WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:15.560 align:middle line:90% 00:00:15.560 --> 00:00:17.943 align:middle line:84% Before I introduce Dr. Baker, I have a few hundred 00:00:17.943 --> 00:00:18.860 align:middle line:90% announcements to make. 00:00:18.860 --> 00:00:21.470 align:middle line:90% 00:00:21.470 --> 00:00:23.270 align:middle line:84% Next Wednesday night, we'll have the first 00:00:23.270 --> 00:00:27.320 align:middle line:84% of our series of student readings in this auditorium. 00:00:27.320 --> 00:00:30.800 align:middle line:84% And three of the candidates for Master's of Fine Arts in poetry 00:00:30.800 --> 00:00:38.450 align:middle line:84% will be reading, Tom Cox, Kim Meilike, and Martha Ostheimer. 00:00:38.450 --> 00:00:41.870 align:middle line:84% And November 1st and 2nd, in cooperation 00:00:41.870 --> 00:00:45.740 align:middle line:84% with this Academy of American Poets and Arizona State 00:00:45.740 --> 00:00:50.480 align:middle line:84% University, we are co-sponsoring a festival of Southwest poets. 00:00:50.480 --> 00:00:52.940 align:middle line:84% And I have some flyers on that I put out 00:00:52.940 --> 00:00:57.290 align:middle line:84% on the refreshment table, so I hope you'll pick up a flyer. 00:00:57.290 --> 00:00:59.300 align:middle line:84% The first day of the festival, there'll 00:00:59.300 --> 00:01:03.200 align:middle line:84% be a panel discussion here with six poets, 00:01:03.200 --> 00:01:05.150 align:middle line:84% and that evening three of the poets 00:01:05.150 --> 00:01:07.400 align:middle line:90% will read in this auditorium. 00:01:07.400 --> 00:01:11.150 align:middle line:84% The next evening we'll all trek up to ASU and the other three 00:01:11.150 --> 00:01:13.070 align:middle line:90% poets will read there. 00:01:13.070 --> 00:01:16.430 align:middle line:84% But the poets who are participating in the festival 00:01:16.430 --> 00:01:23.270 align:middle line:84% are N. Scott Momaday, Naomi Shihab Nye, Peggy Shumaker, 00:01:23.270 --> 00:01:29.180 align:middle line:84% Alberto Ríos, Joy Harjo, and Richard Shelton. 00:01:29.180 --> 00:01:32.750 align:middle line:84% And as with everything the Poetry Center sponsors, 00:01:32.750 --> 00:01:34.380 align:middle line:90% the readings are free. 00:01:34.380 --> 00:01:35.630 align:middle line:90% And we have punch and cookies. 00:01:35.630 --> 00:01:38.330 align:middle line:90% 00:01:38.330 --> 00:01:42.680 align:middle line:84% A week from tonight, the Russian department 00:01:42.680 --> 00:01:45.230 align:middle line:84% is sponsoring a very special reading 00:01:45.230 --> 00:01:49.940 align:middle line:90% by Russian emigré Igor Chinnov. 00:01:49.940 --> 00:01:53.930 align:middle line:84% And he will be reading in Harvill Building room 203 00:01:53.930 --> 00:01:56.390 align:middle line:90% at 8 o'clock. 00:01:56.390 --> 00:01:58.790 align:middle line:84% Harvill is that building that's kind of hard to find. 00:01:58.790 --> 00:02:00.470 align:middle line:90% It's over there. 00:02:00.470 --> 00:02:03.290 align:middle line:84% And you wander around in the maze for hours 00:02:03.290 --> 00:02:07.058 align:middle line:84% before you find where you're supposed to be. 00:02:07.058 --> 00:02:08.600 align:middle line:84% And don't go by yourself because it's 00:02:08.600 --> 00:02:09.767 align:middle line:90% dark and strange over there. 00:02:09.767 --> 00:02:12.950 align:middle line:90% 00:02:12.950 --> 00:02:16.100 align:middle line:84% It's a pleasure to welcome Dr. Baker to our campus. 00:02:16.100 --> 00:02:21.110 align:middle line:84% I had read his vitae and expected an elderly gentleman. 00:02:21.110 --> 00:02:23.810 align:middle line:84% I was quite surprised to be introduced 00:02:23.810 --> 00:02:27.170 align:middle line:90% to this nice young man. 00:02:27.170 --> 00:02:29.810 align:middle line:84% Houston Baker is the director of the Center 00:02:29.810 --> 00:02:32.210 align:middle line:84% for the Study of Black Literature and Culture 00:02:32.210 --> 00:02:34.890 align:middle line:84% at the University of Pennsylvania. 00:02:34.890 --> 00:02:37.430 align:middle line:84% He's published three collections of poetry-- 00:02:37.430 --> 00:02:39.080 align:middle line:84% No Matter Where You Travel, You Still 00:02:39.080 --> 00:02:45.170 align:middle line:84% Be Black, Spirit Run, and Blues Journeys Home. 00:02:45.170 --> 00:02:49.680 align:middle line:84% He's written or edited 17 other books, 00:02:49.680 --> 00:02:52.020 align:middle line:84% including Black Literature in America, 00:02:52.020 --> 00:02:57.050 align:middle line:84% which is an anthology of Black American literature 00:02:57.050 --> 00:03:01.010 align:middle line:84% from folklore to the present, A Many Colored Coat of Dreams: 00:03:01.010 --> 00:03:05.120 align:middle line:84% The Poetry of Countee Cullen, Modernism and the Harlem 00:03:05.120 --> 00:03:11.600 align:middle line:84% Renaissance, Afro-American Poetics, and most recently, 00:03:11.600 --> 00:03:14.570 align:middle line:84% Workings of the Spirit: The Poetics of Afro-American 00:03:14.570 --> 00:03:16.940 align:middle line:90% Women's Writings. 00:03:16.940 --> 00:03:20.270 align:middle line:84% His numerous honors include the 1986 Distinguished Writer 00:03:20.270 --> 00:03:23.840 align:middle line:84% of the Year Award from Middle Atlantic Writers Association 00:03:23.840 --> 00:03:26.780 align:middle line:84% and fellowships from the Rockefeller and Guggenheim 00:03:26.780 --> 00:03:27.680 align:middle line:90% Foundations. 00:03:27.680 --> 00:03:29.340 align:middle line:84% I hope you'll stay after the reading, 00:03:29.340 --> 00:03:33.362 align:middle line:84% and have some refreshments and get acquainted with Dr. Baker. 00:03:33.362 --> 00:03:36.750 align:middle line:90% [APPLAUSE] 00:03:36.750 --> 00:03:43.050 align:middle line:90% 00:03:43.050 --> 00:03:44.980 align:middle line:90% Thank you very much. 00:03:44.980 --> 00:03:48.027 align:middle line:90% It's wonderful to be here. 00:03:48.027 --> 00:03:49.860 align:middle line:84% One of the reasons it's wonderful to be here 00:03:49.860 --> 00:03:54.210 align:middle line:84% is because I've not been here before 00:03:54.210 --> 00:03:56.790 align:middle line:84% and so it's nice to go to new places. 00:03:56.790 --> 00:03:59.250 align:middle line:84% Another reason it's nice to go to be here 00:03:59.250 --> 00:04:02.040 align:middle line:84% is because I have a lot of friends here 00:04:02.040 --> 00:04:07.800 align:middle line:84% who have for years been in a semi-chamber of commerce 00:04:07.800 --> 00:04:11.370 align:middle line:84% capacity, saying if you've never been there, 00:04:11.370 --> 00:04:12.630 align:middle line:90% you've been nowhere. 00:04:12.630 --> 00:04:18.480 align:middle line:84% And after being picked up and shepherded around last night 00:04:18.480 --> 00:04:22.230 align:middle line:84% and today by Annette Kolodny and Dan Peterson, 00:04:22.230 --> 00:04:27.750 align:middle line:84% seeing Barbara Babcock and Ken Hensley 00:04:27.750 --> 00:04:32.550 align:middle line:84% and other people who have made the day very pleasant, 00:04:32.550 --> 00:04:35.610 align:middle line:84% and hearing a wonderful talk by my wife, that's 00:04:35.610 --> 00:04:39.180 align:middle line:84% the best of the team today earlier, 00:04:39.180 --> 00:04:40.890 align:middle line:84% I told her not to be so good because it 00:04:40.890 --> 00:04:42.553 align:middle line:90% would make it tough tonight. 00:04:42.553 --> 00:04:44.970 align:middle line:84% But it's been a wonderful day and the weather's cooperated 00:04:44.970 --> 00:04:45.850 align:middle line:90% and so forth. 00:04:45.850 --> 00:04:47.700 align:middle line:84% And I'm glad you all came out tonight. 00:04:47.700 --> 00:04:50.910 align:middle line:84% In this capacity, in the capacity of poet, 00:04:50.910 --> 00:04:55.350 align:middle line:84% I never have felt comfortable and I don't feel comfortable 00:04:55.350 --> 00:04:56.640 align:middle line:90% now. 00:04:56.640 --> 00:05:00.630 align:middle line:84% So you have to bear with me as I make my way into this. 00:05:00.630 --> 00:05:04.080 align:middle line:84% And one of the reasons I don't feel comfortable 00:05:04.080 --> 00:05:07.860 align:middle line:84% is precisely because it seems to me 00:05:07.860 --> 00:05:15.630 align:middle line:84% that my forte, what I do best is probably a literary criticism, 00:05:15.630 --> 00:05:18.270 align:middle line:84% and the poetry is a secondary process. 00:05:18.270 --> 00:05:21.600 align:middle line:84% Now, I had a person who agreed very much with me 00:05:21.600 --> 00:05:26.680 align:middle line:84% in this for a good deal of my apprenticeship as a poet. 00:05:26.680 --> 00:05:31.050 align:middle line:84% She is now my wife and has been for 28 years. 