WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:02.355 align:middle line:90% 00:00:02.355 --> 00:00:06.610 align:middle line:84% The next Poetry Center reading will be two weeks from tonight; 00:00:06.610 --> 00:00:09.460 align:middle line:84% that will be the Contest Awards Reading, 00:00:09.460 --> 00:00:15.885 align:middle line:84% April 21st in the Student Union terrace lounge. 00:00:15.885 --> 00:00:18.510 align:middle line:84% We figured we didn't have enough poetry readings this semester, 00:00:18.510 --> 00:00:20.650 align:middle line:90% so we've added one more. 00:00:20.650 --> 00:00:22.400 align:middle line:84% We're going to have a new book celebration 00:00:22.400 --> 00:00:24.110 align:middle line:90% on the 25th of April-- 00:00:24.110 --> 00:00:25.940 align:middle line:84% that will be a Sunday afternoon, we'll 00:00:25.940 --> 00:00:27.830 align:middle line:84% be sending out a notice on that-- 00:00:27.830 --> 00:00:31.010 align:middle line:84% to honor eight recent books of poetry 00:00:31.010 --> 00:00:33.095 align:middle line:90% by residents of the area. 00:00:33.095 --> 00:00:36.640 align:middle line:90% 00:00:36.640 --> 00:00:41.030 align:middle line:84% Rolly Kent will be reading at Pima College on Thursday, 00:00:41.030 --> 00:00:43.525 align:middle line:90% April 22nd on West Campus. 00:00:43.525 --> 00:00:46.270 align:middle line:90% 00:00:46.270 --> 00:00:51.040 align:middle line:84% The last Writers at Work will be next Tuesday night April 13th. 00:00:51.040 --> 00:00:55.630 align:middle line:84% The readers are N. Scott Momaday and Todd Lieber. 00:00:55.630 --> 00:00:58.900 align:middle line:84% And that reading will be in the new Harvill Auditorium. 00:00:58.900 --> 00:01:01.090 align:middle line:84% The Harvill building is the new classroom building 00:01:01.090 --> 00:01:02.245 align:middle line:90% on 2nd and Olive. 00:01:02.245 --> 00:01:06.090 align:middle line:90% 00:01:06.090 --> 00:01:09.000 align:middle line:84% We're preparing the last newsletter of the year. 00:01:09.000 --> 00:01:11.670 align:middle line:84% We'll take items for the newsletter 00:01:11.670 --> 00:01:15.060 align:middle line:90% until Friday this week. 00:01:15.060 --> 00:01:16.530 align:middle line:90% We publish only good news. 00:01:16.530 --> 00:01:24.840 align:middle line:90% 00:01:24.840 --> 00:01:28.465 align:middle line:84% Leslie Ullman's first collection of poems, Natural Histories, 00:01:28.465 --> 00:01:33.480 align:middle line:84% won the 1978 Yale Series of Younger Poets Award. 00:01:33.480 --> 00:01:35.430 align:middle line:84% Her poems have appeared in such magazines 00:01:35.430 --> 00:01:41.250 align:middle line:84% as The New Yorker, The Nation, Shenandoah, Mademoiselle, 00:01:41.250 --> 00:01:45.090 align:middle line:84% Poetry Northwest, and many others. 00:01:45.090 --> 00:01:48.060 align:middle line:84% In addition to the Yale prize, she's 00:01:48.060 --> 00:01:51.060 align:middle line:84% been a recipient of the National Endowment for the Arts grant. 00:01:51.060 --> 00:01:54.720 align:middle line:84% She's currently teaching at the University of Texas in El Paso. 00:01:54.720 --> 00:01:57.550 align:middle line:84% I had the pleasure to hear her read two years ago. 00:01:57.550 --> 00:01:59.610 align:middle line:84% She's a very fine reader, fine lady. 00:01:59.610 --> 00:02:02.220 align:middle line:84% I hope you'll be able to come to the Poetry Center following 00:02:02.220 --> 00:02:04.770 align:middle line:84% the reading to have some refreshments 00:02:04.770 --> 00:02:08.345 align:middle line:90% and meet Leslie Ullman. 00:02:08.345 --> 00:02:09.770 align:middle line:90% [APPLAUSE] 00:02:09.770 --> 00:02:13.100 align:middle line:90% 00:02:13.100 --> 00:02:14.090 align:middle line:90% Thank you. 00:02:14.090 --> 00:02:16.580 align:middle line:84% I've sort of fallen in love with your campus after jogging 00:02:16.580 --> 00:02:17.000 align:middle line:90% through it today. 00:02:17.000 --> 00:02:18.375 align:middle line:84% I can't imagine why anybody would 00:02:18.375 --> 00:02:21.310 align:middle line:84% write when they can just walk around and eat salad bars 00:02:21.310 --> 00:02:21.810 align:middle line:90% and things. 00:02:21.810 --> 00:02:25.310 align:middle line:90% It's sort of paradise. 00:02:25.310 --> 00:02:27.740 align:middle line:84% I, first of all, want you to let me 00:02:27.740 --> 00:02:29.932 align:middle line:84% know if you'd like to hear anything a second time, 00:02:29.932 --> 00:02:31.640 align:middle line:84% especially the poems in Natural Histories 00:02:31.640 --> 00:02:34.148 align:middle line:84% seem to need to be read more than once. 00:02:34.148 --> 00:02:36.440 align:middle line:84% And I feel a little hesitant about just doing them all, 00:02:36.440 --> 00:02:38.273 align:middle line:84% but if anybody would like to hear one again, 00:02:38.273 --> 00:02:40.490 align:middle line:90% please just wave a hand. 00:02:40.490 --> 00:02:42.620 align:middle line:84% I think I'll start with some from Natural Histories 00:02:42.620 --> 00:02:44.705 align:middle line:84% and then move to some new things and then come back 00:02:44.705 --> 00:02:45.580 align:middle line:90% to Natural Histories. 