WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:00.870 align:middle line:90% 00:00:00.870 --> 00:00:01.890 align:middle line:90% I don't know. 00:00:01.890 --> 00:00:05.590 align:middle line:84% This one makes me very nervous to read. 00:00:05.590 --> 00:00:06.675 align:middle line:90% I guess I'll read it. 00:00:06.675 --> 00:00:08.800 align:middle line:84% I don't think I've ever read it at a poetry reading 00:00:08.800 --> 00:00:10.630 align:middle line:90% because it bothers me. 00:00:10.630 --> 00:00:14.140 align:middle line:84% The reason it bothers me is because, yeah, I always 00:00:14.140 --> 00:00:16.540 align:middle line:84% like to make happy endings in some way 00:00:16.540 --> 00:00:18.550 align:middle line:84% or I want to turn everything around for good. 00:00:18.550 --> 00:00:20.950 align:middle line:84% And this one-- it was the closest 00:00:20.950 --> 00:00:25.030 align:middle line:84% I've come to realizing that I hated somebody. 00:00:25.030 --> 00:00:27.850 align:middle line:84% And so I wrote this poem called "If I Think About You Again, 00:00:27.850 --> 00:00:30.803 align:middle line:84% It Will Be the 53rd Monday of Next Year." 00:00:30.803 --> 00:00:33.710 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:00:33.710 --> 00:00:35.950 align:middle line:90% So I'll read it. 00:00:35.950 --> 00:00:39.640 align:middle line:84% I guess I couldn't say, no, I don't want to read that now. 00:00:39.640 --> 00:00:41.560 align:middle line:90% And I guess-- 00:00:41.560 --> 00:00:42.340 align:middle line:90% OK, I'll read it. 00:00:42.340 --> 00:00:46.000 align:middle line:90% 00:00:46.000 --> 00:00:49.460 align:middle line:90% But it helped me get over it. 00:00:49.460 --> 00:00:52.250 align:middle line:84% "A musical animal like weather report blows 00:00:52.250 --> 00:00:54.930 align:middle line:84% to the black market on this snowy Monday. 00:00:54.930 --> 00:00:57.800 align:middle line:90% And I can go anywhere I want. 00:00:57.800 --> 00:01:01.400 align:middle line:84% So why does this sound lead to the face of the only one 00:01:01.400 --> 00:01:03.740 align:middle line:90% I could have hated? 00:01:03.740 --> 00:01:07.880 align:middle line:84% Hatred is a vice that smells like four mutilated cats, 00:01:07.880 --> 00:01:12.020 align:middle line:84% smoking in a gasoline fire, and worse. 00:01:12.020 --> 00:01:14.600 align:middle line:84% And here I am, stirring an imagination that 00:01:14.600 --> 00:01:17.600 align:middle line:84% has always got me into trouble, thinking 00:01:17.600 --> 00:01:20.420 align:middle line:90% what I could do to you. 00:01:20.420 --> 00:01:24.170 align:middle line:84% It wouldn't be pretty as the dusk sun slipping from one bed 00:01:24.170 --> 00:01:27.890 align:middle line:84% to the next or feel like a solitary fish on the dance 00:01:27.890 --> 00:01:31.190 align:middle line:84% floor with a woman you have loved forever. 00:01:31.190 --> 00:01:34.820 align:middle line:84% Nothing like that is what I would do to you. 00:01:34.820 --> 00:01:38.600 align:middle line:84% I could make you the fifth cat and turn my back. 00:01:38.600 --> 00:01:42.860 align:middle line:84% I could say your name backwards and send it to a warring star. 00:01:42.860 --> 00:01:46.100 align:middle line:90% Or better yet, erase it. 00:01:46.100 --> 00:01:48.410 align:middle line:84% Your whole story, a sterile page. 00:01:48.410 --> 00:01:51.230 align:middle line:84% And I would rewrite it without you in it. 00:01:51.230 --> 00:01:54.320 align:middle line:84% Yes, let me begin with a day like this, 00:01:54.320 --> 00:01:57.110 align:middle line:84% a musical animal like weather report blowing 00:01:57.110 --> 00:02:00.330 align:middle line:84% through the black market on this snowy, snowy Monday. 00:02:00.330 --> 00:02:05.188 align:middle line:84% And I can go anywhere I want, and do, without you. 00:02:05.188 --> 00:02:08.576 align:middle line:90% [APPLAUSE] 00:02:08.576 --> 00:02:13.420 align:middle line:90% 00:02:13.420 --> 00:02:14.970 align:middle line:90% OK.