WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:02.840 align:middle line:90% 00:00:02.840 --> 00:00:06.040 align:middle line:90% How much more? 00:00:06.040 --> 00:00:07.120 align:middle line:90% OK, all right. 00:00:07.120 --> 00:00:09.782 align:middle line:90% 00:00:09.782 --> 00:00:10.990 align:middle line:90% All right, what are we doing? 00:00:10.990 --> 00:00:17.560 align:middle line:90% 00:00:17.560 --> 00:00:25.770 align:middle line:84% So when you're among poets, then you're 00:00:25.770 --> 00:00:29.670 align:middle line:84% always discussing poetry, obviously-- good, bad poetry. 00:00:29.670 --> 00:00:31.740 align:middle line:90% What-- how you can-- 00:00:31.740 --> 00:00:37.900 align:middle line:84% what your process is like, what you can do with it. 00:00:37.900 --> 00:00:39.850 align:middle line:84% A bunch of the poems in this book 00:00:39.850 --> 00:00:42.670 align:middle line:84% were originally written as postcards. 00:00:42.670 --> 00:00:46.570 align:middle line:84% And a bunch of them I fold into the book because a postcard 00:00:46.570 --> 00:00:48.100 align:middle line:90% is a thing that-- 00:00:48.100 --> 00:00:53.770 align:middle line:84% one, it has that surrealist juxtaposition of text and image 00:00:53.770 --> 00:00:57.910 align:middle line:84% that are somewhat random, like Exquisite Corpse. 00:00:57.910 --> 00:01:03.010 align:middle line:84% And also it goes from point A to point 00:01:03.010 --> 00:01:13.840 align:middle line:84% B in some fortuitous and random flight, 00:01:13.840 --> 00:01:19.430 align:middle line:84% and it's improvisational in a certain sense. 00:01:19.430 --> 00:01:21.670 align:middle line:84% So there's a bunch of postcards in here, 00:01:21.670 --> 00:01:25.180 align:middle line:84% and this is a postcard called City Terrace Postcard, 00:01:25.180 --> 00:01:27.850 align:middle line:84% and that the City Terrace is the neighborhood in which 00:01:27.850 --> 00:01:31.720 align:middle line:84% my mom still lives in, the neighborhood in which I grew up 00:01:31.720 --> 00:01:34.210 align:middle line:90% in. 00:01:34.210 --> 00:01:40.150 align:middle line:84% And it's about somebody that I was wrong about. 00:01:40.150 --> 00:01:43.780 align:middle line:84% And so this poem is wrong, it's not correct. 00:01:43.780 --> 00:01:46.410 align:middle line:90% 00:01:46.410 --> 00:01:48.180 align:middle line:84% And I'll tell you why in a minute. 00:01:48.180 --> 00:01:50.190 align:middle line:84% All right, "City Terrace Postcard." 00:01:50.190 --> 00:01:53.130 align:middle line:84% "It's 10:00 AM Rocha, in a cold wind 00:01:53.130 --> 00:01:57.450 align:middle line:84% you stand guard, sentinel from the old days, 00:01:57.450 --> 00:02:00.900 align:middle line:84% standing in the shadows on the front steps of City Terrace 00:02:00.900 --> 00:02:02.400 align:middle line:90% Elementary. 00:02:02.400 --> 00:02:04.650 align:middle line:84% But I catch your silhouette from the streetlight 00:02:04.650 --> 00:02:07.380 align:middle line:84% on the corner of CT & Eastern, as I drive 00:02:07.380 --> 00:02:10.800 align:middle line:90% by like I usually do, Rocha. 00:02:10.800 --> 00:02:13.410 align:middle line:84% I see you like I always do, Jack in the Box 00:02:13.410 --> 00:02:17.480 align:middle line:84% drink on the top step, all chubby now. 00:02:17.480 --> 00:02:18.950 align:middle line:90% You're the same age as me. 00:02:18.950 --> 00:02:21.050 align:middle line:90% Your face taut and thick. 