00:02:45.580 --> 00:02:48.320 align:middle line:84% And if there's anything you want to hear, just yell at me. 00:02:48.320 --> 00:02:49.580 align:middle line:90% I really don't mind it. 00:02:49.580 --> 00:02:52.790 align:middle line:90% Just let me know what you want. 00:02:52.790 --> 00:02:56.060 align:middle line:84% Since a lot of you are writers and since I'm also 00:02:56.060 --> 00:02:57.950 align:middle line:84% more comfortable doing this, I think 00:02:57.950 --> 00:03:00.230 align:middle line:84% I'd like to tell you a little bit about why 00:03:00.230 --> 00:03:01.490 align:middle line:90% I wanted to write each poem. 00:03:01.490 --> 00:03:04.190 align:middle line:84% I can't explain the poem, obviously, but I can offer-- 00:03:04.190 --> 00:03:08.700 align:middle line:84% I enjoy saying why the poem wanted to get started at all. 00:03:08.700 --> 00:03:13.310 align:middle line:84% And sometimes, what you'll hear will be a distant outgrowth 00:03:13.310 --> 00:03:14.633 align:middle line:90% from what I wanted. 00:03:14.633 --> 00:03:16.550 align:middle line:84% And other times, you might see a relationship. 00:03:16.550 --> 00:03:17.870 align:middle line:84% I don't particularly care what you see. 00:03:17.870 --> 00:03:19.430 align:middle line:84% I just want to share that process, 00:03:19.430 --> 00:03:21.930 align:middle line:84% because it continues to be a mystery to me. 00:03:21.930 --> 00:03:25.940 align:middle line:84% And since we're all involved in the same-- 00:03:25.940 --> 00:03:29.510 align:middle line:84% trying to navigate from the point of wanting 00:03:29.510 --> 00:03:34.670 align:middle line:84% to write a poem to actually then allowing oneself to finish it, 00:03:34.670 --> 00:03:37.760 align:middle line:84% I'd like to just share as much of that process as I can. 00:03:37.760 --> 00:03:42.140 align:middle line:84% The first few-- well, I guess a lot of these poems in the book 00:03:42.140 --> 00:03:43.245 align:middle line:90% were written-- 00:03:43.245 --> 00:03:45.620 align:middle line:84% I felt at the time, they were written from someone else's 00:03:45.620 --> 00:03:46.190 align:middle line:90% point of view. 00:03:46.190 --> 00:03:47.607 align:middle line:84% Because I think, in the beginning, 00:03:47.607 --> 00:03:50.000 align:middle line:84% I felt much more comfortable not being myself. 00:03:50.000 --> 00:03:52.430 align:middle line:84% I didn't think I had anything to say. 00:03:52.430 --> 00:03:54.050 align:middle line:84% It's a fear we never get over, but I 00:03:54.050 --> 00:03:55.520 align:middle line:84% think as we get older and more pompous, 00:03:55.520 --> 00:03:56.547 align:middle line:90% we can get away with it. 00:03:56.547 --> 00:03:58.130 align:middle line:84% And I already-- I am starting to write 00:03:58.130 --> 00:04:00.750 align:middle line:84% from my own point of view, for better or for worse. 00:04:00.750 --> 00:04:02.720 align:middle line:84% But in the beginning, I didn't and I 00:04:02.720 --> 00:04:05.390 align:middle line:90% found it kind of exciting. 00:04:05.390 --> 00:04:07.040 align:middle line:90% I still am excited by the idea. 00:04:07.040 --> 00:04:09.740 align:middle line:84% I found I could see more clearly when I got into someone else's 00:04:09.740 --> 00:04:13.460 align:middle line:84% skin and that I was drawing on experience that I hadn't had 00:04:13.460 --> 00:04:16.040 align:middle line:84% firsthand, but I had had somewhere 00:04:16.040 --> 00:04:18.050 align:middle line:84% through looking at movies, or reading books, 00:04:18.050 --> 00:04:22.310 align:middle line:84% or just having very intense conversations over years 00:04:22.310 --> 00:04:23.840 align:middle line:84% of being alive that I had absorbed. 00:04:23.840 --> 00:04:26.923 align:middle line:84% I found I absorbed a lot more vicarious experience 00:04:26.923 --> 00:04:27.590 align:middle line:90% than I realized. 00:04:27.590 --> 00:04:31.100 align:middle line:84% So in the beginning, in an incidental way, 00:04:31.100 --> 00:04:34.100 align:middle line:84% poetry helped me get access to those different voices, 00:04:34.100 --> 00:04:36.600 align:middle line:90% those different people. 00:04:36.600 --> 00:04:39.560 align:middle line:84% So I'm going to read you a few poems that come out of that. 00:04:39.560 --> 00:04:41.660 align:middle line:84% I can really make sense out of it in retrospect. 00:04:41.660 --> 00:04:43.310 align:middle line:84% At the time, I just felt desperate 00:04:43.310 --> 00:04:46.040 align:middle line:84% that I've got to get these poems written. 00:04:46.040 --> 00:04:47.780 align:middle line:84% And I'm not very good and I'll just 00:04:47.780 --> 00:04:49.460 align:middle line:84% do what I can to get something decent. 00:04:49.460 --> 00:04:51.980 align:middle line:84% And I realized that I was doing something very valuable. 00:04:51.980 --> 00:04:53.548 align:middle line:84% I realized later I had done something 00:04:53.548 --> 00:04:54.590 align:middle line:90% that was valuable for me. 00:04:54.590 --> 00:04:57.480 align:middle line:84% At the time, it didn't feel so great. 00:04:57.480 --> 00:05:00.200 align:middle line:84% This first poem wanted to get started, 00:05:00.200 --> 00:05:01.880 align:middle line:84% because I was listening to some jazz 00:05:01.880 --> 00:05:04.490 align:middle line:84% one night in Kansas City where I lived for a while, which 00:05:04.490 --> 00:05:05.750 align:middle line:90% used to be a big jazz place. 00:05:05.750 --> 00:05:06.745 align:middle line:90% It was pretty bad jazz. 00:05:06.745 --> 00:05:08.120 align:middle line:84% It was a pretty bad bar and I was 00:05:08.120 --> 00:05:09.710 align:middle line:90% drinking a pretty bad drink. 00:05:09.710 --> 00:05:13.220 align:middle line:84% And still, I got overtaken by a kind of false nostalgia 00:05:13.220 --> 00:05:14.930 align:middle line:84% for an era that hadn't been mine, 00:05:14.930 --> 00:05:20.930 align:middle line:84% a sort of a jazz era, the kind of decadent, smoky, tired out. 00:05:20.930 --> 00:05:23.030 align:middle line:90% And some sort of-- 00:05:23.030 --> 00:05:25.310 align:middle line:84% I started thinking of images that I wanted to use. 00:05:25.310 --> 00:05:26.990 align:middle line:84% And eventually, I could make them 00:05:26.990 --> 00:05:29.030 align:middle line:84% cohere by choosing a persona who is sort 00:05:29.030 --> 00:05:32.420 align:middle line:90% of a jaded woman of some sort. 00:05:32.420 --> 00:05:35.990 align:middle line:90% This is called Bravado. 