WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:00.600 align:middle line:90% 00:00:00.600 --> 00:00:04.890 align:middle line:84% Only a few older poems from Monolithos and then 00:00:04.890 --> 00:00:06.135 align:middle line:90% read mostly newer poems. 00:00:06.135 --> 00:00:10.290 align:middle line:90% 00:00:10.290 --> 00:00:14.233 align:middle line:84% This poem is called The Abnormal is Not Courage. 00:00:14.233 --> 00:00:15.900 align:middle line:84% I've always been impatient with the idea 00:00:15.900 --> 00:00:20.430 align:middle line:84% that, like in the old Kirk Douglas movies 00:00:20.430 --> 00:00:27.000 align:middle line:84% there would be a real rotten guy and he would wreck everything. 00:00:27.000 --> 00:00:31.530 align:middle line:84% And at the end of the movie he would suddenly 00:00:31.530 --> 00:00:37.260 align:middle line:84% risk his life to save somebody's cat and everybody would 00:00:37.260 --> 00:00:40.080 align:middle line:90% say, what a wonderful man. 00:00:40.080 --> 00:00:48.090 align:middle line:84% Or the man in La Strada, who's a vicious, selfish, cruel man, 00:00:48.090 --> 00:00:49.590 align:middle line:84% but at the end he's all alone, as he 00:00:49.590 --> 00:00:51.667 align:middle line:84% should have been all alone, dying on the beach 00:00:51.667 --> 00:00:53.250 align:middle line:84% and it's supposed to break our hearts. 00:00:53.250 --> 00:00:55.770 align:middle line:90% 00:00:55.770 --> 00:00:58.530 align:middle line:84% I don't wish him any ill will, but if I'm going to grieve 00:00:58.530 --> 00:01:00.000 align:middle line:84% I'm going to grieve for the woman 00:01:00.000 --> 00:01:02.100 align:middle line:84% that he mistreated all through the film. 00:01:02.100 --> 00:01:07.290 align:middle line:90% 00:01:07.290 --> 00:01:14.700 align:middle line:84% On the other hand, it's about courage in the same way. 00:01:14.700 --> 00:01:18.060 align:middle line:84% Not the spectacular courage, not the person 00:01:18.060 --> 00:01:21.750 align:middle line:84% that will take enormous risks, but the rest of his life 00:01:21.750 --> 00:01:25.140 align:middle line:90% is not a good person. 00:01:25.140 --> 00:01:30.090 align:middle line:84% That's how we define courage so often. 00:01:30.090 --> 00:01:33.390 align:middle line:84% So this is called The Abnormal is Not Courage 00:01:33.390 --> 00:01:37.950 align:middle line:84% and it pivots on an image from the beginning of the Second 00:01:37.950 --> 00:01:41.610 align:middle line:84% World War when the German blitzkrieg was 00:01:41.610 --> 00:01:44.790 align:middle line:90% sweeping across Poland. 00:01:44.790 --> 00:01:47.170 align:middle line:84% Poland was still very underdeveloped in terms 00:01:47.170 --> 00:01:47.670 align:middle line:90% of armies. 00:01:47.670 --> 00:01:49.440 align:middle line:90% They still had cavalry. 00:01:49.440 --> 00:01:58.440 align:middle line:84% So when the big Tiger tanks, gigantic, terrifying machines, 00:01:58.440 --> 00:02:01.060 align:middle line:90% got close they had nothing else. 00:02:01.060 --> 00:02:09.449 align:middle line:84% So the cavalry charged the Tiger tanks with lances and sabers 00:02:09.449 --> 00:02:13.770 align:middle line:84% and with courage and were wiped out. 00:02:13.770 --> 00:02:19.740 align:middle line:84% This poem, not very generously, is against that, or at least 00:02:19.740 --> 00:02:22.105 align:middle line:84% against it in the sense that it's a dangerous definition 00:02:22.105 --> 00:02:22.605 align:middle line:90% of courage. 00:02:22.605 --> 00:02:25.440 align:middle line:90% 00:02:25.440 --> 00:02:29.850 align:middle line:90% The Abnormal is Not Courage. 00:02:29.850 --> 00:02:34.590 align:middle line:84% The Poles rode out from Warsaw against the German tanks 00:02:34.590 --> 00:02:42.360 align:middle line:84% on horses, rode knowing in sunlight with sabers, 00:02:42.360 --> 00:02:46.740 align:middle line:84% a magnitude of beauty that allows me no peace and yet 00:02:46.740 --> 00:02:51.150 align:middle line:84% this poem would lessen that day, question the bravery, 00:02:51.150 --> 00:02:55.350 align:middle line:84% say it's not courage, call it a passion, 00:02:55.350 --> 00:02:58.680 align:middle line:84% would say courage isn't that, not at its best. 00:02:58.680 --> 00:03:02.280 align:middle line:84% It is, it was impossible and with form. 00:03:02.280 --> 00:03:05.820 align:middle line:84% They rode in sunlight, were mangled, 00:03:05.820 --> 00:03:08.940 align:middle line:84% but I say courage is not the abnormal, not 00:03:08.940 --> 00:03:13.710 align:middle line:84% the marvelous act, not Macbeth with fine speeches. 00:03:13.710 --> 00:03:17.910 align:middle line:84% The worthless can manage in public or for the moment. 00:03:17.910 --> 00:03:22.200 align:middle line:84% It's too near the whore's heart, the bounty of impulse, 00:03:22.200 --> 00:03:26.460 align:middle line:84% and the failure to sustain even small kindness. 00:03:26.460 --> 00:03:31.530 align:middle line:84% Not the marvelous act, but the evident conclusion of being. 00:03:31.530 --> 00:03:34.410 align:middle line:84% Not the strangeness, but a leap forward 00:03:34.410 --> 00:03:37.590 align:middle line:84% of the same quality, accomplishment, 00:03:37.590 --> 00:03:41.820 align:middle line:90% the even loyalty, but fresh. 00:03:41.820 --> 00:03:44.760 align:middle line:84% Not the Prodigal Son nor Faustus, 00:03:44.760 --> 00:03:49.650 align:middle line:84% but Penelope, the thing steady and clear. 00:03:49.650 --> 00:03:52.380 align:middle line:84% Then the crescendo, the real form, 00:03:52.380 --> 00:03:55.860 align:middle line:84% the culmination, and the exceeding. 00:03:55.860 --> 00:03:59.310 align:middle line:84% Not the surprise, the amazed understanding. 00:03:59.310 --> 00:04:03.480 align:middle line:84% The marriage, not the month's rapture, not the exception, 00:04:03.480 --> 00:04:08.760 align:middle line:84% the beauty that is of many days, steady and clear. 00:04:08.760 --> 00:04:14.540 align:middle line:84% It is the normal excellence of long accomplishment.