00:05:31.050 --> 00:05:33.510 align:middle line:84% I would pass on things to her and I would say, 00:05:33.510 --> 00:05:36.090 align:middle line:90% you see, here's my latest poem. 00:05:36.090 --> 00:05:39.570 align:middle line:84% And she would look at it and she would say, 00:05:39.570 --> 00:05:43.230 align:middle line:84% ontologically imbibing the late night-- 00:05:43.230 --> 00:05:43.980 align:middle line:90% what is this? 00:05:43.980 --> 00:05:46.710 align:middle line:90% This is not a poem. 00:05:46.710 --> 00:05:49.440 align:middle line:84% And I would go from poet to poet in my literary classes 00:05:49.440 --> 00:05:51.895 align:middle line:84% and try to emulate them and write my own poems 00:05:51.895 --> 00:05:52.770 align:middle line:90% and put my own words. 00:05:52.770 --> 00:05:54.930 align:middle line:84% And she'd keep handing them back to me. 00:05:54.930 --> 00:05:58.860 align:middle line:84% And at one point after I had published a volume of poetry 00:05:58.860 --> 00:06:01.380 align:middle line:84% and gotten a little bit down the line, 00:06:01.380 --> 00:06:05.370 align:middle line:84% it seemed to me that summarizing a lot of experiences 00:06:05.370 --> 00:06:08.760 align:middle line:84% might be those words that she used to say to me, 00:06:08.760 --> 00:06:11.710 align:middle line:90% and that is, this is not a poem. 00:06:11.710 --> 00:06:14.730 align:middle line:84% So I wrote a poem called This Is Not a Poem, which 00:06:14.730 --> 00:06:16.470 align:middle line:90% is about a lot of things. 00:06:16.470 --> 00:06:19.440 align:middle line:84% Maybe it's about how all of us come 00:06:19.440 --> 00:06:23.100 align:middle line:84% to be poets, which I think probably everybody is. 00:06:23.100 --> 00:06:26.490 align:middle line:90% This is not a poem. 00:06:26.490 --> 00:06:31.500 align:middle line:84% This is not a poem nor aesthetic experience. 00:06:31.500 --> 00:06:35.760 align:middle line:84% This is a story of my grandmother's hands chapped 00:06:35.760 --> 00:06:42.150 align:middle line:84% from white folks' wash, an account of her back spasmed 00:06:42.150 --> 00:06:44.410 align:middle line:90% from scrubbing floors. 00:06:44.410 --> 00:06:49.680 align:middle line:84% This is not a poem nor icy art, emotion. 00:06:49.680 --> 00:06:53.250 align:middle line:84% This is a narrative of my father's father 00:06:53.250 --> 00:06:58.920 align:middle line:84% scraping pennies from a rocky economy, depression baby 00:06:58.920 --> 00:07:02.880 align:middle line:90% devouring everything in sight. 00:07:02.880 --> 00:07:08.040 align:middle line:84% This is no poem nor a subtle tingle down your spine while 00:07:08.040 --> 00:07:09.660 align:middle line:90% shaving. 00:07:09.660 --> 00:07:16.140 align:middle line:84% This is a tale of my mother rebuked for calling a Black man 00:07:16.140 --> 00:07:18.490 align:middle line:90% gentleman. 00:07:18.490 --> 00:07:26.550 align:middle line:84% "Lizzie, tell your daughter that Black men are never gentlemen." 00:07:26.550 --> 00:07:32.040 align:middle line:84% This is no poem, nor am I blessed to be impersonal. 00:07:32.040 --> 00:07:36.360 align:middle line:84% I will make no attempt to distance you. 00:07:36.360 --> 00:07:41.040 align:middle line:84% Had you been there, any of you, while I was growing up 00:07:41.040 --> 00:07:46.590 align:middle line:84% or even in the thin warned time of their decline, 00:07:46.590 --> 00:07:51.480 align:middle line:84% I would have introduced you, allowed you to share 00:07:51.480 --> 00:07:57.418 align:middle line:84% the fine goodness of ancestral caring. 00:07:57.418 --> 00:07:58.335 align:middle line:90% But that's not a poem. 00:07:58.335 --> 00:08:01.060 align:middle line:90% 00:08:01.060 --> 00:08:06.640 align:middle line:84% When I began to think about what it was that constituted not 00:08:06.640 --> 00:08:11.500 align:middle line:84% only a poet, because if you walk around in the United States 00:08:11.500 --> 00:08:16.120 align:middle line:84% with melanin, unfortunately you can't be a poet, right? 00:08:16.120 --> 00:08:17.980 align:middle line:90% You can only be what? 00:08:17.980 --> 00:08:18.580 align:middle line:90% Right. 00:08:18.580 --> 00:08:20.290 align:middle line:90% A Black poet. 00:08:20.290 --> 00:08:25.330 align:middle line:84% So I thought, well, OK, I got one hurdle here done, 00:08:25.330 --> 00:08:27.850 align:middle line:90% and right, this is not a poem. 00:08:27.850 --> 00:08:31.210 align:middle line:84% What is it that makes you a Black poet? 00:08:31.210 --> 00:08:34.510 align:middle line:84% The most recent installment on that answer, 00:08:34.510 --> 00:08:37.030 align:middle line:84% an answer to that question, is the blues. 00:08:37.030 --> 00:08:38.980 align:middle line:84% But there were earlier responses. 00:08:38.980 --> 00:08:41.980 align:middle line:84% And it seemed to me that the title of that first volume 00:08:41.980 --> 00:08:45.700 align:middle line:84% of poetry, No Matter Where You Travel, You Still Be Black, 00:08:45.700 --> 00:08:48.730 align:middle line:84% was at least a process of definition. 00:08:48.730 --> 00:08:51.550 align:middle line:84% And the signature poem for that volume, 00:08:51.550 --> 00:08:56.770 align:middle line:84% and probably in most gatherings that I go to, is that-- 00:08:56.770 --> 00:09:00.790 align:middle line:84% goes no matter where you travel, you still be black. 00:09:00.790 --> 00:09:05.920 align:middle line:84% You carry all your history on your own damn back. 00:09:05.920 --> 00:09:09.220 align:middle line:84% Now, your mama raised you proper. 00:09:09.220 --> 00:09:12.100 align:middle line:90% Your daddy caused you pain. 00:09:12.100 --> 00:09:19.090 align:middle line:84% You understand Beethoven, but you still love Trane. 00:09:19.090 --> 00:09:26.660 align:middle line:84% And I found out that Martha was from Carolina, 00:09:26.660 --> 00:09:30.970 align:middle line:84% and she was looking at the front of the volume here, 00:09:30.970 --> 00:09:33.100 align:middle line:84% a table of contents having embarrassingly 00:09:33.100 --> 00:09:36.040 align:middle line:84% asked me where one of the poems came from, which volume. 00:09:36.040 --> 00:09:38.110 align:middle line:84% And I had to look at the table of contents 00:09:38.110 --> 00:09:42.130 align:middle line:84% and she said, my goodness, Carolina, Coltrane and love. 00:09:42.130 --> 00:09:43.250 align:middle line:90% I'm from Carolina. 00:09:43.250 --> 00:09:46.660 align:middle line:84% And I said, well, I read Carolina, Coltrane, and Love. 00:09:46.660 --> 00:09:51.160 align:middle line:84% So Carolina, North Carolina was a significant experience 00:09:51.160 --> 00:09:53.980 align:middle line:84% because I grew up in Louisville, Kentucky 00:09:53.980 --> 00:09:57.730 align:middle line:84% and have been trying to outgrow that ever since, 00:09:57.730 --> 00:10:01.750 align:middle line:84% including language and dialect because we called it Louisville 00:10:01.750 --> 00:10:02.650 align:middle line:90% at that time. 00:10:02.650 --> 00:10:06.370 align:middle line:84% And I was told that I could not say literature when 00:10:06.370 --> 00:10:08.200 align:middle line:90% I went to Howard University. 00:10:08.200 --> 00:10:11.380 align:middle line:84% So I've been working on all these allusions and things 00:10:11.380 --> 00:10:12.260 align:middle line:90% that you do. 00:10:12.260 --> 00:10:15.573 align:middle line:84% But getting back to North Carolina for our research 00:10:15.573 --> 00:10:16.990 align:middle line:84% here at the Research Triangle Park 00:10:16.990 --> 00:10:19.060 align:middle line:84% was great, because the flora, the fauna 00:10:19.060 --> 00:10:21.670 align:middle line:84% reminded me of Louisville, or Louisville 00:10:21.670 --> 00:10:26.350 align:middle line:84% and it helped the writing of Blues Journeys Home. 00:10:26.350 --> 00:10:29.440 align:middle line:84% So Carolina, Coltrane, and Love is a family poem. 00:10:29.440 --> 00:10:33.760 align:middle line:84% Gray autumn squirrel scoots across a distant branch, 00:10:33.760 --> 00:10:38.500 align:middle line:84% sunlight flashes, trees revealing textures in Saturday 00:10:38.500 --> 00:10:41.680 align:middle line:90% light rare as Earth itself. 00:10:41.680 --> 00:10:44.920 align:middle line:84% In my living room, John Coltrane plays 00:10:44.920 --> 00:10:49.600 align:middle line:84% Naima, the old gold and stubborn green of Carolina 00:10:49.600 --> 00:10:53.020 align:middle line:84% are flavored by a neighbor's smoke. 00:10:53.020 --> 00:10:58.090 align:middle line:84% There is a shaman on this album chanting, torturous, 00:10:58.090 --> 00:11:04.420 align:middle line:84% older than Earth, as my son awakens with a boisterous yawn. 00:11:04.420 --> 00:11:07.900 align:middle line:84% A horn is invoking chaos, creating comfort, 00:11:07.900 --> 00:11:10.840 align:middle line:90% ordering old African spirits. 00:11:10.840 --> 00:11:15.010 align:middle line:84% Today, my son and I will complete his African project, 00:11:15.010 --> 00:11:19.960 align:middle line:84% working together at rituals ancient as the seasons, old, 00:11:19.960 --> 00:11:24.250 align:middle line:84% those chordal progressions of Trane, blast barriers. 