00:05:35.990 --> 00:05:39.890 align:middle line:84% "I should have been one of those lean women seen 00:05:39.890 --> 00:05:46.190 align:middle line:84% up and down the coast with neat gin, a long story. 00:05:46.190 --> 00:05:52.070 align:middle line:84% By mistake, I live miles from water and do not smoke. 00:05:52.070 --> 00:05:57.470 align:middle line:84% This man on the saxophone moans and plans his journey someplace 00:05:57.470 --> 00:05:59.060 align:middle line:90% else. 00:05:59.060 --> 00:06:02.210 align:middle line:84% His cheeks swell as though pushing sound 00:06:02.210 --> 00:06:06.260 align:middle line:90% through sea air and old money. 00:06:06.260 --> 00:06:11.390 align:middle line:84% He doesn't understand there is no war anywhere, no 00:06:11.390 --> 00:06:17.120 align:middle line:84% veranda, no bravado of sons about to leave, 00:06:17.120 --> 00:06:22.040 align:middle line:84% that I am a woman with no ear for an old story, 00:06:22.040 --> 00:06:25.580 align:middle line:84% that my cheek sags when touched, that there 00:06:25.580 --> 00:06:30.350 align:middle line:84% are no more bad nights, that another year has fattened 00:06:30.350 --> 00:06:34.160 align:middle line:84% and passed without smudging my unastonished eye." 00:06:34.160 --> 00:06:43.040 align:middle line:90% 00:06:43.040 --> 00:06:45.170 align:middle line:90% This next poem got started-- 00:06:45.170 --> 00:06:47.060 align:middle line:84% this must have been after I'd been 00:06:47.060 --> 00:06:48.380 align:middle line:90% married, a fairly short time. 00:06:48.380 --> 00:06:52.510 align:middle line:84% And I was getting a sense of the creatureliness 00:06:52.510 --> 00:06:54.980 align:middle line:90% of living with someone else. 00:06:54.980 --> 00:06:56.093 align:middle line:90% And at one point-- 00:06:56.093 --> 00:06:58.760 align:middle line:84% this is very vague in my memory, so I'm not going to try to make 00:06:58.760 --> 00:07:01.910 align:middle line:84% too much sense of it-- but I got interested in the fact that-- 00:07:01.910 --> 00:07:04.430 align:middle line:84% in a new realization that we are, indeed, 00:07:04.430 --> 00:07:08.960 align:middle line:84% when I wanted to do something with mammalian imagery. 00:07:08.960 --> 00:07:10.820 align:middle line:84% And I wrote a poem that ended up being 00:07:10.820 --> 00:07:13.790 align:middle line:84% kind of a didactic poem that was sort of too 00:07:13.790 --> 00:07:15.530 align:middle line:84% deliberately dealing with these images. 00:07:15.530 --> 00:07:17.960 align:middle line:84% And I had to put it away for a while. 00:07:17.960 --> 00:07:20.215 align:middle line:84% One night I had been jogging and I 00:07:20.215 --> 00:07:21.590 align:middle line:84% was sitting on the hood of my car 00:07:21.590 --> 00:07:25.620 align:middle line:84% just looking around and congratulating myself that I 00:07:25.620 --> 00:07:27.230 align:middle line:90% managed to do it one more time. 00:07:27.230 --> 00:07:28.820 align:middle line:84% And it was dusk and I saw some kids 00:07:28.820 --> 00:07:30.800 align:middle line:90% walking home from a bus stop. 00:07:30.800 --> 00:07:32.810 align:middle line:84% And I suddenly had a flash of remembering 00:07:32.810 --> 00:07:34.810 align:middle line:84% how it felt to be a child at dusk 00:07:34.810 --> 00:07:36.560 align:middle line:84% when the lights are just starting to go on 00:07:36.560 --> 00:07:39.950 align:middle line:84% and you're about to go home to a lighted place, 00:07:39.950 --> 00:07:43.430 align:middle line:84% but you're still in this outdoor, mysteriously changing 00:07:43.430 --> 00:07:44.270 align:middle line:90% atmosphere. 00:07:44.270 --> 00:07:46.934 align:middle line:84% And I suddenly had a flash of realizing -- 00:07:46.934 --> 00:07:50.630 align:middle line:84% of remembering how I felt as a child and how much like 00:07:50.630 --> 00:07:53.780 align:middle line:84% an animal I felt just with that sensibility. 00:07:53.780 --> 00:07:56.618 align:middle line:84% And I don't know how long it took 00:07:56.618 --> 00:07:58.910 align:middle line:84% me to realize that that was what I wanted for the poem, 00:07:58.910 --> 00:08:01.040 align:middle line:84% but I ended up recasting all the images 00:08:01.040 --> 00:08:02.673 align:middle line:84% from the point of view of a small boy, 00:08:02.673 --> 00:08:03.590 align:middle line:90% which I've never been. 00:08:03.590 --> 00:08:06.230 align:middle line:84% That's a nice way of vicarious experience. 00:08:06.230 --> 00:08:08.420 align:middle line:84% But thinking from realizing that I wanted 00:08:08.420 --> 00:08:10.010 align:middle line:84% a child's point of view and I thought, 00:08:10.010 --> 00:08:12.343 align:middle line:84% I guess, I wanted a little boy, because I thought of him 00:08:12.343 --> 00:08:14.840 align:middle line:84% maybe as more wild and more connected with his animal self. 00:08:14.840 --> 00:08:16.715 align:middle line:84% Although, I don't actually believe that there 00:08:16.715 --> 00:08:18.598 align:middle line:90% should be a difference. 