00:02:21.050 --> 00:02:25.580 align:middle line:84% Your ponytail gone gray, straggly down your back. 00:02:25.580 --> 00:02:30.860 align:middle line:84% It's staring-- it's cold staring at Eastern Avenue traffic 00:02:30.860 --> 00:02:35.010 align:middle line:84% in the dark, but you got a thick, black jacket 00:02:35.010 --> 00:02:38.130 align:middle line:84% and a steely look on your face, as if to say, yeah, 00:02:38.130 --> 00:02:39.900 align:middle line:90% they shot me, but so what? 00:02:39.900 --> 00:02:42.320 align:middle line:90% I'm still here. 00:02:42.320 --> 00:02:44.990 align:middle line:84% They shot you, Rocha, and so what, you're still here, 00:02:44.990 --> 00:02:47.730 align:middle line:84% but does your mom know where you are? 00:02:47.730 --> 00:02:52.610 align:middle line:84% She was our hostess, den mother to the cub scout troop. 00:02:52.610 --> 00:02:55.940 align:middle line:84% When Sixto and my brother were still alive-- 00:02:55.940 --> 00:03:00.980 align:middle line:84% I doubt you remember, that later you sold my brother angel 00:03:00.980 --> 00:03:04.040 align:middle line:84% dust when you were dealing out of that house, 00:03:04.040 --> 00:03:08.020 align:middle line:84% and we never saw your mom again after that. 00:03:08.020 --> 00:03:12.430 align:middle line:84% Did you tear up her last dreams and throw them in her face? 00:03:12.430 --> 00:03:16.030 align:middle line:90% Or is this her last dream-- 00:03:16.030 --> 00:03:20.200 align:middle line:84% you standing in the shadows of 10:00 AM Sunday night, 00:03:20.200 --> 00:03:25.480 align:middle line:84% with that look on your face, so your brother died last month 00:03:25.480 --> 00:03:28.420 align:middle line:90% from this shit, so what? 00:03:28.420 --> 00:03:33.670 align:middle line:84% You ever bump into my mom, tell her I'm still here." 00:03:33.670 --> 00:03:40.170 align:middle line:84% And the reason that the poem is not right 00:03:40.170 --> 00:03:45.900 align:middle line:84% is because like, he was not a bad guy, that guy, 00:03:45.900 --> 00:03:48.880 align:middle line:90% but had anger. 00:03:48.880 --> 00:03:52.270 align:middle line:90% 00:03:52.270 --> 00:03:57.780 align:middle line:84% And then so I walk around the neighborhood, 00:03:57.780 --> 00:04:00.510 align:middle line:84% drive up to my mom's house and walk around. 00:04:00.510 --> 00:04:05.580 align:middle line:84% And he sees me like he's lurking around the neighborhood 00:04:05.580 --> 00:04:06.270 align:middle line:90% all the time. 00:04:06.270 --> 00:04:08.660 align:middle line:90% I don't know what he does. 00:04:08.660 --> 00:04:14.890 align:middle line:84% But he said, hey, I heard your brother died, sorry about that. 00:04:14.890 --> 00:04:23.410 align:middle line:84% So yeah, he really knew more and more about me, I think, 00:04:23.410 --> 00:04:31.610 align:middle line:84% than I knew about him, and so that poem published. 00:04:31.610 --> 00:04:32.640 align:middle line:90% It's not really right. 00:04:32.640 --> 00:04:34.820 align:middle line:84% There's something wrong with that poem. 00:04:34.820 --> 00:04:39.230 align:middle line:84% There's something not correct, not true, not generous 00:04:39.230 --> 00:04:39.950 align:middle line:90% about that poem. 00:04:39.950 --> 00:04:44.030 align:middle line:90% 00:04:44.030 --> 00:04:52.320 align:middle line:84% Yeah, and I guess I feel like I can put these things out 00:04:52.320 --> 00:05:00.260 align:middle line:84% in public and I should own up to them like, yeah. 00:05:00.260 --> 00:05:01.500 align:middle line:90% All right. 00:05:01.500 --> 00:05:02.000 align:middle line:90%