WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:00.600 align:middle line:90% 00:00:00.600 --> 00:00:04.830 align:middle line:84% So, in the end, I realized that this was not simply 00:00:04.830 --> 00:00:06.750 align:middle line:84% a contemporary phenomenon, that this 00:00:06.750 --> 00:00:08.220 align:middle line:84% is something that really goes back 00:00:08.220 --> 00:00:10.560 align:middle line:84% to the beginnings of modern poetry, 00:00:10.560 --> 00:00:14.160 align:middle line:84% and to writers like Marianne Moore and Ezra Pound, 00:00:14.160 --> 00:00:17.430 align:middle line:84% in particular, who drew a lot of their poetics 00:00:17.430 --> 00:00:21.540 align:middle line:84% from their understandings of Asian art, Asian literature, 00:00:21.540 --> 00:00:24.120 align:middle line:84% and what Chinese and Japanese poetry were like. 00:00:24.120 --> 00:00:26.340 align:middle line:84% So, in the end, I really did have 00:00:26.340 --> 00:00:29.250 align:middle line:84% to go back to quote unquote "the source" 00:00:29.250 --> 00:00:33.270 align:middle line:84% and take on the much scarier task of rewriting 00:00:33.270 --> 00:00:36.630 align:middle line:84% the works of some classic modernist poets. 00:00:36.630 --> 00:00:41.490 align:middle line:84% So this was my attempt at rewriting a very famous poem 00:00:41.490 --> 00:00:45.780 align:middle line:84% by Marianne Moore, called "Nine Nectarines." 00:00:45.780 --> 00:00:47.610 align:middle line:84% So this is Chinese science number 82. 00:00:47.610 --> 00:00:50.990 align:middle line:90% 00:00:50.990 --> 00:00:56.690 align:middle line:84% Unchanged by time as Asians are, like intervals 00:00:56.690 --> 00:00:59.480 align:middle line:90% between our words-- 00:00:59.480 --> 00:01:05.260 align:middle line:84% 8 is their lucky number, twigged to what wasn't there before. 00:01:05.260 --> 00:01:09.650 align:middle line:90% They're all unobtrusive nerds. 00:01:09.650 --> 00:01:13.820 align:middle line:84% Although every now and then, a speaking role is seen-- 00:01:13.820 --> 00:01:17.330 align:middle line:90% a pigeon grunt or ninja scream. 00:01:17.330 --> 00:01:20.840 align:middle line:84% Fuzzless, their slender bodies curve 00:01:20.840 --> 00:01:26.450 align:middle line:84% in calligraphic style, that Chinese acrobatic, half 00:01:26.450 --> 00:01:32.030 align:middle line:84% modest lotus pose converts the wrinkled wisdom of the East 00:01:32.030 --> 00:01:35.150 align:middle line:90% to pure American Beauty. 00:01:35.150 --> 00:01:39.470 align:middle line:84% Pink blush applied to our gray visage, 00:01:39.470 --> 00:01:45.300 align:middle line:84% as a pungent yeast makes a flaccid white dough rise. 00:01:45.300 --> 00:01:49.860 align:middle line:84% The grouchy poet-used self-righteous songs cannot 00:01:49.860 --> 00:01:54.210 align:middle line:84% send the shelf of Chinese condiments spilling to the arid 00:01:54.210 --> 00:01:55.350 align:middle line:90% ground-- 00:01:55.350 --> 00:01:58.320 align:middle line:90% above the grave of Ezra Pound. 00:01:58.320 --> 00:02:02.970 align:middle line:84% Secluded homegrown Chinatown, the hothouse fruit 00:02:02.970 --> 00:02:06.290 align:middle line:84% we said we found in China first-- 00:02:06.290 --> 00:02:08.240 align:middle line:90% was it ever theirs? 00:02:08.240 --> 00:02:11.450 align:middle line:90% Old Fenollosa would not say. 00:02:11.450 --> 00:02:16.850 align:middle line:84% One can hear no sound, from that enigmatic group of Chinese-- 00:02:16.850 --> 00:02:22.040 align:middle line:84% their sallow, unrequited voices shallow, as an ink 00:02:22.040 --> 00:02:26.690 align:middle line:84% smudged fingerprint on this much whitened page. 00:02:26.690 --> 00:02:31.100 align:middle line:84% Or in the disregarded rage of the gelded horse, 00:02:31.100 --> 00:02:33.980 align:middle line:84% beneath the ass asleep in the saddle, 00:02:33.980 --> 00:02:39.050 align:middle line:84% whose chin drips with the juice of the low hanging fruit 00:02:39.050 --> 00:02:43.150 align:middle line:90% of the imperial tree in bloom. 00:02:43.150 --> 00:02:46.630 align:middle line:84% A Chinese understands that 100 kinds 00:02:46.630 --> 00:02:50.560 align:middle line:84% of silence made by that mother loving Collins 00:02:50.560 --> 00:02:52.690 align:middle line:90% are only appearance-- 00:02:52.690 --> 00:02:55.990 align:middle line:84% the long-tailed queue of violence 00:02:55.990 --> 00:02:59.650 align:middle line:84% swings blood brown behind our backs. 00:02:59.650 --> 00:03:04.540 align:middle line:84% Black haired historian with feet bound by your orientally 00:03:04.540 --> 00:03:07.080 align:middle line:90% enameled artifacts. 00:03:07.080 --> 00:03:12.380 align:middle line:84% It's on a Chinese that you inscribed this masterpiece. 00:03:12.380 --> 00:03:13.000 align:middle line:90%