WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:00.810 align:middle line:90% 00:00:00.810 --> 00:00:03.007 align:middle line:84% This poem is called "Saying Your Names." 00:00:03.007 --> 00:00:05.990 align:middle line:90% 00:00:05.990 --> 00:00:07.850 align:middle line:90% Chemical names. 00:00:07.850 --> 00:00:09.470 align:middle line:90% Bird names. 00:00:09.470 --> 00:00:13.130 align:middle line:84% Names of fire and flame and stone. 00:00:13.130 --> 00:00:14.540 align:middle line:90% Paint names. 00:00:14.540 --> 00:00:17.450 align:middle line:84% Delicate names like bones in the body. 00:00:17.450 --> 00:00:20.870 align:middle line:84% Rumpelstiltskin names that are always changing. 00:00:20.870 --> 00:00:24.770 align:middle line:84% Names that no one's ever able to figure out. 00:00:24.770 --> 00:00:27.980 align:middle line:90% Names of spells and names hexes. 00:00:27.980 --> 00:00:30.170 align:middle line:84% Names cursed quietly under the breath 00:00:30.170 --> 00:00:35.300 align:middle line:84% or called out loudly to fill the yard, calling you inside again, 00:00:35.300 --> 00:00:37.700 align:middle line:90% calling you home. 00:00:37.700 --> 00:00:42.320 align:middle line:84% Nicknames and pet names and Baroque French monikers 00:00:42.320 --> 00:00:45.380 align:middle line:84% written in shorthand, written in longhand, 00:00:45.380 --> 00:00:49.730 align:middle line:84% scrawled allegedly in brown ink on the backs of photographs 00:00:49.730 --> 00:00:53.420 align:middle line:84% or embossed on envelopes lined with gold. 00:00:53.420 --> 00:00:55.880 align:middle line:84% Names called out across the water. 00:00:55.880 --> 00:01:02.030 align:middle line:84% Names I called you behind your back, sour and delicious, 00:01:02.030 --> 00:01:04.760 align:middle line:90% secret and unrepeatable. 00:01:04.760 --> 00:01:07.880 align:middle line:84% The names of flowers that open only once, 00:01:07.880 --> 00:01:11.090 align:middle line:84% shouted from balconies, shouted from rooftops, 00:01:11.090 --> 00:01:14.120 align:middle line:84% or muffled by pillows or whispered in sleep 00:01:14.120 --> 00:01:17.180 align:middle line:84% or caught in the throat like a lump of meat. 00:01:17.180 --> 00:01:20.420 align:middle line:90% 00:01:20.420 --> 00:01:22.550 align:middle line:90% I try, I do. 00:01:22.550 --> 00:01:24.646 align:middle line:90% I try and try. 00:01:24.646 --> 00:01:28.310 align:middle line:90% A happy ending, sure enough. 00:01:28.310 --> 00:01:31.340 align:middle line:90% Hello, Darling, welcome home. 00:01:31.340 --> 00:01:34.340 align:middle line:84% I'll call you Darling, hold you tight, 00:01:34.340 --> 00:01:38.180 align:middle line:84% we are not traitors when the lights go out. 00:01:38.180 --> 00:01:40.150 align:middle line:90% It's dark. 00:01:40.150 --> 00:01:42.594 align:middle line:90% Sweetheart, is that you? 00:01:42.594 --> 00:01:45.930 align:middle line:90% 00:01:45.930 --> 00:01:50.130 align:middle line:84% There are no tears, no pictures of him squarely. 00:01:50.130 --> 00:01:52.860 align:middle line:84% A sea sign framed in glass and boats, 00:01:52.860 --> 00:01:55.230 align:middle line:84% those little boats with sails aflutter, 00:01:55.230 --> 00:01:58.935 align:middle line:84% shining lights upon the water, lights that splinter one 00:01:58.935 --> 00:02:00.960 align:middle line:90% the end of the pier. 00:02:00.960 --> 00:02:06.540 align:middle line:84% His voice on tape, his name on the envelope. 00:02:06.540 --> 00:02:11.850 align:middle line:84% The soft sound of a body falling off a bridge behind you. 00:02:11.850 --> 00:02:15.140 align:middle line:84% The body hardly even makes a sound. 00:02:15.140 --> 00:02:18.350 align:middle line:84% The waters of dead, the clear road, 00:02:18.350 --> 00:02:23.900 align:middle line:84% every lover in the form of stars, the road blocked. 