WEBVTT

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I should say that the last
poem that I read and this one

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were published in Ironwood.

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And that wasn't
just any magazine.

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I didn't mean what I said
about magazines about Ironwood.

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But then it doesn't
exist anymore,

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which is why it's great.

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"From the New World."

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In this poem, in
the second stanza,

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there's a phrase, "should
You be keeping track,"

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and that y in the
you is a capital Y.

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It's the only time in the
poem though that's the case.

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You all might remember there was
a trial of a man named Ivan who

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lived in Cleveland and was
tried for crimes committed

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during the Holocaust,
was tried in Israel.

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And it was reported extensively
on television in this country.

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"Has to do with the
story about the girl who

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didn't die in the gas
chamber, who came back

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out asking for her mother.

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Then the moment--
the next coil--

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where the guard,
Ivan, since the '50s,

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an auto worker in
Cleveland, orders a man

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on his way in to rape her.

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Then the narrowing, the
tightening, but not in hunger.

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No, the witness recollecting
this on the stand

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somewhere in Israel
in February '87,

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should You be keeping track.

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Has to do with her coming back
out, asking for her mother?

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Can you help me in this?

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Are you there in your stillness?

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Is it a real place?

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God knows I too want
the poem to continue.

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I want the silky
swerve into shapeliness

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and then the click shut.

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And then the issue of sincerity,
the glossy, diamond-backed skin

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will you buy me?

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Will you take me home?

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About the one who didn't die.

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Her face still there on
the new stalk of her body

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as the doors open.

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The one who didn't like
her relentless treble

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coming back out right there
into the thing we call daylight.

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But which is what now?

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Unmoored.

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The one time I knew
something about us,

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though, I couldn't say what.

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My grandmother then
already ill took me

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by the hand asking
to be introduced.

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And then, no, you are not jury.

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But thank you for
saying you are.

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No, I'm sure I
know her, you see.

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I went into the bathroom,
locked the door,

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stood in front of the mirrored
wall, not so much to see in,

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not looking up at all, in fact.

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But to be held in
it as by a gas.

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The thing which was me
there in its chamber.

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Reader, they were all in there.

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I didn't look up.

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They were all in there.

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The coiling and
uncoiling billions,

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the about-to-be-seized.

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The about to be held down.

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The about to be held
down a bit clean-shaped.

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And the other ones too,
the ones gone back out,

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the ending wrapped around
them, hands up to their faces.

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Why?

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I don't know.

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And the about to be stepping in.

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One form at a time stepping
in as if to stay clean.

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Stepping over something
to get into here,

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something there on the
floor now dissolving.

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Not looking down, but
stepping up to clear it,

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and clearing it.

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Stepping in without existence
and then with existence.

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Then into the clearing as
it clamps down all around.

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Then into the fable
as it clamps down.

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We put her in a
Home, mother paid.

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We put him in a
Home, mother paid.

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There wasn't one that would take
both of them we could afford.

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We were right.

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We put them down the
road, it's all there.

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There was a marriage
of 50 years.

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You know this
already, don't you?

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Fill in the blanks.

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They never saw each other again.

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Paralyzed on his back
the last few years,

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he bribed himself
a private line.

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He rigged the phone so
he could talk, et cetera.

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You know this.

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We put her in X. She'd fallen
out, we put her back in.

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There, in her diaper
sitting with her purse

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in her hands all day, every
day asking, can I go now?

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Meaning, him-- meaning,
the apartment by then

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long since let go.

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You know this, don't you?

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Shifting wind, sorting,
and resorting the stuff--

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flesh.

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Now the sun struck
field beyond her window.

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Now her hands on the '40s
sunburst, silver clasp.

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The white patent
leather pocketbook.

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I stood there.

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Let the silver down
all over my shoulders.

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The sink, the gold
speck formica.

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The water uncoiling.

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Then the click like
a lock being tried.

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Then the hollow caressing
the back of my neck.

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Then the whole thing
like a benediction.

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You can't shake off.

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And the eyes,
unfastening, nervous as

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if they smelled something
up there and had to go,

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don't wait for me.

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The eyes lifting up
into the decoration.

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The eyes looking.

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Poor thing as if real,
as if in the place.

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The twitch where the
eyes meet the eyes.

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A blush.

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You see, it's not the matter
of her coming back out alive,

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is it?

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It's the asking for
the please, isn't it?

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Then the man standing up, the
witness, screaming, it's him,

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it's him.

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I'm sure your honor, I'm sure.

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Then Ivan coming up
to him, and Ivan, you

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saw this, offering his hand.

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Click, whoever he is.

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And the old man getting
a dial-tone, friend,

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and old whoever clicking
and clicking the clasp,

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the silver knobs,
shall we end on them?

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A tracking shot?

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A close up on the clasp, a
two-headed beast it turns out

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made of silvery leaves.

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Where would you go now?

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Where?

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Screaming, it's him.

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It's him.

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At the point where she comes
back out, something begins.

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Yes, something new.

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Something completely new.

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But what?

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They're underneath
the screaming.

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What?

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Like what?

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I wonder, to make the bodies
come on, to make room.

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Like what?

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I whisper.

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Like, which is the
last new world.

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Like, like, which is
the thin young body

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before it's made to go back
in, whispering please."

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[APPLAUSE]

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