00:08:18.598 --> 00:08:20.640 align:middle line:84% This is not written in the voice of a little boy. 00:08:20.640 --> 00:08:22.348 align:middle line:84% It's written more from the point of view. 00:08:22.348 --> 00:08:24.860 align:middle line:90% It's called Fur. 00:08:24.860 --> 00:08:28.520 align:middle line:84% "The small boy at dusk arranges himself 00:08:28.520 --> 00:08:32.120 align:middle line:90% in the dark bones of a tree. 00:08:32.120 --> 00:08:36.830 align:middle line:84% Moths enter the blue air and come home. 00:08:36.830 --> 00:08:40.880 align:middle line:84% His mother leans into it, calling his name. 00:08:40.880 --> 00:08:44.780 align:middle line:90% Her body smells like milk. 00:08:44.780 --> 00:08:50.450 align:middle line:84% Behind her, the moon climbs like a slow howl and his father 00:08:50.450 --> 00:08:58.730 align:middle line:84% comes home, swollen or in pain, resting on the last few stairs. 00:08:58.730 --> 00:09:02.630 align:middle line:84% His voice breaks into the small room. 00:09:02.630 --> 00:09:07.250 align:middle line:84% Listening, the boy finds no place for so many words. 00:09:07.250 --> 00:09:10.715 align:middle line:84% And later, his mother's kiss adheres to him like fur. 00:09:10.715 --> 00:09:13.410 align:middle line:90% 00:09:13.410 --> 00:09:17.780 align:middle line:84% He kicks off the sheets and hears nothing. 00:09:17.780 --> 00:09:20.795 align:middle line:84% Two eyes touch the length of him through branches. 00:09:20.795 --> 00:09:23.360 align:middle line:90% 00:09:23.360 --> 00:09:26.270 align:middle line:84% A long way in, he hears his parents 00:09:26.270 --> 00:09:28.970 align:middle line:90% breathe through their skin. 00:09:28.970 --> 00:09:32.910 align:middle line:84% Long vowels uncurl in their throats. 00:09:32.910 --> 00:09:36.740 align:middle line:84% He hears his name as less than sound, 00:09:36.740 --> 00:09:38.375 align:middle line:90% a slight movement of wings." 00:09:38.375 --> 00:09:49.190 align:middle line:90% 00:09:49.190 --> 00:09:52.460 align:middle line:84% This is also is a voice poem that isn't in a voice, 00:09:52.460 --> 00:09:54.650 align:middle line:84% but more out of another point of view. 00:09:54.650 --> 00:09:57.830 align:middle line:84% And this one really baffles me, because I don't quite remember 00:09:57.830 --> 00:09:59.240 align:middle line:90% how I got started with it. 00:09:59.240 --> 00:10:02.810 align:middle line:84% But this one's called Midwife and it deals with a subject 00:10:02.810 --> 00:10:05.180 align:middle line:84% that I have no firsthand knowledge about. 00:10:05.180 --> 00:10:08.180 align:middle line:84% And not only do I not know much, except what 00:10:08.180 --> 00:10:12.440 align:middle line:84% I've seen in movies, melodramatic births 00:10:12.440 --> 00:10:14.750 align:middle line:84% where the woman is some kind of hero 00:10:14.750 --> 00:10:17.360 align:middle line:84% and there's all sorts of screaming and sweating going on 00:10:17.360 --> 00:10:21.440 align:middle line:84% and I don't really believe in it that much, but somehow 00:10:21.440 --> 00:10:24.715 align:middle line:84% in this poem, not only did I find myself talking 00:10:24.715 --> 00:10:26.090 align:middle line:84% from the point of view of someone 00:10:26.090 --> 00:10:28.250 align:middle line:84% who has access to birth, but I also 00:10:28.250 --> 00:10:30.440 align:middle line:84% find myself reversing what I thought 00:10:30.440 --> 00:10:32.240 align:middle line:84% would be the role between the midwife, 00:10:32.240 --> 00:10:34.970 align:middle line:84% the professional, and the woman giving birth, who 00:10:34.970 --> 00:10:37.520 align:middle line:90% might not be so cool about it. 00:10:37.520 --> 00:10:40.400 align:middle line:84% It really kind of turned around on me as I worked on the poem. 00:10:40.400 --> 00:10:42.942 align:middle line:84% I think that happens when you get into another point of view. 00:10:42.942 --> 00:10:46.130 align:middle line:84% And it's one of the reasons why I really like it, 00:10:46.130 --> 00:10:49.100 align:middle line:84% because it ends up leading me around more than me leading it. 00:10:49.100 --> 00:10:50.933 align:middle line:84% And I needed to learn how to do that 00:10:50.933 --> 00:10:52.100 align:middle line:90% very badly in the beginning. 00:10:52.100 --> 00:10:56.490 align:middle line:84% And that was, for me, the best thing to teach me. 00:10:56.490 --> 00:10:56.990 align:middle line:90% "Midwife. 00:10:56.990 --> 00:10:59.510 align:middle line:90% 00:10:59.510 --> 00:11:02.660 align:middle line:84% She smells blood in her hair and dreams 00:11:02.660 --> 00:11:07.070 align:middle line:84% of crouching at the limits of her skin. 00:11:07.070 --> 00:11:09.800 align:middle line:84% Having spent themselves, the new mothers 00:11:09.800 --> 00:11:15.080 align:middle line:84% sleep like men in the scent of what they are. 00:11:15.080 --> 00:11:17.660 align:middle line:84% The pain, she thinks, is the first screen 00:11:17.660 --> 00:11:20.480 align:middle line:90% to dismantle itself. 00:11:20.480 --> 00:11:27.380 align:middle line:84% They did not try to swallow her hands, small, awed husbands. 00:11:27.380 --> 00:11:31.970 align:middle line:84% Each speaks softly on two legs as if the room 00:11:31.970 --> 00:11:35.510 align:middle line:90% had been lit by candles. 00:11:35.510 --> 00:11:38.420 align:middle line:84% It is she who reels in the corridor. 00:11:38.420 --> 00:11:40.730 align:middle line:90% They smell of flowers. 00:11:40.730 --> 00:11:44.390 align:middle line:84% They say it was only the body emptying itself." 