00:11:24.250 --> 00:11:26.710 align:middle line:84% The shaman gives birth to the world. 00:11:26.710 --> 00:11:28.660 align:middle line:90% The squirrel is on our deck. 00:11:28.660 --> 00:11:31.810 align:middle line:90% Dry leaves and sheets of sound. 00:11:31.810 --> 00:11:35.680 align:middle line:84% We discuss my son and I, forest and rivers, 00:11:35.680 --> 00:11:38.290 align:middle line:90% older than the signs of man. 00:11:38.290 --> 00:11:43.240 align:middle line:84% On that disk, Naima gives way to ohm, 00:11:43.240 --> 00:11:50.350 align:middle line:84% a single hand clapping, Charlotte awakens, 00:11:50.350 --> 00:11:53.050 align:middle line:90% stretches toward the sun. 00:11:53.050 --> 00:11:57.940 align:middle line:84% She is motion, she is energy, embodiment of spirits 00:11:57.940 --> 00:12:04.180 align:middle line:84% called, the ending is black, the ending is love, 00:12:04.180 --> 00:12:11.890 align:middle line:84% the ending of African genius is always, always love. 00:12:11.890 --> 00:12:13.600 align:middle line:90% Caroline and Coltrane and love. 00:12:13.600 --> 00:12:17.009 align:middle line:90% [APPLAUSE] 00:12:17.009 --> 00:12:21.890 align:middle line:90% 00:12:21.890 --> 00:12:23.405 align:middle line:90% Well, where did it go? 00:12:23.405 --> 00:12:27.780 align:middle line:90% 00:12:27.780 --> 00:12:31.160 align:middle line:84% This is the title poem of second volume of poetry 00:12:31.160 --> 00:12:32.360 align:middle line:90% that's called Spirit Run. 00:12:32.360 --> 00:12:35.120 align:middle line:90% 00:12:35.120 --> 00:12:38.120 align:middle line:84% It's about running, which is really strange for a poem, 00:12:38.120 --> 00:12:40.130 align:middle line:84% to say spirit run and to be about running 00:12:40.130 --> 00:12:43.370 align:middle line:84% because there's a standard poetical rap that you all have 00:12:43.370 --> 00:12:47.300 align:middle line:84% heard that the poet does is a kind of entr'acte. 00:12:47.300 --> 00:12:51.450 align:middle line:84% And it goes, gee, I don't know what I'm going to do next. 00:12:51.450 --> 00:12:53.720 align:middle line:84% But I was visiting my mother out in Seattle. 00:12:53.720 --> 00:12:57.440 align:middle line:84% And in her backyard, there's this really interesting 00:12:57.440 --> 00:13:00.290 align:middle line:90% Japanese maple. 00:13:00.290 --> 00:13:05.000 align:middle line:90% And the deer come each year. 00:13:05.000 --> 00:13:09.890 align:middle line:84% So this is a poem about my mother and the deer. 00:13:09.890 --> 00:13:14.270 align:middle line:84% And then they read something like cosmology's birth scene, 00:13:14.270 --> 00:13:20.150 align:middle line:84% the tone is rain and gone, but this is really 00:13:20.150 --> 00:13:26.000 align:middle line:84% a poem about running, which I was fanatical about not so long 00:13:26.000 --> 00:13:28.040 align:middle line:90% ago, called Spirit Run. 00:13:28.040 --> 00:13:31.820 align:middle line:84% Stones in the path are no object, 00:13:31.820 --> 00:13:35.090 align:middle line:84% darkening skies offer no retreat, 00:13:35.090 --> 00:13:40.430 align:middle line:84% and my legs stretch farther, pace quickens as first rain 00:13:40.430 --> 00:13:42.530 align:middle line:90% begins to fall. 00:13:42.530 --> 00:13:48.830 align:middle line:84% The mine revives a moment long passed by a lake. 00:13:48.830 --> 00:13:53.030 align:middle line:84% In a country of red, we sat, grandfather. 00:13:53.030 --> 00:13:58.910 align:middle line:84% You told of kin battered and sold. 00:13:58.910 --> 00:14:01.850 align:middle line:84% You mapped the land's holy spaces, 00:14:01.850 --> 00:14:09.260 align:middle line:84% you bestowed upon my boy's self blues notes of our survival. 00:14:09.260 --> 00:14:12.140 align:middle line:84% I mount the final hill reflecting 00:14:12.140 --> 00:14:18.680 align:middle line:84% that the land's now contour holds no record, coded message, 00:14:18.680 --> 00:14:23.180 align:middle line:84% secret name, the blatant fact that we have run 00:14:23.180 --> 00:14:27.320 align:middle line:84% is signaled by the single shoe prints. 00:14:27.320 --> 00:14:31.970 align:middle line:90% In the sun, trees grow still. 00:14:31.970 --> 00:14:36.620 align:middle line:84% My flapping soles are the only sound for miles around. 00:14:36.620 --> 00:14:40.340 align:middle line:90% A moment of revision is at hand. 00:14:40.340 --> 00:14:43.040 align:middle line:84% Approaching the low ground's clearing, 00:14:43.040 --> 00:14:46.610 align:middle line:84% I remember the Korean tribesmen chant, 00:14:46.610 --> 00:14:52.610 align:middle line:84% "On this day of good sun and brilliant moon, 00:14:52.610 --> 00:14:57.740 align:middle line:90% we leave this for you to eat. 00:14:57.740 --> 00:15:02.180 align:middle line:84% Shadows of the spirit house, descend. 00:15:02.180 --> 00:15:04.580 align:middle line:90% Imagination reigns. 00:15:04.580 --> 00:15:08.870 align:middle line:84% And as I cool into the blues of Southern summer dusk, 00:15:08.870 --> 00:15:13.820 align:middle line:84% I dedicate this poem and present run to you. 00:15:13.820 --> 00:15:19.550 align:middle line:84% You who worked the levees, you who worked the long rice 00:15:19.550 --> 00:15:25.130 align:middle line:84% fields, you who taught us the graceful stride 00:15:25.130 --> 00:15:29.720 align:middle line:90% of this American race, run. 00:15:29.720 --> 00:15:35.900 align:middle line:90% 00:15:35.900 --> 00:15:38.687 align:middle line:90% You don't have to do that. 00:15:38.687 --> 00:15:40.520 align:middle line:84% And that's what-- I'm paying the honorarium. 00:15:40.520 --> 00:15:43.280 align:middle line:90% I can do anything I want. 00:15:43.280 --> 00:15:45.980 align:middle line:90% I'll clap when I want to. 00:15:45.980 --> 00:15:49.160 align:middle line:84% Someone wrote to me recently just out 00:15:49.160 --> 00:15:52.670 align:middle line:84% of the blue, which is unusual, at least for me, 00:15:52.670 --> 00:15:56.960 align:middle line:84% poetical experience and said, I've read your poetry. 00:15:56.960 --> 00:15:59.990 align:middle line:90% It was great. 00:15:59.990 --> 00:16:04.070 align:middle line:84% But I thought, wow, OK, it's happening. 00:16:04.070 --> 00:16:08.090 align:middle line:84% But this one person who wrote to me 00:16:08.090 --> 00:16:13.010 align:middle line:84% also said that he liked poems in a section of Blues Journeys 00:16:13.010 --> 00:16:16.250 align:middle line:84% Home that are the section called Guardians. 00:16:16.250 --> 00:16:20.960 align:middle line:84% And again, last night as we traveled on the plane 00:16:20.960 --> 00:16:23.540 align:middle line:84% into Tucson, I asked Charlotte which 00:16:23.540 --> 00:16:27.170 align:middle line:90% ones I should read in this. 00:16:27.170 --> 00:16:30.270 align:middle line:84% I'm going to-- oh, here's one of my favorite. 00:16:30.270 --> 00:16:32.480 align:middle line:90% This is a poem for Gus Cannon. 00:16:32.480 --> 00:16:37.850 align:middle line:84% It's not C-A-N-O-N. It's C-A-N-N-O-N, Gus Cannon, 00:16:37.850 --> 00:16:40.760 align:middle line:84% who was a reviser in his own right though. 00:16:40.760 --> 00:16:46.830 align:middle line:84% And Gus Cannon was a blues man and played the guitar. 00:16:46.830 --> 00:16:50.390 align:middle line:84% And in the Blues, there's a guy by the name of Barry 00:16:50.390 --> 00:16:52.370 align:middle line:84% Pierce who's written a book about this, 00:16:52.370 --> 00:16:54.950 align:middle line:90% there's a standard story. 00:16:54.950 --> 00:16:58.460 align:middle line:84% Musicians want to play their music 00:16:58.460 --> 00:17:02.120 align:middle line:84% but their mothers and fathers say it's sacrilegious 00:17:02.120 --> 00:17:03.710 align:middle line:90% and they won't let him play it. 00:17:03.710 --> 00:17:06.170 align:middle line:84% They won't buy him instruments, and so they 00:17:06.170 --> 00:17:08.060 align:middle line:84% have to make their own first instrument, 00:17:08.060 --> 00:17:11.390 align:middle line:84% so they have an uncle somewhere who's not far away, 00:17:11.390 --> 00:17:14.720 align:middle line:84% and they steal his guitar and their adventures 00:17:14.720 --> 00:17:16.160 align:middle line:84% like having to jump out the window 00:17:16.160 --> 00:17:17.750 align:middle line:84% and leave the guitar behind because they've 00:17:17.750 --> 00:17:19.167 align:middle line:84% been messing with somebody's wife, 00:17:19.167 --> 00:17:22.310 align:middle line:84% and you get these stories of Bluesman. 00:17:22.310 --> 00:17:25.040 align:middle line:84% And Gus Cannon's story is not unlike that 00:17:25.040 --> 00:17:27.480 align:middle line:84% when he tells it about his early days 00:17:27.480 --> 00:17:29.460 align:middle line:84% and how he came to the guitar playing. 