00:02:23.900 --> 00:02:27.920 align:middle line:84% All night I stretch my arms across rivers of blood, 00:02:27.920 --> 00:02:31.100 align:middle line:84% the dark woods, singing with all my skin and bone, 00:02:31.100 --> 00:02:33.730 align:middle line:90% please keep him safe. 00:02:33.730 --> 00:02:35.680 align:middle line:84% Let him play his head on my chest 00:02:35.680 --> 00:02:40.480 align:middle line:84% and we will be like sailors, swimming in the sound of it, 00:02:40.480 --> 00:02:43.570 align:middle line:90% dashed to pieces. 00:02:43.570 --> 00:02:46.120 align:middle line:84% Makes a cathedral, him pressing against me, 00:02:46.120 --> 00:02:50.350 align:middle line:84% his lips at my neck, and yes, I do believe his mouth 00:02:50.350 --> 00:02:55.780 align:middle line:84% is heaven, his kisses falling over me like stars. 00:02:55.780 --> 00:02:58.660 align:middle line:84% Names of heat and names of light, 00:02:58.660 --> 00:03:02.410 align:middle line:84% themes of collision in the dark, on the side of the bus, 00:03:02.410 --> 00:03:05.680 align:middle line:84% in the bark of the tree, in ballpoint pen on jeans 00:03:05.680 --> 00:03:09.370 align:middle line:84% and hands and the backs of matchbooks that then get lost. 00:03:09.370 --> 00:03:12.970 align:middle line:84% Names like pain cries, names like tombstones, 00:03:12.970 --> 00:03:18.880 align:middle line:84% names forgotten and reinvented, names forbidden or overused. 00:03:18.880 --> 00:03:22.750 align:middle line:84% Your name, like a song, I sing to myself. 00:03:22.750 --> 00:03:25.630 align:middle line:84% Your name, like a box where I keep my love. 00:03:25.630 --> 00:03:28.210 align:middle line:84% Your name, like a nest in the tree of love. 00:03:28.210 --> 00:03:30.410 align:middle line:84% Your name, like a boat in the sea of love. 00:03:30.410 --> 00:03:33.940 align:middle line:84% Oh, now we're in the sea of love! 00:03:33.940 --> 00:03:37.900 align:middle line:84% Your name like detergent in the washing machine. 00:03:37.900 --> 00:03:42.490 align:middle line:84% Your name like two Xs, like punched- in eyes, 00:03:42.490 --> 00:03:46.150 align:middle line:84% like a drunk cartoon passed out in the gutter. 00:03:46.150 --> 00:03:50.740 align:middle line:84% Your name with two Xs to mark the spots, to hold the place, 00:03:50.740 --> 00:03:54.700 align:middle line:84% to keep the treasure from becoming ever lost. 00:03:54.700 --> 00:03:56.900 align:middle line:84% I'm saying your name of the grocery store. 00:03:56.900 --> 00:04:01.120 align:middle line:84% I'm saying your name on the bridge at dawn. 00:04:01.120 --> 00:04:04.090 align:middle line:84% Your name like an animal covered with frost. 00:04:04.090 --> 00:04:07.240 align:middle line:84% Your name like a music that's been transposed. 00:04:07.240 --> 00:04:10.900 align:middle line:84% A suit of fur, a coat of mud, a kick in the pants, 00:04:10.900 --> 00:04:14.015 align:middle line:84% a lung full of glass, the sails in the wind, and the slap 00:04:14.015 --> 00:04:15.640 align:middle line:84% of waves, and the hull of a boat that's 00:04:15.640 --> 00:04:20.050 align:middle line:84% sinking, to the sound of mermaids singing songs of love 00:04:20.050 --> 00:04:26.260 align:middle line:84% in the tub of a simple, profound sadness when it sounds so far 00:04:26.260 --> 00:04:28.000 align:middle line:90% away. 00:04:28.000 --> 00:04:32.110 align:middle line:84% Here is a map with your name for a capital. 00:04:32.110 --> 00:04:35.800 align:middle line:84% Here is an arrow to prove a point. 00:04:35.800 --> 00:04:39.550 align:middle line:84% We laugh and it pits the world against us. 00:04:39.550 --> 00:04:44.680 align:middle line:84% We laugh and we've got nothing left to lose. 00:04:44.680 --> 00:04:49.190 align:middle line:84% I came to tell you we'll swim in the water. 