[APPLAUSE]
So the thing you want to know about when a poet reads
new poems, it means if you ever should see them again,
they may be different.
Who knows, you may not recognize them, right?
But here they are.
You get them in their--
not quite raw state, but their on the way to cooked state.
"Imperative."
"He's my age, the man leaning dark against his storefront
window ledge, hair and beard dusted
white, face impressed with a frazzled net of lines.
He doesn't attempt to please or seem
in need but practices all day a toneless, steady neutrality,
repeating his monosyllabic plea, change.
In this way, he resembles a prisoner
who's learned to show almost no deference to his guards,
nothing of abasement.
He's a barely rippling tank of dark water, superbly contained.
He submits to a precise degree.
He's had years to gauge.
Change, he says all day, fixed in his spot on seventh.
The word a key he tries again, hoping this time
the tumblers turn.
His voice at night more driven, change, as if he meant to chip
away at something.
The word falling hard on the sidewalk's flint and shadow,
ringing on the pavement like a dime."