00:17:29.460 --> 00:17:32.100 align:middle line:84% But he used to play in Memphis, and he had a group 00:17:32.100 --> 00:17:35.370 align:middle line:84% called the Jug Stompers, Gus Cannon's Jug Stompers. 00:17:35.370 --> 00:17:40.800 align:middle line:84% And I saw a picture once of Gus Cannon, and Gus was bad, 00:17:40.800 --> 00:17:43.740 align:middle line:84% I mean, he was definitely bad, the way he dressed 00:17:43.740 --> 00:17:44.530 align:middle line:90% and so forth. 00:17:44.530 --> 00:17:48.120 align:middle line:84% So he seemed to me to capture not only the standard story 00:17:48.120 --> 00:17:51.450 align:middle line:84% of the blues man, but also in a sense 00:17:51.450 --> 00:17:53.490 align:middle line:84% implied or suggested the lifestyle. 00:17:53.490 --> 00:17:57.210 align:middle line:90% So a poem for Gus Cannon. 00:17:57.210 --> 00:18:02.400 align:middle line:84% A raccoon skin scraped thin for resonance, a guitar-neck 00:18:02.400 --> 00:18:07.950 align:middle line:84% and an old bread pan made you a Stomper, medicine show 00:18:07.950 --> 00:18:12.000 align:middle line:84% traveler, jug band man for Southern barbecues 00:18:12.000 --> 00:18:14.520 align:middle line:90% and rollicking barrel houses. 00:18:14.520 --> 00:18:20.820 align:middle line:84% Your long frame became an instrument of pure delight. 00:18:20.820 --> 00:18:25.560 align:middle line:84% Men in plantation fields held you in awe. 00:18:25.560 --> 00:18:31.230 align:middle line:84% Brown girls with big eyes hummed at your strumming, Gus. 00:18:31.230 --> 00:18:34.380 align:middle line:84% And around Memphis, everyone took pride 00:18:34.380 --> 00:18:40.620 align:middle line:84% in your new store-bought guitar and sharp-creased pants. 00:18:40.620 --> 00:18:46.830 align:middle line:84% Gus Cannon, you would say, Gus Cannon and his Jug Stompers, 00:18:46.830 --> 00:18:51.310 align:middle line:84% here to let you know what country Blues is all about. 00:18:51.310 --> 00:18:57.120 align:middle line:84% And then you made them Gus drop down mama, 00:18:57.120 --> 00:18:59.775 align:middle line:90% sweet as the showers of rain. 00:18:59.775 --> 00:19:02.850 align:middle line:90% 00:19:02.850 --> 00:19:05.700 align:middle line:90% Go you, got you there. 00:19:05.700 --> 00:19:10.230 align:middle line:90% 00:19:10.230 --> 00:19:15.480 align:middle line:84% This is a person in another tradition as guardian 00:19:15.480 --> 00:19:17.640 align:middle line:84% of the culture, as guardian of the law, 00:19:17.640 --> 00:19:19.320 align:middle line:90% as guardian of the word. 00:19:19.320 --> 00:19:22.850 align:middle line:90% This is a poem for Hosea Hudson. 00:19:22.850 --> 00:19:29.640 align:middle line:84% H-O-S-E-A Hudson, who is a Black communist worker and will tell 00:19:29.640 --> 00:19:33.090 align:middle line:84% you that he is still a black communist worker. 00:19:33.090 --> 00:19:36.480 align:middle line:84% Gus was around during those days when 00:19:36.480 --> 00:19:38.700 align:middle line:84% the Communist Party in the United States 00:19:38.700 --> 00:19:42.120 align:middle line:84% endorsed a separate Black nation, a nation 00:19:42.120 --> 00:19:44.070 align:middle line:84% within a nation, and suggested that people 00:19:44.070 --> 00:19:45.780 align:middle line:90% should organize among workers. 00:19:45.780 --> 00:19:51.180 align:middle line:84% And Hosea Hudson worked in the whole southern region 00:19:51.180 --> 00:19:54.090 align:middle line:84% when you had to do the kinds of things 00:19:54.090 --> 00:19:57.840 align:middle line:84% that you have to do again in the 1960s, and who knows, 00:19:57.840 --> 00:20:01.620 align:middle line:84% you might have to do again in the 1980s, and the 1990s, 00:20:01.620 --> 00:20:03.720 align:middle line:90% and in the 2010s, and whatever. 00:20:03.720 --> 00:20:11.040 align:middle line:84% But he was eluding always one brigade of people threatening 00:20:11.040 --> 00:20:13.080 align:middle line:90% to beat up Communist Workers. 00:20:13.080 --> 00:20:16.710 align:middle line:84% And he was a person who read the literature 00:20:16.710 --> 00:20:19.230 align:middle line:84% and who was deeply and deeply invested, 00:20:19.230 --> 00:20:24.780 align:middle line:84% and still is, in the Communist Party and in its possibilities 00:20:24.780 --> 00:20:27.060 align:middle line:90% in the United States of America. 00:20:27.060 --> 00:20:30.480 align:middle line:84% A friend of mine by the name of Nell Painter, N-E-L-L, 00:20:30.480 --> 00:20:34.620 align:middle line:84% and despite the word painter, who is a brilliant Black woman, 00:20:34.620 --> 00:20:38.070 align:middle line:84% historian, now at Princeton, wrote a book called The 00:20:38.070 --> 00:20:40.170 align:middle line:90% Narrative of Hosea Hudson. 00:20:40.170 --> 00:20:43.110 align:middle line:84% And she afforded me the privilege one 00:20:43.110 --> 00:20:45.630 align:middle line:84% day of going with her over to Atlantic City 00:20:45.630 --> 00:20:49.020 align:middle line:84% where Hosea Hudson lives while she taped and interviewed 00:20:49.020 --> 00:20:52.360 align:middle line:84% and talked with him about the Communist Party and his work. 00:20:52.360 --> 00:20:57.420 align:middle line:84% And I wrote a poem about that day and about Hosea Hudson. 00:20:57.420 --> 00:21:00.210 align:middle line:90% 00:21:00.210 --> 00:21:05.970 align:middle line:84% For Hosea Hudson, Black Communist worker at age 79. 00:21:05.970 --> 00:21:12.300 align:middle line:84% The pungent odor of Vaporub and too many hours without sun 00:21:12.300 --> 00:21:17.100 align:middle line:84% or the season's quick wind through broken screens 00:21:17.100 --> 00:21:19.260 align:middle line:90% was your room. 00:21:19.260 --> 00:21:23.640 align:middle line:84% The compact chairs were bursting their limits. 00:21:23.640 --> 00:21:30.090 align:middle line:84% Their stuffing exposed to bright dim gray ancestors 00:21:30.090 --> 00:21:32.820 align:middle line:90% across the walls. 00:21:32.820 --> 00:21:36.690 align:middle line:84% The browning of a bare bulb on the table 00:21:36.690 --> 00:21:40.140 align:middle line:90% laden with political affairs. 00:21:40.140 --> 00:21:44.820 align:middle line:84% Refrigerator clicks, hums low in a farther room 00:21:44.820 --> 00:21:48.870 align:middle line:84% as a counterpoint, as low, signifying voice 00:21:48.870 --> 00:21:52.650 align:middle line:84% without judgment, and the tape recorders 00:21:52.650 --> 00:21:56.970 align:middle line:90% whirring and your voice. 00:21:56.970 --> 00:22:00.150 align:middle line:84% Not everyone can be in the party. 00:22:00.150 --> 00:22:03.960 align:middle line:84% Now, the party don't mind your having a friend, even 00:22:03.960 --> 00:22:05.670 align:middle line:90% a lady friend. 00:22:05.670 --> 00:22:08.280 align:middle line:84% I mean, they didn't want you hopping around from limb 00:22:08.280 --> 00:22:11.880 align:middle line:90% to limb like no Bantam rooster. 00:22:11.880 --> 00:22:17.610 align:middle line:84% The cassettes change, scene unfolds in mute significance, 00:22:17.610 --> 00:22:22.320 align:middle line:84% eyes along the wall on the table glass on a mantle's ledge 00:22:22.320 --> 00:22:24.280 align:middle line:90% become family. 00:22:24.280 --> 00:22:26.750 align:middle line:90% And you resume. 00:22:26.750 --> 00:22:28.190 align:middle line:90% That's my mother. 00:22:28.190 --> 00:22:32.720 align:middle line:84% She is faint, unripe candidate for his dark voice. 00:22:32.720 --> 00:22:35.820 align:middle line:84% And the cousin I told you about, her daughter and aunt, 00:22:35.820 --> 00:22:38.660 align:middle line:90% my mother's sister. 00:22:38.660 --> 00:22:45.920 align:middle line:84% He is drawn back by the sharp fight of dogs outside. 00:22:45.920 --> 00:22:47.180 align:middle line:90% Every afternoon. 00:22:47.180 --> 00:22:51.830 align:middle line:84% Every afternoon, them dogs, but that wasn't my point. 00:22:51.830 --> 00:22:54.770 align:middle line:84% My point you see is now ain't no such thing 00:22:54.770 --> 00:22:58.220 align:middle line:84% as high ups in the Communist Party. 00:22:58.220 --> 00:23:02.690 align:middle line:84% What you got is Democratic centralism. 00:23:02.690 --> 00:23:06.890 align:middle line:84% The majority decide and everybody got to shut up. 00:23:06.890 --> 00:23:12.290 align:middle line:84% Dogs crackle through the room releasing violent eyes 00:23:12.290 --> 00:23:16.070 align:middle line:84% along the wall, avoiding the frame 00:23:16.070 --> 00:23:20.060 align:middle line:90% of his dead wife in coffin. 00:23:20.060 --> 00:23:23.720 align:middle line:84% I inquire about the overalled Black man 00:23:23.720 --> 00:23:27.920 align:middle line:90% and his solemn Black companion. 00:23:27.920 --> 00:23:33.410 align:middle line:90% Yes, sho, that's Sarge Garfield. 00:23:33.410 --> 00:23:37.730 align:middle line:84% His brother-in-law down in Baton Rouge. 