WEBVTT

00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:01.763 align:middle line:90%


00:00:01.763 --> 00:00:04.180 align:middle line:84%
This feels so formal, but I
don't know what to do about it

00:00:04.180 --> 00:00:06.630 align:middle line:84%
so we'll just be
formal, I guess.

00:00:06.630 --> 00:00:11.380 align:middle line:90%


00:00:11.380 --> 00:00:13.660 align:middle line:84%
The next poem has
an epigraph that's

00:00:13.660 --> 00:00:18.320 align:middle line:84%
a rough translation of a very
famous quotation from Freud

00:00:18.320 --> 00:00:22.900 align:middle line:84%
which goes, "women,
women, what do they want?"

00:00:22.900 --> 00:00:25.780 align:middle line:90%
And that's what he said.

00:00:25.780 --> 00:00:26.410 align:middle line:90%
He really did.

00:00:26.410 --> 00:00:29.693 align:middle line:90%
[LAUGHTER]

00:00:29.693 --> 00:00:31.100 align:middle line:90%


00:00:31.100 --> 00:00:35.480 align:middle line:84%
And the title of the poem is
"The Wide and Varied World."

00:00:35.480 --> 00:00:38.480 align:middle line:90%
Women, women, what do they want?

00:00:38.480 --> 00:00:41.030 align:middle line:84%
Oh, let me warn you
about this one, too.

00:00:41.030 --> 00:00:45.230 align:middle line:84%
I think it's hard to listen to
and not have it in front of you

00:00:45.230 --> 00:00:47.870 align:middle line:84%
unless you know that there are
a whole lot of characters in it.

00:00:47.870 --> 00:00:50.180 align:middle line:84%
There are a lot of
figures in the poem

00:00:50.180 --> 00:00:53.760 align:middle line:84%
and that's because it takes
place in a gynecologist office.

00:00:53.760 --> 00:00:55.760 align:middle line:84%
And if you've ever been
in a gynecologist office

00:00:55.760 --> 00:00:59.195 align:middle line:84%
you can never go in there
without seeing a lot of people.

00:00:59.195 --> 00:01:02.970 align:middle line:90%


00:01:02.970 --> 00:01:05.459 align:middle line:90%
"The Wide and Varied World."

00:01:05.459 --> 00:01:08.670 align:middle line:84%
The first ones in the door
of the plant-filled office

00:01:08.670 --> 00:01:12.360 align:middle line:84%
were the twins fresh from the
upper grades, their matched

00:01:12.360 --> 00:01:17.190 align:middle line:84%
coats dangling open, and then
their more compliant brother

00:01:17.190 --> 00:01:21.450 align:middle line:84%
leading the dear, stuffed,
tottering creature, amazing

00:01:21.450 --> 00:01:23.640 align:middle line:84%
that she could lift
her leg high enough

00:01:23.640 --> 00:01:27.720 align:middle line:84%
to cross the threshold
to the waiting room.

00:01:27.720 --> 00:01:30.360 align:middle line:84%
Then the woman, the
patient, carrying

00:01:30.360 --> 00:01:34.380 align:middle line:84%
the baby in an infant seat,
his every inch of flesh

00:01:34.380 --> 00:01:37.440 align:middle line:84%
swaddled against
the vicious weather.

00:01:37.440 --> 00:01:40.530 align:middle line:84%
Once inside, how
skillfully the mother

00:01:40.530 --> 00:01:46.260 align:middle line:84%
unwound the many layers and now
so quickly must restore them.

00:01:46.260 --> 00:01:49.770 align:middle line:84%
News from the lab has
passed through the nurse's

00:01:49.770 --> 00:01:51.570 align:middle line:90%
sliding window.

00:01:51.570 --> 00:01:54.700 align:middle line:84%
The youngest, strapped
again into his shell,

00:01:54.700 --> 00:01:58.650 align:middle line:84%
fusses for the breast, the
twins tease their sister,

00:01:58.650 --> 00:02:01.320 align:middle line:84%
the eight-year-old
looks almost wise

00:02:01.320 --> 00:02:04.980 align:middle line:84%
as his mother struggles
into her coat with one hand

00:02:04.980 --> 00:02:08.039 align:middle line:84%
and with the other
pinches his sweaty neck,

00:02:08.039 --> 00:02:13.410 align:middle line:84%
her hissed threats swarming
his face like flies.

00:02:13.410 --> 00:02:15.450 align:middle line:90%
Now she's gone.

00:02:15.450 --> 00:02:18.750 align:middle line:84%
The women remaining
don't need to speak.

00:02:18.750 --> 00:02:23.130 align:middle line:84%
Outside, snow falls in the
streets and quiet hills

00:02:23.130 --> 00:02:26.820 align:middle line:84%
and seems in the window,
framed by the room's

00:02:26.820 --> 00:02:29.670 align:middle line:84%
continuous greenery,
to obliterate

00:02:29.670 --> 00:02:32.310 align:middle line:90%
the wide and varied world.

00:02:32.310 --> 00:02:36.480 align:middle line:84%
We half smile, half
nod to one another.

00:02:36.480 --> 00:02:39.900 align:middle line:90%
One returns to her magazine.

00:02:39.900 --> 00:02:44.700 align:middle line:84%
One shifts gently to the right
arm, her sleeping newborn

00:02:44.700 --> 00:02:48.120 align:middle line:90%
unfurls the bud of its hand.

00:02:48.120 --> 00:02:51.510 align:middle line:84%
One of us takes her
turn in the inner office

00:02:51.510 --> 00:02:56.280 align:middle line:84%
where she submits to the steel
table and removes from her body

00:02:56.280 --> 00:02:57.900 align:middle line:90%
its stubborn wish.

00:02:57.900 --> 00:03:03.576 align:middle line:84%
We want what you want, only
we have to want it more.

00:03:03.576 --> 00:03:06.950 align:middle line:90%
[APPLAUSE]

00:03:06.950 --> 00:03:10.330 align:middle line:90%


00:03:10.330 --> 00:03:11.630 align:middle line:90%
Been to that office, huh?

00:03:11.630 --> 00:03:14.380 align:middle line:90%
[LAUGHTER]

00:03:14.380 --> 00:03:16.000 align:middle line:90%