00:11:44.390 --> 00:11:59.210 align:middle line:90% 00:11:59.210 --> 00:12:01.880 align:middle line:84% Actually, there's another kind of experience I've never had. 00:12:01.880 --> 00:12:04.460 align:middle line:90% 00:12:04.460 --> 00:12:06.980 align:middle line:84% And I must have gotten interested in it 00:12:06.980 --> 00:12:10.720 align:middle line:84% by watching The Nun's Story on TV at a time in my life 00:12:10.720 --> 00:12:12.470 align:middle line:84% when nothing much was happening in my life 00:12:12.470 --> 00:12:15.890 align:middle line:84% except teaching four sections of sophomore composition, 00:12:15.890 --> 00:12:16.940 align:middle line:90% my first teaching job. 00:12:16.940 --> 00:12:18.530 align:middle line:90% It was a pretty bleak year. 00:12:18.530 --> 00:12:22.160 align:middle line:84% And I think-- actually, I wrote a lot of poems that year 00:12:22.160 --> 00:12:22.940 align:middle line:90% for me, anyway. 00:12:22.940 --> 00:12:24.620 align:middle line:84% Now that my life's getting more fun, 00:12:24.620 --> 00:12:26.840 align:middle line:84% I'm having trouble getting poems finished. 00:12:26.840 --> 00:12:30.485 align:middle line:84% But I guess my taste for vicarious experience 00:12:30.485 --> 00:12:31.610 align:middle line:90% really got going that year. 00:12:31.610 --> 00:12:33.620 align:middle line:90% And I tried to write a poem. 00:12:33.620 --> 00:12:35.805 align:middle line:84% It was another one I had to put away for a while. 00:12:35.805 --> 00:12:38.180 align:middle line:84% I tried to write a poem from the point of view of someone 00:12:38.180 --> 00:12:41.493 align:middle line:84% who had started out wanting to be a nun. 00:12:41.493 --> 00:12:43.160 align:middle line:84% It's long enough ago so I can't give you 00:12:43.160 --> 00:12:45.650 align:middle line:84% a real coherent story about why I was interested in it 00:12:45.650 --> 00:12:46.910 align:middle line:90% or how I solved the problem. 00:12:46.910 --> 00:12:50.730 align:middle line:84% I do know that I had to put the poem away for a year. 00:12:50.730 --> 00:12:52.310 align:middle line:90% And this is another voice poem. 00:12:52.310 --> 00:12:55.905 align:middle line:84% And again, it's something, I guess, I'm fascinated by-- 00:12:55.905 --> 00:12:58.280 align:middle line:84% there's something very beautiful and also very terrifying 00:12:58.280 --> 00:13:00.280 align:middle line:84% about the notion of secluding yourself that way. 00:13:00.280 --> 00:13:01.940 align:middle line:84% And I guess I must have been thinking 00:13:01.940 --> 00:13:06.020 align:middle line:84% about it subconsciously a lot and that all back to this poem. 00:13:06.020 --> 00:13:09.555 align:middle line:90% This is called Shade. 00:13:09.555 --> 00:13:14.140 align:middle line:84% "You never saw your mother's body, only a face, 00:13:14.140 --> 00:13:18.550 align:middle line:84% which fades now without disappearing, like the saints' 00:13:18.550 --> 00:13:21.340 align:middle line:90% faces in silver. 00:13:21.340 --> 00:13:25.000 align:middle line:84% And the nuns, the sisters you might have kept, 00:13:25.000 --> 00:13:29.320 align:middle line:84% they knelt and rose as though made of air. 00:13:29.320 --> 00:13:32.200 align:middle line:90% Where did their legs begin? 00:13:32.200 --> 00:13:35.050 align:middle line:84% They gathered their skirts, like girls, 00:13:35.050 --> 00:13:39.670 align:middle line:84% and you took no food without their blessing. 00:13:39.670 --> 00:13:42.940 align:middle line:84% Now you must think before rising. 00:13:42.940 --> 00:13:45.730 align:middle line:90% I went to him without thinking. 00:13:45.730 --> 00:13:49.720 align:middle line:90% I touched him everywhere. 00:13:49.720 --> 00:13:51.640 align:middle line:84% Within the folds of their skirts, 00:13:51.640 --> 00:13:55.330 align:middle line:84% the nuns rose as though wearing nothing. 00:13:55.330 --> 00:13:59.800 align:middle line:84% They rose as though leaving their bodies. 00:13:59.800 --> 00:14:03.820 align:middle line:84% Already, the sun grows and you rise, porous 00:14:03.820 --> 00:14:07.060 align:middle line:90% with sleep and sweating. 00:14:07.060 --> 00:14:10.270 align:middle line:90% He makes room as you pass. 00:14:10.270 --> 00:14:12.760 align:middle line:84% You remember how the leaves in midsummer 00:14:12.760 --> 00:14:17.650 align:middle line:84% clouded the stained glass and the litanies. 00:14:17.650 --> 00:14:20.170 align:middle line:84% The murmuring of their voices like 00:14:20.170 --> 00:14:22.075 align:middle line:90% insects moving into the shade." 00:14:22.075 --> 00:14:29.580 align:middle line:90% 00:14:29.580 --> 00:14:32.990 align:middle line:84% Another poem that-- this one wanted to be a voice poem. 00:14:32.990 --> 00:14:34.460 align:middle line:90% And it really ended up-- 00:14:34.460 --> 00:14:36.740 align:middle line:84% I think this was the beginning of my getting out 00:14:36.740 --> 00:14:38.300 align:middle line:90% of needing other voices. 00:14:38.300 --> 00:14:41.090 align:middle line:84% This poem started out from a free association assignment 00:14:41.090 --> 00:14:44.540 align:middle line:84% that I gave to a class on one of my classes. 00:14:44.540 --> 00:14:46.740 align:middle line:84% And somebody brought in a little wire statue 00:14:46.740 --> 00:14:49.880 align:middle line:84% of a figure that looked like it was either kicking a football 00:14:49.880 --> 00:14:50.600 align:middle line:90% or dancing. 00:14:50.600 --> 00:14:52.790 align:middle line:84% And we all wrote about it for 15 minutes. 00:14:52.790 --> 00:14:54.380 align:middle line:90% And I decided it was a dancer. 00:14:54.380 --> 00:14:57.350 align:middle line:84% And I decided to use it as an excuse 00:14:57.350 --> 00:15:00.890 align:middle line:84% to work out some images from a point of view 00:15:00.890 --> 00:15:03.350 align:middle line:84% I've always wanted to have, which is that of a dancer. 00:15:03.350 --> 00:15:06.230 align:middle line:84% I've always thought it'd be wonderful to be a dancer. 