00:23:37.730 --> 00:23:45.170 align:middle line:84% Before he lost his strength, the light dims and resumes. 00:23:45.170 --> 00:23:48.920 align:middle line:84% I'm old now, but I still believes. 00:23:48.920 --> 00:23:52.259 align:middle line:90% [APPLAUSE] 00:23:52.259 --> 00:23:58.940 align:middle line:90% 00:23:58.940 --> 00:24:04.970 align:middle line:84% I think now what I like to do is, before reading 00:24:04.970 --> 00:24:08.240 align:middle line:84% one of the poem in this volume, a couple of other poems 00:24:08.240 --> 00:24:14.660 align:middle line:84% in this volume, try some things that are recent and fairly new. 00:24:14.660 --> 00:24:17.160 align:middle line:84% They all have stories of one sort or another, 00:24:17.160 --> 00:24:22.970 align:middle line:84% but I haven't made them up yet, so I take it as it comes. 00:24:22.970 --> 00:24:27.740 align:middle line:84% This is a poem that's called After All That Happened. 00:24:27.740 --> 00:24:30.540 align:middle line:90% 00:24:30.540 --> 00:24:34.420 align:middle line:84% And I think in a sense, this poem 00:24:34.420 --> 00:24:38.410 align:middle line:84% is a kind of break that moves away from Blues Journeys Home 00:24:38.410 --> 00:24:44.170 align:middle line:84% and offers an opening into a different kind 00:24:44.170 --> 00:24:49.570 align:middle line:84% of poetical world and different themes. 00:24:49.570 --> 00:24:50.740 align:middle line:90% After all that happened. 00:24:50.740 --> 00:24:54.370 align:middle line:90% 00:24:54.370 --> 00:24:59.620 align:middle line:84% You have come back to me through legends, rumors, 00:24:59.620 --> 00:25:05.950 align:middle line:84% wars of the self, analysis, tears, and blood, 00:25:05.950 --> 00:25:09.400 align:middle line:84% the agony of operations incalculable, 00:25:09.400 --> 00:25:13.390 align:middle line:84% the severing of heads and tearing of flesh, 00:25:13.390 --> 00:25:21.480 align:middle line:84% the mightiness of your suffering is beyond question or doubt. 00:25:21.480 --> 00:25:23.970 align:middle line:84% When they pushed you farther than the mine could bear 00:25:23.970 --> 00:25:26.670 align:middle line:84% and you took residents outside your skin 00:25:26.670 --> 00:25:33.090 align:middle line:84% to behold their sick violence, I was bound hand and foot 00:25:33.090 --> 00:25:36.480 align:middle line:90% beneath ashes of despair. 00:25:36.480 --> 00:25:40.890 align:middle line:84% I heard your tears but could not move. 00:25:40.890 --> 00:25:47.130 align:middle line:84% The sun, the next morning rose as though nothing was wrong, 00:25:47.130 --> 00:25:51.120 align:middle line:84% but your blood was a screen across it. 00:25:51.120 --> 00:25:54.600 align:middle line:90% My eyes were the color of milk. 00:25:54.600 --> 00:25:57.810 align:middle line:84% You touched my forehead but cringed 00:25:57.810 --> 00:26:00.510 align:middle line:90% when I reached for your face. 00:26:00.510 --> 00:26:05.130 align:middle line:84% You knew it was no longer there, and now you 00:26:05.130 --> 00:26:09.810 align:middle line:84% have come back to me through caverns of despair. 00:26:09.810 --> 00:26:12.210 align:middle line:84% You are not afraid of man monsters who 00:26:12.210 --> 00:26:15.210 align:middle line:84% walk midnight streets with their flags 00:26:15.210 --> 00:26:20.220 align:middle line:84% waving, killing women and children across the Old City's 00:26:20.220 --> 00:26:22.260 align:middle line:90% moons. 00:26:22.260 --> 00:26:25.950 align:middle line:84% You have come back across deserts of loneliness 00:26:25.950 --> 00:26:29.130 align:middle line:90% and depressions set in stone. 00:26:29.130 --> 00:26:31.890 align:middle line:84% You are moving across gleaming mirrors, 00:26:31.890 --> 00:26:36.030 align:middle line:84% your image rejoined to solid flesh. 00:26:36.030 --> 00:26:40.230 align:middle line:84% Your mind is a flowering garden now, 00:26:40.230 --> 00:26:42.940 align:middle line:90% and I love you more than ever. 00:26:42.940 --> 00:26:47.980 align:middle line:84% And I love you more, more, more than ever 00:26:47.980 --> 00:26:49.210 align:middle line:90% before all that happened. 00:26:49.210 --> 00:26:55.760 align:middle line:90% 00:26:55.760 --> 00:26:59.030 align:middle line:84% We moved a few years ago to a place 00:26:59.030 --> 00:27:03.972 align:middle line:84% called Belfry, as in bats, as everybody would say. 00:27:03.972 --> 00:27:05.180 align:middle line:90% They'd say, "You live where?" 00:27:05.180 --> 00:27:06.770 align:middle line:90% And we say, Belfry Drive. 00:27:06.770 --> 00:27:08.540 align:middle line:90% They say, "As in bats?" 00:27:08.540 --> 00:27:11.240 align:middle line:84% So you would anticipate the line. 00:27:11.240 --> 00:27:15.200 align:middle line:84% So I live in bats, as in Belfry to confuse them. 00:27:15.200 --> 00:27:20.000 align:middle line:84% But this is a place that had lots of Republicans who 00:27:20.000 --> 00:27:20.888 align:middle line:90% were nice to us. 00:27:20.888 --> 00:27:21.680 align:middle line:90% They left us alone. 00:27:21.680 --> 00:27:26.570 align:middle line:90% 00:27:26.570 --> 00:27:29.960 align:middle line:90% We call it benign neglect. 00:27:29.960 --> 00:27:32.660 align:middle line:84% And the compensation for this was 00:27:32.660 --> 00:27:35.750 align:middle line:84% that there were lots of geese and wonderful tree lines. 00:27:35.750 --> 00:27:38.030 align:middle line:84% And it was at that point the country, 00:27:38.030 --> 00:27:43.258 align:middle line:84% it stopped being the country as they built lots of houses, 00:27:43.258 --> 00:27:44.550 align:middle line:90% and now we've moved from there. 00:27:44.550 --> 00:27:46.910 align:middle line:84% But there's a set of poems that I kind of call 00:27:46.910 --> 00:27:48.710 align:middle line:90% the Belfry poems. 00:27:48.710 --> 00:27:52.230 align:middle line:84% The first one is called Grandfather. 00:27:52.230 --> 00:27:57.320 align:middle line:84% The muscles in my grandfather's neck grew slack in his 90s, 00:27:57.320 --> 00:28:00.620 align:middle line:84% making channels through which the spirit flowed. 00:28:00.620 --> 00:28:04.250 align:middle line:84% Black beds of wisdom where rivers rose, 00:28:04.250 --> 00:28:06.800 align:middle line:84% his sinews were cathedral columns 00:28:06.800 --> 00:28:10.160 align:middle line:84% lifting to radiant eyes, excuse me, where 00:28:10.160 --> 00:28:14.540 align:middle line:84% I read the whole Earth's love and pain. 00:28:14.540 --> 00:28:20.870 align:middle line:84% Today, winter geese at sunset recall those ancient outlets, 00:28:20.870 --> 00:28:25.250 align:middle line:84% suggest a black and gracious gift of sound. 00:28:25.250 --> 00:28:28.810 align:middle line:90% 00:28:28.810 --> 00:28:33.820 align:middle line:90% Belfry to Hiroshima now. 00:28:33.820 --> 00:28:38.350 align:middle line:84% Afternoon and our chimes, our path, our wind 00:28:38.350 --> 00:28:40.630 align:middle line:90% chimes hang melodious. 00:28:40.630 --> 00:28:44.410 align:middle line:84% They are counterpart for wrinkled veterans 00:28:44.410 --> 00:28:45.820 align:middle line:90% on television. 00:28:45.820 --> 00:28:50.980 align:middle line:84% They speak of a day 40 years ago when the gay Enola rained fire 00:28:50.980 --> 00:28:52.420 align:middle line:90% on the Orient. 00:28:52.420 --> 00:28:57.400 align:middle line:84% We see on the tube despite the chimes' distraction, surgically 00:28:57.400 --> 00:29:02.950 align:middle line:84% perfect faces, spotless children following old footage and more 00:29:02.950 --> 00:29:08.680 align:middle line:84% white males talk of napping, napping while fire 00:29:08.680 --> 00:29:10.900 align:middle line:90% set the ground boiling. 00:29:10.900 --> 00:29:15.700 align:middle line:90% Babies dying, samurai melting. 00:29:15.700 --> 00:29:19.840 align:middle line:84% The wrinkled man says, "Well, I was 00:29:19.840 --> 00:29:22.360 align:middle line:90% so tired to tell you the truth. 00:29:22.360 --> 00:29:27.400 align:middle line:84% After the mission, I went back into the back of the plane 00:29:27.400 --> 00:29:30.250 align:middle line:90% and slept for hours. 00:29:30.250 --> 00:29:35.800 align:middle line:84% Never occurred to me, what a great thing we had done." 00:29:35.800 --> 00:29:41.830 align:middle line:84% Belfry's sun makes late clouds lavender and rose. 00:29:41.830 --> 00:29:47.230 align:middle line:84% Bells of nearby churches feel like charred flesh 00:29:47.230 --> 00:29:50.080 align:middle line:90% dropping to Earth. 00:29:50.080 --> 00:29:53.710 align:middle line:84% I push open the screen and assault 00:29:53.710 --> 00:29:59.755 align:middle line:84% our chimes apart with a madness that makes my neighbors stare. 00:29:59.755 --> 00:30:05.540 align:middle line:90% 00:30:05.540 --> 00:30:07.580 align:middle line:84% I guess this would have to be Belfry 3. 