WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:02.940 align:middle line:84% I'm going to read a poem that, I think, 00:00:02.940 --> 00:00:06.840 align:middle line:84% I, finally, finished tinkering with. 00:00:06.840 --> 00:00:09.940 align:middle line:84% It's called The Last Packard, Until We Win The War, 00:00:09.940 --> 00:00:12.630 align:middle line:84% and it's based on an issue of Life Magazine. 00:00:12.630 --> 00:00:15.240 align:middle line:90% 00:00:15.240 --> 00:00:17.520 align:middle line:84% The date is mentioned in the poem itself. 00:00:17.520 --> 00:00:21.420 align:middle line:84% It's, again, a combination of prose and verse lines, 00:00:21.420 --> 00:00:27.690 align:middle line:84% and the verse lines, well, I think you'll 00:00:27.690 --> 00:00:29.685 align:middle line:90% recognize which is which. 00:00:29.685 --> 00:00:32.220 align:middle line:90% 00:00:32.220 --> 00:00:34.980 align:middle line:90% I was a child during the war. 00:00:34.980 --> 00:00:36.870 align:middle line:90% First, let me say that-- 00:00:36.870 --> 00:00:39.780 align:middle line:84% and I think this will actually be quite obvious 00:00:39.780 --> 00:00:45.540 align:middle line:84% that the poem refers to many of the ads in that issue of Life 00:00:45.540 --> 00:00:48.240 align:middle line:90% and to a number of the articles. 00:00:48.240 --> 00:00:50.310 align:middle line:90% And, again, it was 1945. 00:00:50.310 --> 00:00:54.210 align:middle line:84% It was almost the end of the war. 00:00:54.210 --> 00:00:56.160 align:middle line:84% Could smell that the end was coming, 00:00:56.160 --> 00:01:03.960 align:middle line:84% but nonetheless, the war effort was still very gung ho as such. 00:01:03.960 --> 00:01:05.820 align:middle line:90% I was a child during the war. 00:01:05.820 --> 00:01:07.090 align:middle line:90% It marked me. 00:01:07.090 --> 00:01:10.440 align:middle line:84% I hope you have noticed my seriousness. 00:01:10.440 --> 00:01:18.100 align:middle line:84% Life, April 16, 1945, Ike's massive forehead. 00:01:18.100 --> 00:01:21.570 align:middle line:84% Creases I hiked in my Poll Parrot shoes. 00:01:21.570 --> 00:01:25.140 align:middle line:84% Rosebud mouth is especially bad on round faces. 00:01:25.140 --> 00:01:28.260 align:middle line:84% Full mouth becomes Barbara Nelson. 00:01:28.260 --> 00:01:31.575 align:middle line:84% 17 shells have hit in the target area above. 00:01:31.575 --> 00:01:34.470 align:middle line:90% 00:01:34.470 --> 00:01:38.010 align:middle line:84% Child, you could be such a piece of sweetness and communism, 00:01:38.010 --> 00:01:42.630 align:middle line:84% a pinwheel worrying up over this republic of coming and going 00:01:42.630 --> 00:01:43.545 align:middle line:90% grasshopper lights. 00:01:43.545 --> 00:01:46.430 align:middle line:90% 00:01:46.430 --> 00:01:50.930 align:middle line:84% This is how we looked when US troops freed him last week. 00:01:50.930 --> 00:01:54.320 align:middle line:84% Exaggerated mouth looks bad on lean faces. 00:01:54.320 --> 00:01:57.380 align:middle line:84% This one's right for Carolyn Kasler. 00:01:57.380 --> 00:02:00.050 align:middle line:84% The men opened their mouths to lessen the concussion 00:02:00.050 --> 00:02:02.030 align:middle line:90% on their eardrums. 00:02:02.030 --> 00:02:05.270 align:middle line:84% The laughs of a nation of all American traits, none 00:02:05.270 --> 00:02:07.790 align:middle line:84% is more characteristic than our universal appreciation 00:02:07.790 --> 00:02:10.520 align:middle line:90% of comedy. 00:02:10.520 --> 00:02:18.960 align:middle line:84% I want bags, Bradley said, bags, bags, bags, bags, 00:02:18.960 --> 00:02:21.360 align:middle line:90% but she called him fool. 00:02:21.360 --> 00:02:23.100 align:middle line:84% What good will all the riches on Earth 00:02:23.100 --> 00:02:25.680 align:middle line:84% do me if I just sit on the saddle? 00:02:25.680 --> 00:02:28.630 align:middle line:90% 00:02:28.630 --> 00:02:32.530 align:middle line:84% A war is not won, until the last shot is fired. 00:02:32.530 --> 00:02:34.660 align:middle line:90% Continue to give blood. 00:02:34.660 --> 00:02:37.870 align:middle line:84% On D-day, a Jeep must be ready to roll the instant the ship 00:02:37.870 --> 00:02:42.660 align:middle line:84% grounds, and thanks to Veedol motor oil, it is. 00:02:42.660 --> 00:02:47.700 align:middle line:84% Oh, clouds, oh, spirits, did you see my vulture of syringes 00:02:47.700 --> 00:02:51.290 align:middle line:90% captured at the border? 