WEBVTT

00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:01.410 align:middle line:90%


00:00:01.410 --> 00:00:03.420 align:middle line:84%
Next poem I want
to read it's a poem

00:00:03.420 --> 00:00:08.189 align:middle line:84%
that I wrote for Robert
Lowell, whom I didn't know,

00:00:08.189 --> 00:00:10.140 align:middle line:84%
but one night I was
thinking about him.

00:00:10.140 --> 00:00:11.910 align:middle line:84%
I had finished
Killing Floor and I

00:00:11.910 --> 00:00:13.920 align:middle line:84%
was thinking about
confessional poetry

00:00:13.920 --> 00:00:17.970 align:middle line:84%
and I was thinking about
Plath too at the time,

00:00:17.970 --> 00:00:22.140 align:middle line:84%
and what a trap that
confessional poetry can be,

00:00:22.140 --> 00:00:24.600 align:middle line:84%
and then I thought, well,
why don't you try it.

00:00:24.600 --> 00:00:26.490 align:middle line:84%
I was damning it, but
at the same time I

00:00:26.490 --> 00:00:27.720 align:middle line:90%
thought, why don't you try?

00:00:27.720 --> 00:00:31.060 align:middle line:84%
Because I never write
anything about myself.

00:00:31.060 --> 00:00:34.290 align:middle line:84%
So I got about four lines
in and it seemed to me

00:00:34.290 --> 00:00:38.520 align:middle line:84%
that I felt this presence from
the top of my head to my toes

00:00:38.520 --> 00:00:40.170 align:middle line:84%
and it was Robert
Lowell, and I just

00:00:40.170 --> 00:00:45.210 align:middle line:84%
crossed out those four
lines and have this poem.

00:00:45.210 --> 00:00:47.580 align:middle line:90%
This is called Conversation.

00:00:47.580 --> 00:00:50.550 align:middle line:84%
We smile at each
other and I lean back

00:00:50.550 --> 00:00:52.590 align:middle line:90%
against the wicker couch.

00:00:52.590 --> 00:00:54.010 align:middle line:90%
How does it feel to be dead?

00:00:54.010 --> 00:00:55.200 align:middle line:90%
I say.

00:00:55.200 --> 00:00:57.870 align:middle line:84%
You touch my knees
with your blue fingers,

00:00:57.870 --> 00:01:00.750 align:middle line:84%
and when you open your
mouth a ball of yellow light

00:01:00.750 --> 00:01:04.230 align:middle line:84%
falls to the floor and
burns a hole through it.

00:01:04.230 --> 00:01:05.910 align:middle line:90%
Don't tell me, I say.

00:01:05.910 --> 00:01:07.590 align:middle line:90%
I don't want to hear.

00:01:07.590 --> 00:01:11.940 align:middle line:84%
Did you ever, you start, wear
a certain kind of silk dress

00:01:11.940 --> 00:01:16.110 align:middle line:84%
and just by accident, so
inconsequential you barely

00:01:16.110 --> 00:01:17.140 align:middle line:90%
notice it,

00:01:17.140 --> 00:01:19.650 align:middle line:84%
your fingers graze
that dress and you

00:01:19.650 --> 00:01:23.700 align:middle line:84%
hear the sound of a knife
cutting paper, you see it too

00:01:23.700 --> 00:01:27.150 align:middle line:84%
and you realize how
that image is simply

00:01:27.150 --> 00:01:29.700 align:middle line:90%
the extension of another image?

00:01:29.700 --> 00:01:35.370 align:middle line:84%
That your own life is a chain
of words that one day will snap?

00:01:35.370 --> 00:01:38.250 align:middle line:84%
Words, you say, young
girls in a circle

00:01:38.250 --> 00:01:40.770 align:middle line:84%
holding hands and
beginning to rise

00:01:40.770 --> 00:01:44.010 align:middle line:84%
heavenward like
white helium balloons

00:01:44.010 --> 00:01:46.260 align:middle line:90%
in their confirmation dresses,

00:01:46.260 --> 00:01:48.360 align:middle line:84%
the wreaths of
flowers on their heads

00:01:48.360 --> 00:01:52.690 align:middle line:84%
spinning, and above all that,
that's where I'm floating,

00:01:52.690 --> 00:01:54.090 align:middle line:90%
and that's what it's like,

00:01:54.090 --> 00:01:58.110 align:middle line:84%
only 10 times clearer,
10 times more horrible.

00:01:58.110 --> 00:02:01.790 align:middle line:90%
Could anyone alive survive it?

00:02:01.790 --> 00:02:02.489 align:middle line:90%