00:30:07.580 --> 00:30:10.688 align:middle line:84% I mean, logically, it would be cool if it was Belfry 6, 00:30:10.688 --> 00:30:12.230 align:middle line:84% and everybody would say what happened 00:30:12.230 --> 00:30:14.180 align:middle line:90% to the missing belfry poems? 00:30:14.180 --> 00:30:19.160 align:middle line:84% A whole dissertation of speculation. 00:30:19.160 --> 00:30:20.180 align:middle line:90% This is 3. 00:30:20.180 --> 00:30:23.690 align:middle line:84% This is for my son, Mark Frederick Baker, who 00:30:23.690 --> 00:30:26.450 align:middle line:90% is now a freshman in college. 00:30:26.450 --> 00:30:30.260 align:middle line:90% And it's called Against Romance. 00:30:30.260 --> 00:30:33.553 align:middle line:84% He might be a little embarrassed by this poem now. 00:30:33.553 --> 00:30:35.720 align:middle line:84% This was written when he was a junior in high school 00:30:35.720 --> 00:30:38.120 align:middle line:90% and he quite liked it then. 00:30:38.120 --> 00:30:41.360 align:middle line:90% But it's called Against Romance. 00:30:41.360 --> 00:30:43.670 align:middle line:84% Behind the line of trees at Belfry, 00:30:43.670 --> 00:30:47.750 align:middle line:84% light rises, birds who should be romantic, 00:30:47.750 --> 00:30:52.040 align:middle line:84% grackles, swifts, but are only sparrows, 00:30:52.040 --> 00:30:57.860 align:middle line:84% dart into the sunrise like thrown objects fort-da. 00:30:57.860 --> 00:31:02.540 align:middle line:84% My son, who should resemble romantic heroes, 00:31:02.540 --> 00:31:06.800 align:middle line:84% but is more beautiful, has departed for the day. 00:31:06.800 --> 00:31:10.760 align:middle line:84% The house grows hugely and I, who 00:31:10.760 --> 00:31:13.730 align:middle line:84% should know more prestigious things to do, 00:31:13.730 --> 00:31:18.170 align:middle line:84% have already begun planning his return. 00:31:18.170 --> 00:31:23.240 align:middle line:84% He will arrive in the red orange of evening, a light 00:31:23.240 --> 00:31:27.560 align:middle line:84% that silhouettes barrenness and raises 00:31:27.560 --> 00:31:32.570 align:middle line:90% plane birds to winter perches. 00:31:32.570 --> 00:31:38.330 align:middle line:84% He will not realize how exciting my day has been without him. 00:31:38.330 --> 00:31:44.740 align:middle line:90% 00:31:44.740 --> 00:31:50.080 align:middle line:84% Oh, this is a poem that I have not read before. 00:31:50.080 --> 00:31:55.290 align:middle line:90% 00:31:55.290 --> 00:32:01.350 align:middle line:84% It's for a woman by the name of Rita Watkins. 00:32:01.350 --> 00:32:05.730 align:middle line:84% She was the first wife of a mentor of mine in college, 00:32:05.730 --> 00:32:09.690 align:middle line:84% and she and the mentor were both extraordinarily important 00:32:09.690 --> 00:32:11.286 align:middle line:90% to us. 00:32:11.286 --> 00:32:16.710 align:middle line:84% The poem is called Simply for Rita, R-I-T-A. 00:32:16.710 --> 00:32:22.620 align:middle line:84% It seems now always the same: morning and wind, the leaves 00:32:22.620 --> 00:32:29.490 align:middle line:84% down and endlessly moving, pools undercover, boats moored, 00:32:29.490 --> 00:32:31.950 align:middle line:90% deckchair is firmly stored. 00:32:31.950 --> 00:32:37.050 align:middle line:84% It seems now always to last, the strangely full feeling 00:32:37.050 --> 00:32:40.740 align:middle line:84% of having consumed too much, of having eaten more than a 00:32:40.740 --> 00:32:45.090 align:middle line:84% fill and unable to bear the radiant weight of the hearth's 00:32:45.090 --> 00:32:46.200 align:middle line:90% glow. 00:32:46.200 --> 00:32:49.410 align:middle line:84% It is as though with winter nothing can be renewed. 00:32:49.410 --> 00:32:52.920 align:middle line:84% The destroying hand of December lifting 00:32:52.920 --> 00:32:54.990 align:middle line:84% heat and life and all nourishment 00:32:54.990 --> 00:32:59.790 align:middle line:84% from the surface, an icy destruction that pushes away 00:32:59.790 --> 00:33:04.350 align:middle line:84% grave covers on summer grills, rattles the new panes 00:33:04.350 --> 00:33:06.240 align:middle line:90% in every room. 00:33:06.240 --> 00:33:09.420 align:middle line:84% It seems now to have swallowed the good, 00:33:09.420 --> 00:33:17.970 align:middle line:84% to have scuttled and sunk the last dry enterprise of August. 00:33:17.970 --> 00:33:22.680 align:middle line:84% Today, word came of the same bleak endings. 00:33:22.680 --> 00:33:25.860 align:middle line:84% I see you on a barren farm in Idaho, 00:33:25.860 --> 00:33:29.790 align:middle line:84% sorting out what is left of your life. 00:33:29.790 --> 00:33:33.600 align:middle line:84% The piles of books and letters for designated friends 00:33:33.600 --> 00:33:37.080 align:middle line:84% and places, the onions and perfumes 00:33:37.080 --> 00:33:40.950 align:middle line:84% arranged in serried rows along your dresser. 00:33:40.950 --> 00:33:45.090 align:middle line:84% A gentle hand passing along a kitchen shelf. 00:33:45.090 --> 00:33:51.210 align:middle line:84% Then you read once more a son's card sent long ago. 00:33:51.210 --> 00:33:57.540 align:middle line:84% Write what they shall read of you upon that wintry discovery. 00:33:57.540 --> 00:33:59.760 align:middle line:90% You ignite the engine. 00:33:59.760 --> 00:34:03.840 align:middle line:84% Stuff the largest means of breath. 00:34:03.840 --> 00:34:07.740 align:middle line:84% Await in December the same, always 00:34:07.740 --> 00:34:12.810 align:middle line:90% the same quiet hope of death. 00:34:12.810 --> 00:34:18.420 align:middle line:90% 00:34:18.420 --> 00:34:21.590 align:middle line:84% But it's not always the same, is it really? 00:34:21.590 --> 00:34:25.940 align:middle line:84% Nelson Mandela had a birthday, and people put together 00:34:25.940 --> 00:34:30.560 align:middle line:84% a collection of poems for Nelson Mandela's birthday 00:34:30.560 --> 00:34:35.840 align:middle line:84% to be sent off to, hopefully to him but certainly 00:34:35.840 --> 00:34:38.960 align:middle line:84% to South Africa and this is called A Birthday in the Dust: 00:34:38.960 --> 00:34:42.679 align:middle line:90% for Mandela in his 70s. 00:34:42.679 --> 00:34:45.830 align:middle line:84% The dust and great trees mark the contrast. 00:34:45.830 --> 00:34:50.210 align:middle line:84% Brown sediment settles over ripe savannas. 00:34:50.210 --> 00:34:54.170 align:middle line:90% Lush growth bounds its space. 00:34:54.170 --> 00:34:59.990 align:middle line:84% Dust is an itinerant reminder of soil possessed, 00:34:59.990 --> 00:35:01.970 align:middle line:90% people dispossessed. 00:35:01.970 --> 00:35:07.730 align:middle line:84% Its element is wind, rustling trees carrying fine grains 00:35:07.730 --> 00:35:10.100 align:middle line:90% everywhere. 00:35:10.100 --> 00:35:13.370 align:middle line:84% Forest of Johannesburg are a rich burgeoning 00:35:13.370 --> 00:35:16.700 align:middle line:84% of stone and steel, white settlers 00:35:16.700 --> 00:35:22.790 align:middle line:84% are lush reducing black and brown life to the invisible. 00:35:22.790 --> 00:35:28.940 align:middle line:84% Wind riding out of Bantustans and urban bistros. 00:35:28.940 --> 00:35:36.260 align:middle line:84% Wind blows majestic clouds like prophecies of change. 00:35:36.260 --> 00:35:40.730 align:middle line:84% Speckles are what you catch, Nelson Mandela. 00:35:40.730 --> 00:35:44.240 align:middle line:84% In the sunlit stream of your cell, 00:35:44.240 --> 00:35:48.860 align:middle line:84% a swirl of brown and black that reminds you of the day 00:35:48.860 --> 00:35:51.350 align:middle line:90% the Earth was born. 00:35:51.350 --> 00:35:53.510 align:middle line:90% Cosmic matter. 00:35:53.510 --> 00:35:56.030 align:middle line:90% That will not abate. 00:35:56.030 --> 00:36:01.430 align:middle line:84% You are a grain no bounded moment can contain, 00:36:01.430 --> 00:36:05.170 align:middle line:84% no great and subtle trees resist. 00:36:05.170 --> 00:36:13.590 align:middle line:90% 00:36:13.590 --> 00:36:19.350 align:middle line:84% This is a poem about my father and experience in youth. 00:36:19.350 --> 00:36:22.455 align:middle line:84% Has trees in it, but they're not maples and there are no deers. 00:36:22.455 --> 00:36:25.380 align:middle line:90% 00:36:25.380 --> 00:36:30.540 align:middle line:84% On a cold Saturday full of gray sidewalks and first steps 00:36:30.540 --> 00:36:34.830 align:middle line:84% of real youth, I was no more than four, 00:36:34.830 --> 00:36:39.360 align:middle line:84% my young dad promised a nickel for each piece of firewood 00:36:39.360 --> 00:36:42.510 align:middle line:84% that made it to the backyard in my arms. 00:36:42.510 --> 00:36:45.870 align:middle line:90% Suddenly the elm was gone. 00:36:45.870 --> 00:36:50.730 align:middle line:84% I went, bravely loaded underwood, feeling rich already 00:36:50.730 --> 00:36:54.580 align:middle line:90% when pieces began to fall. 00:36:54.580 --> 00:36:57.375 align:middle line:84% The dime I made is luscious today. 