00:15:06.230 --> 00:15:10.737 align:middle line:84% But somehow to be able to be on stage and move 00:15:10.737 --> 00:15:12.320 align:middle line:84% like that for a little while every day 00:15:12.320 --> 00:15:13.970 align:middle line:90% would sort of save my soul. 00:15:13.970 --> 00:15:16.140 align:middle line:84% I've always envied people who do that. 00:15:16.140 --> 00:15:18.320 align:middle line:84% And so I thought I was going to be working out 00:15:18.320 --> 00:15:19.520 align:middle line:90% a kind of celebration. 00:15:19.520 --> 00:15:22.940 align:middle line:84% And I ended up finding, like with the midwife, 00:15:22.940 --> 00:15:24.440 align:middle line:84% I found some reversals taking place. 00:15:24.440 --> 00:15:25.815 align:middle line:84% I think I'll read this one twice. 00:15:25.815 --> 00:15:29.111 align:middle line:84% I won't say anything more about it, Dancing. 00:15:29.111 --> 00:15:34.190 align:middle line:84% "At dawn, I begin at the window, unable to begin 00:15:34.190 --> 00:15:37.370 align:middle line:90% in the flesh-colored light. 00:15:37.370 --> 00:15:43.070 align:middle line:84% At night, I am singular and white in my multiple names. 00:15:43.070 --> 00:15:47.270 align:middle line:84% I can turn each of my bones to air. 00:15:47.270 --> 00:15:51.740 align:middle line:84% I can take the trembling when it begins deep inside, 00:15:51.740 --> 00:15:55.640 align:middle line:90% like a gypsy swallowing flame. 00:15:55.640 --> 00:15:59.180 align:middle line:84% I've heard that men are frightened of my body, 00:15:59.180 --> 00:16:02.150 align:middle line:84% that they conjure it in the dark over women 00:16:02.150 --> 00:16:05.270 align:middle line:90% they've made into wives. 00:16:05.270 --> 00:16:09.350 align:middle line:84% My last lover never closed his eyes. 00:16:09.350 --> 00:16:14.840 align:middle line:84% Magnificent, he said carefully, as though I were water 00:16:14.840 --> 00:16:20.750 align:middle line:84% and he a swan, poised over a swan's image. 00:16:20.750 --> 00:16:24.650 align:middle line:84% Lately now, the bed tilts while I sleep. 00:16:24.650 --> 00:16:28.010 align:middle line:84% By morning, I'm stiff, endangered, 00:16:28.010 --> 00:16:30.770 align:middle line:90% like some parchment. 00:16:30.770 --> 00:16:35.960 align:middle line:84% The child I may never have rises, plump with sleep. 00:16:35.960 --> 00:16:40.820 align:middle line:84% My thoughts lurch backward, straining for purchase, 00:16:40.820 --> 00:16:43.070 align:middle line:90% resume their necessary flow." 00:16:43.070 --> 00:16:47.230 align:middle line:90% 00:16:47.230 --> 00:16:49.100 align:middle line:84% For a long time while I worked on that poem, 00:16:49.100 --> 00:16:51.160 align:middle line:84% I thought I was writing about a persona. 00:16:51.160 --> 00:16:53.710 align:middle line:84% I was picturing a dancer who is not 00:16:53.710 --> 00:16:56.980 align:middle line:84% too old to dance beautifully, but is beginning to feel old 00:16:56.980 --> 00:16:59.560 align:middle line:84% and is beginning to feel a kind of terror 00:16:59.560 --> 00:17:00.550 align:middle line:90% and a kind of fatigue. 00:17:00.550 --> 00:17:02.920 align:middle line:84% And it's not something I think about a lot. 00:17:02.920 --> 00:17:05.380 align:middle line:84% So I was kind of intrigued with what was happening. 00:17:05.380 --> 00:17:07.720 align:middle line:84% But I also realized, as I worked on this poem, 00:17:07.720 --> 00:17:09.880 align:middle line:84% that I was also writing very personally. 00:17:09.880 --> 00:17:12.088 align:middle line:84% And I think maybe at least I found with voice poems-- 00:17:12.088 --> 00:17:14.088 align:middle line:84% I don't know if this has happened to some of you 00:17:14.088 --> 00:17:14.619 align:middle line:90% or not-- 00:17:14.619 --> 00:17:17.319 align:middle line:84% I find that I am really writing myself back 00:17:17.319 --> 00:17:19.990 align:middle line:84% into some part of myself that is as much part of me 00:17:19.990 --> 00:17:21.369 align:middle line:84% as it is about another character. 00:17:21.369 --> 00:17:24.099 align:middle line:84% It's just that I'm going in through the back door. 00:17:24.099 --> 00:17:27.310 align:middle line:84% And in this poem, I really understood quickly 00:17:27.310 --> 00:17:32.110 align:middle line:84% that I was also writing about process. 00:17:32.110 --> 00:17:33.730 align:middle line:90% And it's the process of writing. 00:17:33.730 --> 00:17:34.760 align:middle line:90% There's that fatigue. 00:17:34.760 --> 00:17:37.810 align:middle line:84% There's that sense, can I still do it? 00:17:37.810 --> 00:17:40.210 align:middle line:90% A sense that I almost can't. 00:17:40.210 --> 00:17:44.087 align:middle line:84% And so at that point, I changed the title to Dancing, 00:17:44.087 --> 00:17:45.670 align:middle line:84% because I wanted it to have more to do 00:17:45.670 --> 00:17:48.100 align:middle line:90% with the process than a person. 00:17:48.100 --> 00:17:50.320 align:middle line:90% I'll read this one more time. 00:17:50.320 --> 00:17:52.291 align:middle line:90% Dancing. 00:17:52.291 --> 00:17:56.860 align:middle line:84% "At dawn, I begin at the window, unable to begin 00:17:56.860 --> 00:17:59.770 align:middle line:90% in the flesh-colored light. 00:17:59.770 --> 00:18:05.410 align:middle line:84% At night, I am singular and white in my multiple names. 00:18:05.410 --> 00:18:09.490 align:middle line:84% I can turn each of my bones to air. 00:18:09.490 --> 00:18:13.810 align:middle line:84% I can take the trembling when it begins deep inside, 00:18:13.810 --> 00:18:18.010 align:middle line:90% like a gypsy swallowing flame. 