00:04:49.190 --> 00:04:52.780 align:middle line:84% We'll swim like something sparkling underneath the glass, 00:04:52.780 --> 00:04:55.900 align:middle line:84% our bodies shivering and the sound of our breathing 00:04:55.900 --> 00:04:59.710 align:middle line:90% and the shore so far away. 00:04:59.710 --> 00:05:02.470 align:middle line:84% I use my body like a ladder, climbing 00:05:02.470 --> 00:05:05.530 align:middle line:84% to the thing behind it, saying farewell to flesh, 00:05:05.530 --> 00:05:10.180 align:middle line:84% farewell to everything caught underfoot and flattened. 00:05:10.180 --> 00:05:11.680 align:middle line:90% Names of poisons. 00:05:11.680 --> 00:05:13.660 align:middle line:90% Names of handguns. 00:05:13.660 --> 00:05:15.670 align:middle line:84% Names of places we've been together. 00:05:15.670 --> 00:05:18.640 align:middle line:84% Names of people we'd be together. 00:05:18.640 --> 00:05:19.840 align:middle line:90% Names of endurance. 00:05:19.840 --> 00:05:21.160 align:middle line:90% Names of devotion. 00:05:21.160 --> 00:05:24.370 align:middle line:84% Street names and place names and all the names 00:05:24.370 --> 00:05:28.240 align:middle line:84% of our dark heaven crackling in their pan. 00:05:28.240 --> 00:05:31.370 align:middle line:90% It's a bed of straw, darling. 00:05:31.370 --> 00:05:33.460 align:middle line:90% It sure as shit is. 00:05:33.460 --> 00:05:36.430 align:middle line:90% 00:05:36.430 --> 00:05:42.430 align:middle line:84% If there was one thing I could save from the fire, he said, 00:05:42.430 --> 00:05:46.660 align:middle line:84% the broken arms of the sycamore, the eucalyptus still trying 00:05:46.660 --> 00:05:50.980 align:middle line:84% to climb out of the yard, your breath on my neck 00:05:50.980 --> 00:05:54.010 align:middle line:84% like the music that holds my hands down, 00:05:54.010 --> 00:05:59.140 align:middle line:84% kisses as they burn their way across my spine or rain, 00:05:59.140 --> 00:06:02.590 align:middle line:84% our bodies wet, clothes clinging arm to elbow, 00:06:02.590 --> 00:06:05.740 align:middle line:84% clothes clinging nipple to groin. 00:06:05.740 --> 00:06:08.290 align:middle line:90% I'll be right here. 00:06:08.290 --> 00:06:10.330 align:middle line:90% I'm waiting. 00:06:10.330 --> 00:06:12.880 align:middle line:90% Say hallelujah. 00:06:12.880 --> 00:06:14.140 align:middle line:90% Say good night. 00:06:14.140 --> 00:06:17.860 align:middle line:84% Say it over the canned music and your feet won't stumble. 00:06:17.860 --> 00:06:22.360 align:middle line:84% His face getting larger, the rest wearing on every side. 00:06:22.360 --> 00:06:27.100 align:middle line:84% And angels, about 12 angels, angels knocking on your head 00:06:27.100 --> 00:06:28.000 align:middle line:90% right now. 00:06:28.000 --> 00:06:29.500 align:middle line:90% Hello, hello. 00:06:29.500 --> 00:06:31.630 align:middle line:90% A flash in the sky. 00:06:31.630 --> 00:06:35.563 align:middle line:84% Would you like to meet him there in heaven? 00:06:35.563 --> 00:06:38.800 align:middle line:90% 00:06:38.800 --> 00:06:41.290 align:middle line:90% Imagine a room. 00:06:41.290 --> 00:06:43.750 align:middle line:90% A sudden glow. 00:06:43.750 --> 00:06:50.920 align:middle line:84% Here is my hand, my heart, my throat, my wrist. 00:06:50.920 --> 00:06:55.100 align:middle line:84% Here are the illuminated cities at the center of me. 00:06:55.100 --> 00:06:58.900 align:middle line:84% And here is the center of me, which 00:06:58.900 --> 00:07:04.180 align:middle line:84% is a lake, which is a well that we can drink from. 00:07:04.180 --> 00:07:07.560 align:middle line:90% But I can't go through with it. 00:07:07.560 --> 00:07:10.830 align:middle line:84% I just don't want to die anymore. 00:07:10.830 --> 00:07:12.000 align:middle line:90%