00:36:57.375 --> 00:37:00.240 align:middle line:90% 00:37:00.240 --> 00:37:06.060 align:middle line:84% At your death, I thought of the oxen yoke and lacquered wood 00:37:06.060 --> 00:37:08.460 align:middle line:90% you urged upon us always. 00:37:08.460 --> 00:37:11.640 align:middle line:90% The elm was suddenly no more. 00:37:11.640 --> 00:37:17.100 align:middle line:84% The shining coins of memory you bestowed, the example 00:37:17.100 --> 00:37:22.560 align:middle line:84% you were that fall day when your bulging arms lifted me 00:37:22.560 --> 00:37:27.270 align:middle line:84% toward a gray sky like a very tree of glory. 00:37:27.270 --> 00:37:36.480 align:middle line:90% 00:37:36.480 --> 00:37:43.200 align:middle line:84% This is a poem that Annette will appreciate since we started out 00:37:43.200 --> 00:37:45.490 align:middle line:90% in New Haven together. 00:37:45.490 --> 00:37:47.190 align:middle line:84% I don't think this is a very deep poem, 00:37:47.190 --> 00:37:49.380 align:middle line:84% but there's something sardonic about it 00:37:49.380 --> 00:37:50.640 align:middle line:90% and I couldn't even tell you. 00:37:50.640 --> 00:37:53.940 align:middle line:84% I think anyway, I hope there is something sardonic about it. 00:37:53.940 --> 00:37:54.900 align:middle line:90% It's very short. 00:37:54.900 --> 00:37:59.820 align:middle line:84% It's called Girl At the Bar after Manet. 00:37:59.820 --> 00:38:07.980 align:middle line:84% A white arm, blue veined, and draped across a table. 00:38:07.980 --> 00:38:12.216 align:middle line:84% Sundays in New Haven are like that. 00:38:12.216 --> 00:38:12.720 align:middle line:90% That's it. 00:38:12.720 --> 00:38:17.370 align:middle line:90% 00:38:17.370 --> 00:38:20.160 align:middle line:90% A more romantic poem in place. 00:38:20.160 --> 00:38:24.180 align:middle line:84% It's called Citing, C-I-T-I-N-G, Eric the Red, 00:38:24.180 --> 00:38:25.380 align:middle line:90% who found Greenland. 00:38:25.380 --> 00:38:29.700 align:middle line:84% We were flying back actually from Nigeria 00:38:29.700 --> 00:38:33.390 align:middle line:84% and then from London to the United States. 00:38:33.390 --> 00:38:38.100 align:middle line:84% And we crossed over this huge amazing site. 00:38:38.100 --> 00:38:39.900 align:middle line:84% And the pilot came on and he said, 00:38:39.900 --> 00:38:42.390 align:middle line:84% this was the first real estate hustle. 00:38:42.390 --> 00:38:46.350 align:middle line:84% The guy named it Greenland and told people 00:38:46.350 --> 00:38:49.170 align:middle line:84% they could come and live the good life there. 00:38:49.170 --> 00:38:54.990 align:middle line:84% So this guy citing Eric the Red, who found Greenland. 00:38:54.990 --> 00:38:58.290 align:middle line:84% When I'm finally finished, I want Fulani maidens 00:38:58.290 --> 00:39:01.710 align:middle line:84% to reduce my bones to ash and deposit them 00:39:01.710 --> 00:39:04.740 align:middle line:90% on caps and peaks of Greenland. 00:39:04.740 --> 00:39:08.910 align:middle line:84% At last, I will live in the shadow of glacial valleys 00:39:08.910 --> 00:39:10.950 align:middle line:90% with Eric the Red. 00:39:10.950 --> 00:39:16.140 align:middle line:84% We will invent melodies for ice floes and harmonies 00:39:16.140 --> 00:39:18.180 align:middle line:90% for singing whales. 00:39:18.180 --> 00:39:23.025 align:middle line:84% Earth, wind, and fire will keep us going forever. 00:39:23.025 --> 00:39:27.410 align:middle line:90% 00:39:27.410 --> 00:39:32.870 align:middle line:84% And a couple of the most recent poems, and then I 00:39:32.870 --> 00:39:37.490 align:middle line:84% think I'll read one last one from the other volume. 00:39:37.490 --> 00:39:40.580 align:middle line:90% 00:39:40.580 --> 00:39:45.230 align:middle line:84% This is called Me and William Carlos, Enough Said, as my son 00:39:45.230 --> 00:39:46.910 align:middle line:90% says to me sometime. 00:39:46.910 --> 00:39:50.180 align:middle line:84% A violet tinged pink softly takes 00:39:50.180 --> 00:39:52.920 align:middle line:90% place behind belfry trees. 00:39:52.920 --> 00:39:57.530 align:middle line:84% I am writing poems today only about what one can see. 00:39:57.530 --> 00:40:01.190 align:middle line:90% Imagination need not apply. 00:40:01.190 --> 00:40:06.170 align:middle line:84% Brown sticks, black birds have fallen fence 00:40:06.170 --> 00:40:10.550 align:middle line:84% around the garden where someone's sandy paper has 00:40:10.550 --> 00:40:15.380 align:middle line:84% been redistributed by a socialist wind. 00:40:15.380 --> 00:40:21.740 align:middle line:84% A place where a red wheelbarrow might stand, if only 00:40:21.740 --> 00:40:22.385 align:middle line:90% it would rain. 00:40:22.385 --> 00:40:25.820 align:middle line:90% 00:40:25.820 --> 00:40:28.770 align:middle line:90% This is called Mountain Radio-- 00:40:28.770 --> 00:40:31.490 align:middle line:84% thanks-- Mountain Radio in Winter. 00:40:31.490 --> 00:40:33.920 align:middle line:90% This is the Poconos. 00:40:33.920 --> 00:40:36.230 align:middle line:84% The curve and spread of these hills 00:40:36.230 --> 00:40:41.000 align:middle line:84% was a surprising as the diverse memento or your telephone 00:40:41.000 --> 00:40:46.190 align:middle line:84% call from a suburban town, voice and music spreading like light 00:40:46.190 --> 00:40:52.010 align:middle line:84% in winter places, Yo-Yo Ma's, with the stringed grace 00:40:52.010 --> 00:40:55.550 align:middle line:90% of December love. 00:40:55.550 --> 00:40:57.230 align:middle line:84% This is my William Carlos Williams poem. 00:40:57.230 --> 00:40:59.522 align:middle line:84% If this does not remind you of William Carlos Williams, 00:40:59.522 --> 00:41:01.610 align:middle line:90% I don't want to know about it. 00:41:01.610 --> 00:41:03.140 align:middle line:90% Don't tell me. 00:41:03.140 --> 00:41:07.280 align:middle line:84% It's called A Blessing of Horses. 00:41:07.280 --> 00:41:12.770 align:middle line:84% A touch in January of spring brings chestnut horses 00:41:12.770 --> 00:41:17.240 align:middle line:90% to the field dry as sage. 00:41:17.240 --> 00:41:23.480 align:middle line:84% One stretches for water, creates a sculpture at rest 00:41:23.480 --> 00:41:28.955 align:middle line:84% with water, and the startling grace of winter Earth. 00:41:28.955 --> 00:41:34.190 align:middle line:90% 00:41:34.190 --> 00:41:36.935 align:middle line:90% From Blues Journeys Home. 00:41:36.935 --> 00:41:47.800 align:middle line:90% 00:41:47.800 --> 00:41:54.970 align:middle line:90% This is a poem for my wife. 00:41:54.970 --> 00:41:59.890 align:middle line:90% 00:41:59.890 --> 00:42:05.230 align:middle line:84% We had a dinner party once and we had a very nice Chablis 00:42:05.230 --> 00:42:06.520 align:middle line:90% or something. 00:42:06.520 --> 00:42:09.250 align:middle line:84% And then we had people who said, "Do you 00:42:09.250 --> 00:42:10.600 align:middle line:90% have any more of that Chablis?" 00:42:10.600 --> 00:42:11.740 align:middle line:90% And we did. 00:42:11.740 --> 00:42:13.900 align:middle line:84% And we opened some more of the Chablis 00:42:13.900 --> 00:42:18.340 align:middle line:84% and suddenly everybody was just turned toward the spot where 00:42:18.340 --> 00:42:22.900 align:middle line:84% my wife was sitting because she was talking about her past 00:42:22.900 --> 00:42:29.320 align:middle line:84% and things that I knew nothing about or, of course, 00:42:29.320 --> 00:42:30.640 align:middle line:90% would never have married her. 00:42:30.640 --> 00:42:34.120 align:middle line:90% 00:42:34.120 --> 00:42:36.550 align:middle line:84% But actually she was talking about her youth. 00:42:36.550 --> 00:42:39.130 align:middle line:84% She used to go down to North Carolina in the summer, which 00:42:39.130 --> 00:42:40.600 align:middle line:90% was a familiar practice. 00:42:40.600 --> 00:42:42.340 align:middle line:84% Northern families who had migrated 00:42:42.340 --> 00:42:45.400 align:middle line:84% Black would send the kids back South to be with grandparents. 00:42:45.400 --> 00:42:47.150 align:middle line:84% But I hadn't heard these stories. 00:42:47.150 --> 00:42:50.590 align:middle line:84% So this is called Socializing Roots: 00:42:50.590 --> 00:42:52.510 align:middle line:84% When My Wife Surprised the Dinner 00:42:52.510 --> 00:42:54.325 align:middle line:90% Party With Talk of Her Youth. 00:42:54.325 --> 00:42:57.190 align:middle line:90% 00:42:57.190 --> 00:43:01.750 align:middle line:84% I see you in North Carolina dawns, your knees rattling 00:43:01.750 --> 00:43:05.080 align:middle line:84% against the morning chill, yellow pump 00:43:05.080 --> 00:43:07.870 align:middle line:90% water in your six years' hands. 