00:18:18.010 --> 00:18:21.760 align:middle line:84% I've heard that men are frightened of my body, 00:18:21.760 --> 00:18:24.430 align:middle line:84% that they conjure it in the dark over women 00:18:24.430 --> 00:18:27.880 align:middle line:90% they've made into wives. 00:18:27.880 --> 00:18:31.750 align:middle line:84% My last lover never closed his eyes. 00:18:31.750 --> 00:18:36.550 align:middle line:84% Magnificent, he said carefully, as though I were water 00:18:36.550 --> 00:18:42.670 align:middle line:84% and he a swan, poised over a swan's image. 00:18:42.670 --> 00:18:46.840 align:middle line:84% Lately now, the bed tilts while I sleep. 00:18:46.840 --> 00:18:50.050 align:middle line:84% By morning, I'm stiff, endangered, 00:18:50.050 --> 00:18:52.810 align:middle line:90% like some parchment. 00:18:52.810 --> 00:18:58.150 align:middle line:84% The child I may never have rises, plump with sleep. 00:18:58.150 --> 00:19:03.220 align:middle line:84% My thoughts lurch backward, straining for purchase, 00:19:03.220 --> 00:19:05.485 align:middle line:90% resume their necessary flow." 00:19:05.485 --> 00:19:09.990 align:middle line:90% 00:19:09.990 --> 00:19:11.970 align:middle line:84% I want to try something next that I've only 00:19:11.970 --> 00:19:13.170 align:middle line:90% done once before. 00:19:13.170 --> 00:19:15.630 align:middle line:84% And I'm hoping it'll work, because you're all writers. 00:19:15.630 --> 00:19:17.670 align:middle line:84% And that is simply to read you a journal entry 00:19:17.670 --> 00:19:20.160 align:middle line:90% that I did that led to a poem. 00:19:20.160 --> 00:19:21.720 align:middle line:84% Because I'm always intrigued when 00:19:21.720 --> 00:19:23.820 align:middle line:84% I talk to other writers, the relationship 00:19:23.820 --> 00:19:29.810 align:middle line:84% between the beginnings of a poem and what they end up with. 00:19:29.810 --> 00:19:33.210 align:middle line:84% I just don't want to gross anybody out. 00:19:33.210 --> 00:19:35.070 align:middle line:90% One of the things-- 00:19:35.070 --> 00:19:39.570 align:middle line:84% well, what started this poem was hearing about a conversation 00:19:39.570 --> 00:19:41.200 align:middle line:90% between two men. 00:19:41.200 --> 00:19:43.840 align:middle line:84% And I wasn't there when the conversation took place, 00:19:43.840 --> 00:19:45.330 align:middle line:90% but I was told about it. 00:19:45.330 --> 00:19:48.090 align:middle line:84% And I was kind of amused when I heard about it, because I've 00:19:48.090 --> 00:19:50.400 align:middle line:84% always been kind of interested in the way men talk 00:19:50.400 --> 00:19:51.180 align:middle line:90% about women. 00:19:51.180 --> 00:19:52.340 align:middle line:90% And I'm not angry. 00:19:52.340 --> 00:19:54.825 align:middle line:84% I just think of it as a phenomenon. 00:19:54.825 --> 00:19:56.700 align:middle line:84% I may not like some of the things that go on, 00:19:56.700 --> 00:20:00.072 align:middle line:84% but I certainly don't think there's anything wrong with it. 00:20:00.072 --> 00:20:01.530 align:middle line:84% I'm just interested in the dynamic. 00:20:01.530 --> 00:20:03.363 align:middle line:84% I'm interested in the way men look at women. 00:20:03.363 --> 00:20:05.590 align:middle line:90% 00:20:05.590 --> 00:20:07.410 align:middle line:90% And when I heard-- 00:20:07.410 --> 00:20:09.630 align:middle line:84% I found myself wondering about this conversation. 00:20:09.630 --> 00:20:11.370 align:middle line:84% Well, what was really going on between the lines 00:20:11.370 --> 00:20:12.120 align:middle line:90% of that conversation? 00:20:12.120 --> 00:20:14.328 align:middle line:84% Were they really just talking about what they thought 00:20:14.328 --> 00:20:15.540 align:middle line:90% they were talking about? 00:20:15.540 --> 00:20:17.498 align:middle line:84% I don't know how much I need to say about this. 00:20:17.498 --> 00:20:20.010 align:middle line:84% I'll read you the journal entry and hope that that 00:20:20.010 --> 00:20:21.300 align:middle line:90% is one cohesive entity. 00:20:21.300 --> 00:20:23.092 align:middle line:84% And then I'll just turn around and read you 00:20:23.092 --> 00:20:26.670 align:middle line:84% the poem, which was certainly a fictional adaptation of what 00:20:26.670 --> 00:20:27.383 align:middle line:90% I started out. 00:20:27.383 --> 00:20:28.800 align:middle line:84% The journal entry, I think, it was 00:20:28.800 --> 00:20:31.080 align:middle line:90% a kind of speculative rampage. 00:20:31.080 --> 00:20:33.688 align:middle line:84% I started out saying what I had heard about the conversation. 00:20:33.688 --> 00:20:35.730 align:middle line:84% Then I started asking myself a bunch of questions 00:20:35.730 --> 00:20:36.930 align:middle line:90% about the conversation. 00:20:36.930 --> 00:20:40.210 align:middle line:84% And from there, I went on to write a poem. 00:20:40.210 --> 00:20:42.140 align:middle line:90% So this is the journal. 00:20:42.140 --> 00:20:45.300 align:middle line:84% "Stephen said that Hal said to him, sometimes, 00:20:45.300 --> 00:20:50.250 align:middle line:84% he goes home and, quote, "fucks his wife's brains out." 00:20:50.250 --> 00:20:54.000 align:middle line:84% Hal is one of the few men I know who says he is happy. 00:20:54.000 --> 00:20:56.620 align:middle line:90% Curiously, he is not stupid. 00:20:56.620 --> 00:20:59.280 align:middle line:84% He is a good-natured intellectual, teaches history, 00:20:59.280 --> 00:21:02.070 align:middle line:84% illuminates for college students the qualities of our culture 00:21:02.070 --> 00:21:04.680 align:middle line:90% that give rise to wars. 00:21:04.680 --> 00:21:08.640 align:middle line:84% He finds the Nazis horrifying and also a source of humor. 