.100 align:middle line:84% Castles and ponds are being disappeared 00:03:00.100 --> 00:03:04.210 align:middle line:84% from the chess players' tables, shitty art reinstalled 00:03:04.210 --> 00:03:07.390 align:middle line:90% in the museums of panel vans. 00:03:07.390 --> 00:03:10.300 align:middle line:84% Umbrellas and hoodies, tarps on the carts 00:03:10.300 --> 00:03:15.460 align:middle line:84% of the homeless hunkering down while leaves skid around. 00:03:15.460 --> 00:03:19.660 align:middle line:84% In Greece, chair legs drive themselves into stone 00:03:19.660 --> 00:03:22.030 align:middle line:90% and sink into the Aegean. 00:03:22.030 --> 00:03:26.470 align:middle line:84% But in Syria, chemical weapons are descending, meaning 00:03:26.470 --> 00:03:30.190 align:middle line:84% raining down like secretaries and restaurant workers 00:03:30.190 --> 00:03:33.040 align:middle line:84% from the towers, meaning metaphor 00:03:33.040 --> 00:03:36.370 align:middle line:84% is being abandoned for the hell of the real, 00:03:36.370 --> 00:03:40.630 align:middle line:84% meaning what falls from the sky keeps falling. 00:03:40.630 --> 00:03:46.660 align:middle line:84% Fallon, fission, thermonuclear but not yet cobalt. 00:03:46.660 --> 00:03:49.570 align:middle line:84% What the rain said to the wind was not, 00:03:49.570 --> 00:03:51.710 align:middle line:90% you push and I'll pelt-- 00:03:51.710 --> 00:03:52.900 align:middle line:90% that's Robert Frost. 00:03:52.900 --> 00:03:58.030 align:middle line:84% But, let's see who can destroy the most flowers, 00:03:58.030 --> 00:04:01.150 align:middle line:84% though it may also have said, sometimes I want to weep 00:04:01.150 --> 00:04:04.780 align:middle line:84% softly while you moan over the seedlings. 00:04:04.780 --> 00:04:08.200 align:middle line:84% In Germany it rains puppies, were once 00:04:08.200 --> 00:04:10.210 align:middle line:90% rained Walther bullets. 00:04:10.210 --> 00:04:14.560 align:middle line:84% And in Denmark, shoemakers' apprentices land softly 00:04:14.560 --> 00:04:19.139 align:middle line:84% on the Earth and set off to teach whom they can. 00:04:19.139 --> 00:04:21.000 align:middle line:90%