00:43:07.870 --> 00:43:10.810 align:middle line:84% Your city-born mom has launched you 00:43:10.810 --> 00:43:15.310 align:middle line:84% South with toothpaste, toilet tissue, 00:43:15.310 --> 00:43:18.400 align:middle line:90% warning off dirt in the country. 00:43:18.400 --> 00:43:21.820 align:middle line:84% You return from the field with foaming mouth, 00:43:21.820 --> 00:43:25.480 align:middle line:84% the butt of rural jokes with flattened toilet 00:43:25.480 --> 00:43:27.640 align:middle line:90% rolls in your possession. 00:43:27.640 --> 00:43:32.050 align:middle line:84% No Sears catalog for your tender bottom. 00:43:32.050 --> 00:43:37.930 align:middle line:84% Undaunted, you meet the sun with your own etchings in dust, 00:43:37.930 --> 00:43:42.610 align:middle line:84% shell-dried corn for your grandfather's biddies, 00:43:42.610 --> 00:43:45.100 align:middle line:90% tough birds all. 00:43:45.100 --> 00:43:49.120 align:middle line:84% Your words return southern accents, 00:43:49.120 --> 00:43:55.142 align:middle line:84% sources of your excellence hidden until now. 00:43:55.142 --> 00:43:56.350 align:middle line:90% Thank you for your attention. 00:43:56.350 --> 00:43:59.815 align:middle line:90% [APPLAUSE] 00:43:59.815 --> 00:44:15.170 align:middle line:90% 00:44:15.170 --> 00:44:16.690 align:middle line:90% Thank you so much, Dr. Baker. 00:44:16.690 --> 00:44:19.060 align:middle line:84% Dr. Baker will be lecturing tomorrow afternoon 00:44:19.060 --> 00:44:23.050 align:middle line:84% in this building Room 14 at 3 o'clock. 00:44:23.050 --> 00:44:26.800 align:middle line:84% And I understand you've changed the lecture topic, what's the-- 00:44:26.800 --> 00:44:28.030 align:middle line:90% It's about rap music. 00:44:28.030 --> 00:44:28.900 align:middle line:90% About rap music. 00:44:28.900 --> 00:44:29.590 align:middle line:90% About rap music. 00:44:29.590 --> 00:44:30.250 align:middle line:90% Great. 00:44:30.250 --> 00:44:33.010 align:middle line:84% That's at 3 o'clock tomorrow in 14. 00:44:33.010 --> 00:44:37.140 align:middle line:84% Why don't you join us for some refreshments. 00:44:37.140 --> 00:44:37.890 align:middle line:90% Thank you so much. 00:44:37.890 --> 00:44:40.650 align:middle line:90% Thank you. 00:44:40.650 --> 00:44:42.720 align:middle line:90% What a night? 00:44:42.720 --> 00:44:43.650 align:middle line:90% Oh, yeah, we weren't. 00:44:43.650 --> 00:44:44.612 align:middle line:90% We have. 00:44:44.612 --> 00:44:48.950 align:middle line:90% 00:44:48.950 --> 00:44:51.070 align:middle line:84% Two in a row 3 we had one last night. 00:44:51.070 --> 00:44:53.080 align:middle line:90% Wow. 00:44:53.080 --> 00:44:54.393 align:middle line:90% Thank you, I'm Bob Houston. 00:44:54.393 --> 00:44:55.060 align:middle line:90% I teach fiction. 00:44:55.060 --> 00:44:55.900 align:middle line:90% Hi, how are you? 00:44:55.900 --> 00:44:56.830 align:middle line:90% Very, very pleased. 00:44:56.830 --> 00:44:59.260 align:middle line:84% I understand that we were conflated last night. 00:44:59.260 --> 00:44:59.900 align:middle line:90% She said it? 00:44:59.900 --> 00:45:00.620 align:middle line:90% Yeah. 00:45:00.620 --> 00:45:04.670 align:middle line:84% Robert Houston and then she said Houston will read and then we. 00:45:04.670 --> 00:45:07.978 align:middle line:84% Gather with a real writer I felt like his name was Baker. 00:45:07.978 --> 00:45:10.020 align:middle line:84% When we got married, she was Sharon Houston Baker 00:45:10.020 --> 00:45:10.990 align:middle line:90% Is that right? 00:45:10.990 --> 00:45:13.255 align:middle line:90% [OVERLAPPING VOICES] 00:45:13.255 --> 00:45:15.380 align:middle line:84% So are you from do you ever get back to Louisville? 00:45:15.380 --> 00:45:17.530 align:middle line:84% I have been back within the last couple of years. 00:45:17.530 --> 00:45:19.870 align:middle line:90% Do you know about Belmont? 00:45:19.870 --> 00:45:22.300 align:middle line:84% No, but I used to know people at Belmont. 00:45:22.300 --> 00:45:24.533 align:middle line:84% I mean, Belmont was, of course, a school of choice 00:45:24.533 --> 00:45:25.450 align:middle line:90% when I was growing up. 00:45:25.450 --> 00:45:25.950 align:middle line:90% Personally? 00:45:25.950 --> 00:45:26.548 align:middle line:90% Oh, yeah. 00:45:26.548 --> 00:45:28.090 align:middle line:84% I mean, a couple of people came to me 00:45:28.090 --> 00:45:32.560 align:middle line:84% and said, Why are you leaving Louisville? 00:45:32.560 --> 00:45:34.900 align:middle line:84% I mean, right here you have Belmont College 00:45:34.900 --> 00:45:36.400 align:middle line:90% that you should go to. 00:45:36.400 --> 00:45:37.360 align:middle line:90% No, yeah, I was-- 00:45:37.360 --> 00:45:38.050 align:middle line:90% I rode there. 00:45:38.050 --> 00:45:42.790 align:middle line:84% I spent a weekend residency, and was really impressed. 00:45:42.790 --> 00:45:46.150 align:middle line:84% It's his friend Thomas Martin's papers. 00:45:46.150 --> 00:45:50.450 align:middle line:84% It's connected with that kind, of I have a reputation. 00:45:50.450 --> 00:45:54.970 align:middle line:84% I mean, with Louisville and you were in there. 00:45:54.970 --> 00:45:57.520 align:middle line:84% But I mean, it was right a lot of people. 00:45:57.520 --> 00:45:59.080 align:middle line:90% You're a really good by the way. 00:45:59.080 --> 00:46:00.180 align:middle line:90% Oh, listen, thank you. 00:46:00.180 --> 00:46:01.480 align:middle line:90% Thank you. 00:46:01.480 --> 00:46:02.620 align:middle line:90% Forget thank you credit. 00:46:02.620 --> 00:46:05.380 align:middle line:90% OK, just say it's worth it. 00:46:05.380 --> 00:46:05.950 align:middle line:90% Thanks. 00:46:05.950 --> 00:46:06.520 align:middle line:90% Thanks. 00:46:06.520 --> 00:46:07.720 align:middle line:90% It's always tough. 00:46:07.720 --> 00:46:14.140 align:middle line:84% The process is getting easier of writing and I'm liking it more. 00:46:14.140 --> 00:46:16.930 align:middle line:84% But to get up and do it, it's still really tough. 00:46:16.930 --> 00:46:20.050 align:middle line:84% And there were poems that I knew I was going to read tonight. 00:46:20.050 --> 00:46:21.640 align:middle line:84% I mean, because I've begun, I've got 00:46:21.640 --> 00:46:26.320 align:middle line:84% a whole thing about the muse and their loved ones right. 00:46:26.320 --> 00:46:29.200 align:middle line:84% And I thought that'll be the principal thing of the night. 00:46:29.200 --> 00:46:32.060 align:middle line:90% And I couldn't do it. 00:46:32.060 --> 00:46:33.230 align:middle line:90% I couldn't get enough. 00:46:33.230 --> 00:46:35.350 align:middle line:84% But you're one of my closest friends. 00:46:35.350 --> 00:46:38.530 align:middle line:84% A guy named Paul Moriarty, William Carlos Williams, 00:46:38.530 --> 00:46:41.380 align:middle line:84% and for years we've been talking about Paul's 00:46:41.380 --> 00:46:43.480 align:middle line:84% life-saving scholarship, And I'll 00:46:43.480 --> 00:46:47.230 align:middle line:84% tell you the same thing I told Paul, "Write poetry." 00:46:47.230 --> 00:46:48.620 align:middle line:90% Because he's so good at it. 00:46:48.620 --> 00:46:49.120 align:middle line:90% Thank you. 00:46:49.120 --> 00:46:50.484 align:middle line:90% He's so good at it. 00:46:50.484 --> 00:46:51.250 align:middle line:90% Lovely. 00:46:51.250 --> 00:46:53.590 align:middle line:84% I mentioned Joseph Hudson, that was him. 00:46:53.590 --> 00:46:56.470 align:middle line:84% He was a-- he and my grandfather were friends. 00:46:56.470 --> 00:46:57.100 align:middle line:90% Were they? 00:46:57.100 --> 00:46:57.730 align:middle line:90% No kidding. 00:46:57.730 --> 00:47:02.540 align:middle line:84% My grandfather was an old Wobbly and CIO organizer in the South. 00:47:02.540 --> 00:47:04.690 align:middle line:84% Yeah, then there aren't many people that know it. 00:47:04.690 --> 00:47:05.630 align:middle line:90% How was he? 00:47:05.630 --> 00:47:06.130 align:middle line:90% Jose? 00:47:06.130 --> 00:47:06.910 align:middle line:90% He calls it that. 00:47:06.910 --> 00:47:07.420 align:middle line:90% Yeah, Jose. 00:47:07.420 --> 00:47:09.310 align:middle line:90% He calls himself Jose. 00:47:09.310 --> 00:47:13.780 align:middle line:84% Yeah, because you think Jose, any other kind of pronunciation 00:47:13.780 --> 00:47:16.017 align:middle line:84% could come up, but Jose Hudson is what he called it. 00:47:16.017 --> 00:47:16.600 align:middle line:90% Oh, I love it. 00:47:16.600 --> 00:47:17.584 align:middle line:90% Tough man. 00:47:17.584 --> 00:47:19.376 align:middle line:84% Wouldn't you love to have a name out there? 00:47:19.376 --> 00:47:20.350 align:middle line:84% I would love to have a name like it. 00:47:20.350 --> 00:47:21.160 align:middle line:90% It's so worth. 00:47:21.160 --> 00:47:21.702 align:middle line:90% That's right. 00:47:21.702 --> 00:47:23.470 align:middle line:90% Hi, I'm Jose Hudson. 00:47:23.470 --> 00:47:50.000 align:middle line:90%