WEBVTT

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You know, if you did graduate
work here at the U of A,

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to be reading in the Modern
Languages Auditorium,

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it's kind of the equivalent
of going to Carnegie

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Hall with poorer aesthetics.

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This first poem-- and I'm going
to read mostly poems from a new

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manuscript that I've just
finished entitled Late Empire--

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the first one takes place
in this neighborhood

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in the Chicago where
we're now living.

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And it's Rogers Park, which
is right in the northern part

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of Chicago.

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And it's kind of like the
neighborhood you would

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expect in a city 100 years ago.

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It's still a melting
pot neighborhood

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that hasn't melted yet.

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So in our neighborhood,
you have a lot

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of like Ukrainians,
Estonians, Hispanics,

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a lot of recent Russian
Jewish immigrants.

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So when you walk
down the street,

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you hear four or five
different languages

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on any kind of given block.

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And that's partly in there.

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There are some memories
from childhood in too.

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I'll just read the poem.

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It's called "Human
Form," Loyola Park.

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"Two weeks past Labor Day, the
lifeguard towers pulled down,

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replaced by Ukrainian
crones on benches,

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chattering beyond
the yuppie jogging

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suit scoring crack from a
second jogging suit, which nods.

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Blink eyes and the deal's done.

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The Black guy ambling
off, the doctor,

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lawyer, investment banker,
unlocking the door of his BMW.

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Mexican Independence
Day, raised banderas

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snapping beside braziers.

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Women in armchair
circles, men kicking

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soccer balls, careful not to
spill their cans of Pabst.

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Local color, that's
the way to start.

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Voice off, long shot
of the lake, caption.

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Portrait of the author
circa 1991 or two or three.

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Time when the gods descend to
walk the evening, human form.

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May the author
now erase himself.

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He is tired of his
small, mourning self.

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He has a working title,
Poem Without a Body Count.

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And yet did the gods descend
to bring his mother back

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from last night's dream?

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Bald from the chemo, raising
herself from the car,

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one shoe off, that's all.

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Close up to the author, long
shot of the lake, empty beach

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but for this couple.

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Operatically obese, each of them
headphoned to a metal detector.

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Cumbersome back and forth
along the sand like stitchery.

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The woman gestures and
the man grunts back.

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May the author
now erase himself.

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The woman bends down.

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This shape she's taken,
how slowly it sifts

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through the sand with a trowel.

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Catch anything?

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Bottle caps, quarters,
someone's cheap wedding ring,

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electroplated, gleaming.

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Yet this is not a
wedding ring, but a coal

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glowing as the woman,
believe me as I say this,

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places it upon the
author's tongue.

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Do the gods not have the power
to bestow such gifts of vision?

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And does the coal not
burn me even as I speak?

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I am nine again.

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And helping her to stack
the canned goods and radio

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batteries in the
basement fallout shelter.

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For Khrushchev is
sending missiles to Cuba.

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And if my father comes
home tomorrow or next week,

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the room will be prepared.

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And we shall enter it as
if we were whole, a family.

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The coal, searing orange,
my tongue composed of fire.

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My happiness as I hand her
soup cans, bags of rice.

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And from the flame,
I watch her hand

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reach out to touch my hair, run
fingers through it absently.

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Of fire she has fashioned me.

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Of sparks flaring
out with her strokes,

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cascading, acetylene white."

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