00:02:51.290 --> 00:02:54.350 align:middle line:84% The happier you are, the lovelier you are. 00:02:54.350 --> 00:02:57.110 align:middle line:90% Fresh up, keep smiling. 00:02:57.110 --> 00:02:59.180 align:middle line:84% You've been in a gray fog since the day 00:02:59.180 --> 00:03:05.030 align:middle line:84% he went away, half seeing, half hearing, hardly daring to hope. 00:03:05.030 --> 00:03:07.130 align:middle line:90% Then the sun floods in. 00:03:07.130 --> 00:03:08.750 align:middle line:90% Your man is yours. 00:03:08.750 --> 00:03:10.310 align:middle line:90% You're his. 00:03:10.310 --> 00:03:14.630 align:middle line:84% Here at Community, we'll have the finest silver plate for you 00:03:14.630 --> 00:03:18.890 align:middle line:84% when your man comes home, home for keeps, 00:03:18.890 --> 00:03:22.940 align:middle line:84% and a kitchen for me that's full of magical things. 00:03:22.940 --> 00:03:27.950 align:middle line:84% Blown dams farther South, rosebud shells 00:03:27.950 --> 00:03:33.940 align:middle line:84% have hit Barbara Nelson, her melting helmet. 00:03:33.940 --> 00:03:36.700 align:middle line:84% A man who has just come up trail is bending over 00:03:36.700 --> 00:03:38.230 align:middle line:90% to keep out of sight. 00:03:38.230 --> 00:03:40.870 align:middle line:84% Helen, honey looks better this way. 00:03:40.870 --> 00:03:43.270 align:middle line:84% Promise yourself you'll keep your hands as thrillingly 00:03:43.270 --> 00:03:45.670 align:middle line:90% lovely as they are now. 00:03:45.670 --> 00:03:48.580 align:middle line:84% You decreed, years ago, that these lives 00:03:48.580 --> 00:03:52.600 align:middle line:84% be saved when you first demanded US rubber products. 00:03:52.600 --> 00:03:56.650 align:middle line:84% A weird assortment of our boys be crutched, bandaged, 00:03:56.650 --> 00:03:57.330 align:middle line:90% splintered. 00:03:57.330 --> 00:04:01.220 align:middle line:90% 00:04:01.220 --> 00:04:04.550 align:middle line:84% The mosquito evening stands on long legs. 00:04:04.550 --> 00:04:11.390 align:middle line:84% Live veins blister up now, departures red pout mouth 00:04:11.390 --> 00:04:13.400 align:middle line:90% blisters up now. 00:04:13.400 --> 00:04:16.910 align:middle line:90% Set then moon your cirrus table. 00:04:16.910 --> 00:04:20.329 align:middle line:84% Best return on your dollar one slice of bread, 00:04:20.329 --> 00:04:24.170 align:middle line:84% unpeeled potatoes, one bowl of pea soup per day. 00:04:24.170 --> 00:04:27.800 align:middle line:84% Light, then, the [? Scud ?] bread; light, then, 00:04:27.800 --> 00:04:30.080 align:middle line:84% the new skills born of war, the building 00:04:30.080 --> 00:04:34.140 align:middle line:90% of a greater, happier nation. 00:04:34.140 --> 00:04:38.910 align:middle line:84% Then it's actually a speech given by Gertrude Stein 00:04:38.910 --> 00:04:40.950 align:middle line:90% to the troops. 00:04:40.950 --> 00:04:42.810 align:middle line:84% The French are very disappointed. 00:04:42.810 --> 00:04:45.150 align:middle line:84% Last time, everybody was drunk all the time. 00:04:45.150 --> 00:04:47.850 align:middle line:84% All right, you'll have to go to the Pacific, and the Pacific, 00:04:47.850 --> 00:04:49.860 align:middle line:84% you'll have people to smile at too. 00:04:49.860 --> 00:04:52.170 align:middle line:90% Not Japs waving their finger. 00:04:52.170 --> 00:04:55.560 align:middle line:84% Nobody wants to smile at Japs, but there are Chinaman. 00:04:55.560 --> 00:04:58.350 align:middle line:90% Chinamen are kindly people too. 00:04:58.350 --> 00:05:02.730 align:middle line:84% What I am getting at is that, in this horrible war, 00:05:02.730 --> 00:05:07.520 align:middle line:84% we're in danger of losing our humanity. 00:05:07.520 --> 00:05:11.000 align:middle line:84% Homeless drifts in the cloud ways of destruction. 00:05:11.000 --> 00:05:13.370 align:middle line:90% You cannot turn to one another. 00:05:13.370 --> 00:05:15.020 align:middle line:90% Some of you are dead. 00:05:15.020 --> 00:05:18.020 align:middle line:84% Only the holy remains intact without a location. 00:05:18.020 --> 00:05:19.940 align:middle line:90% Do you see? 00:05:19.940 --> 00:05:22.550 align:middle line:84% Go now, like language opened up at great depth. 00:05:22.550 --> 00:05:24.390 align:middle line:90% Can you imagine? 00:05:24.390 --> 00:05:26.700 align:middle line:84% Where there are no gods, phantoms 00:05:26.700 --> 00:05:29.190 align:middle line:90% wander in the cloudways. 00:05:29.190 --> 00:05:31.620 align:middle line:90% Hatred's dispersals. 00:05:31.620 --> 00:05:33.680 align:middle line:90% Do you see now?