WEBVTT

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I'm going to begin
with a couple of poems

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that I was asked to read.

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I was asked to read
a few of the poems

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that I wrote about
Sylvia the pig.

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And I think I'll start with
some of those to warm up with.

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Sylvia was a Hampshire pig.

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She was black and
white, that is to say.

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And she was a pet pig.

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She lived most of her life
in Vermont, some of it

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in Western Massachusetts.

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And she was a house pig.

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And not only was she trained
but she trained her piglets

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like a cat training its kittens.

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And somehow rather,
I don't know how

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it happened because my publisher
is really very nice and very

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considerate and I usually get
consulted about these things

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but somehow or other
look the kind of jacket

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copy for this book claim
that these pig dreams, which

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is what the pig poems were
called, were wry satire.

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Well, they weren't.

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[LAUGHTER]

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I've always been very fond of
pigs and I was fond of this pig

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and I just got into trying
to articulate her life

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and thoughts.

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[LAUGHTER]

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So I will read you the opening
poem of the Pig Dreams.

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And I will also
before I do so read

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you the titles of those
poems because it gives you

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a little idea perhaps of that
book, which first appeared

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as a separate book actually
with pictures of Sylvia

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and friends in pastel
colored pictures

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by her human person Liebe
Coolidge who's an artist.

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So Pig Dreams: Scenes
from the Life of Sylvia

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comprise "Her Destiny."

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"Dog Brothers," "The Cat Pig,"
"Winterpig," "The Bride,"

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"Her Task," "Her Secret,"
"Her Nightmare," "Her Lament,"

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"Her Sadness," "Her Sister,"
"Her Delight," "Her Judgment,"

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"Pig Song," "Her
Vision," "Her Prayer,"

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and finally "Isis Speaks."

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Most pigs are
worshipers of Ishtar

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but her best friend
was a cow and so

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she also worshipped Isis.

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Now, I'll read you the
first one, "Her Destiny,"

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which sort of sets the scene.

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The beginning piglet
among piglets.

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The soft mud caking our mother's
teats, sweet squeal grunt.

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Her stiff white lashes,
the sleepy glint

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of her precious tiny eyes.

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But I am Sylvia.

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Chosen.

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I was established pet,
to be the pig of dreams,

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the pig any of us could
be, taken out of the sty

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away from the ravaged
soil of pig yards.

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Freed from boredom and ugliness.

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I was chosen to live
without dread of slaughter.

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For three days after they took
me I hungered, nowhere a teat

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to suck from, no piglet
siblings to jostle and nudge.

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At last in the full
moon's sacred light

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in the human room where
I'd run in circles

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till my tapping trotters
almost gave way,

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the he human, naked and
white as my lost mother,

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bent on all fours over
my untouched bowl,

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his beard a veil before me.

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And with musical loud sounds
of guzzling, showed me eating.

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Gave me the joy of survival.

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Quick learner, soon
I could hold my shit.

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I was rocked in warm
human arms, cuddling.

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Every pig could be cuddled
if there were justice.

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Every human could have
its intelligent pig,

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every pig its dexterous human.

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Our lives would be rich as
creamy corn, tasty as acorns.

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