00:21:08.640 --> 00:21:11.010 align:middle line:90% He loves Sichuan food. 00:21:11.010 --> 00:21:14.490 align:middle line:84% He, quote, "fucks her brains out." 00:21:14.490 --> 00:21:16.470 align:middle line:84% As a woman, I try to picture this way 00:21:16.470 --> 00:21:18.930 align:middle line:90% of keeping depression at bay. 00:21:18.930 --> 00:21:21.090 align:middle line:90% He fucks her brains out. 00:21:21.090 --> 00:21:25.170 align:middle line:84% His penis becomes a drill, a grenade. 00:21:25.170 --> 00:21:28.590 align:middle line:84% Going out later for a beer, does he still look at strange women 00:21:28.590 --> 00:21:30.300 align:middle line:90% with longing? 00:21:30.300 --> 00:21:31.890 align:middle line:84% Does he talk with a colleague about 00:21:31.890 --> 00:21:34.740 align:middle line:90% famous military campaigns? 00:21:34.740 --> 00:21:38.340 align:middle line:84% Does he compliment the colleague on his sexy wife? 00:21:38.340 --> 00:21:42.420 align:middle line:84% Does the colleague take this as a personal compliment? 00:21:42.420 --> 00:21:44.100 align:middle line:84% Are parts of a woman's [AUDIO OUT] 00:21:44.100 --> 00:21:49.500 align:middle line:84% to save men from using words like happiness and longing? 00:21:49.500 --> 00:21:51.840 align:middle line:90% He fucks her brains out. 00:21:51.840 --> 00:21:55.080 align:middle line:84% Then his penis sleeps like a small animal. 00:21:55.080 --> 00:21:58.740 align:middle line:84% He mentions happiness and we gather around him 00:21:58.740 --> 00:22:01.170 align:middle line:84% like tourists with cameras at the scene of a hit 00:22:01.170 --> 00:22:04.680 align:middle line:90% and run accident." 00:22:04.680 --> 00:22:06.930 align:middle line:84% Already, this entry started off-- 00:22:06.930 --> 00:22:08.055 align:middle line:90% started to go into fantasy. 00:22:08.055 --> 00:22:10.980 align:middle line:90% 00:22:10.980 --> 00:22:12.175 align:middle line:90% I asked a lot of questions. 00:22:12.175 --> 00:22:13.800 align:middle line:84% I began to think-- just now it occurred 00:22:13.800 --> 00:22:17.100 align:middle line:84% to me that maybe a lot of my poems 00:22:17.100 --> 00:22:19.470 align:middle line:84% result from my having asked myself questions, 00:22:19.470 --> 00:22:22.500 align:middle line:84% either on paper or just walking around. 00:22:22.500 --> 00:22:24.580 align:middle line:84% And I guess I wanted to continue asking them. 00:22:24.580 --> 00:22:26.580 align:middle line:84% So that's where the Sunday Dialogues came from, 00:22:26.580 --> 00:22:28.890 align:middle line:84% if any of you read this poem in the book. 00:22:28.890 --> 00:22:31.770 align:middle line:84% And in the poem, I really can't explain it too well, 00:22:31.770 --> 00:22:33.690 align:middle line:84% because I got myself thoroughly confused. 00:22:33.690 --> 00:22:36.780 align:middle line:84% It's an eight-part poem, which means that each little part is 00:22:36.780 --> 00:22:37.770 align:middle line:90% a little island. 00:22:37.770 --> 00:22:39.720 align:middle line:84% It's supposed to be taken as itself. 00:22:39.720 --> 00:22:43.410 align:middle line:84% But the situation in the poem is a woman, I think, 00:22:43.410 --> 00:22:46.530 align:middle line:84% a woman sitting in a bar overhearing two men talking, 00:22:46.530 --> 00:22:49.050 align:middle line:84% kind of blurring in the poem between the dialogue 00:22:49.050 --> 00:22:51.785 align:middle line:84% between the men and the dialogue between the woman and the man, 00:22:51.785 --> 00:22:53.910 align:middle line:84% which is taking place probably in the woman's mind. 00:22:53.910 --> 00:22:57.330 align:middle line:84% They're not literally having any interaction at all. 00:22:57.330 --> 00:22:59.550 align:middle line:84% Probably interaction of sensibility. 00:22:59.550 --> 00:23:01.230 align:middle line:84% I remember getting wonderfully confused 00:23:01.230 --> 00:23:03.850 align:middle line:84% as I worked on this poem as to just what was going on. 00:23:03.850 --> 00:23:06.712 align:middle line:84% And I decided that was all right. 00:23:06.712 --> 00:23:08.920 align:middle line:84% So I will read you this and I'll read you the numbers 00:23:08.920 --> 00:23:13.440 align:middle line:84% so you'll know when one part's over and another one begins. 00:23:13.440 --> 00:23:16.490 align:middle line:90% Sunday Dialogues, one. 00:23:16.490 --> 00:23:21.630 align:middle line:84% "Two men, one drains his glass, one 00:23:21.630 --> 00:23:26.520 align:middle line:84% eyes a placid woman crossing unremarkable legs. 00:23:26.520 --> 00:23:30.420 align:middle line:84% One says he only imagines his hands 00:23:30.420 --> 00:23:33.150 align:middle line:84% on the sides of women half asleep 00:23:33.150 --> 00:23:37.380 align:middle line:90% who slowly feel his damp skin. 00:23:37.380 --> 00:23:39.990 align:middle line:84% One says, I tear off their clothes." 00:23:39.990 --> 00:23:42.780 align:middle line:90% 00:23:42.780 --> 00:23:44.150 align:middle line:90% Two. 00:23:44.150 --> 00:23:48.630 align:middle line:84% "The woman I have become crosses her legs and stares 00:23:48.630 --> 00:23:52.440 align:middle line:84% at newsprint on a page a strand of hair, 00:23:52.440 --> 00:23:55.590 align:middle line:90% her glass suddenly empty. 00:23:55.590 --> 00:23:58.260 align:middle line:90% He tears off their clothes. 00:23:58.260 --> 00:24:01.770 align:middle line:90% I cross my legs." 00:24:01.770 --> 00:24:03.110 align:middle line:90% Three. 00:24:03.110 --> 00:24:06.300 align:middle line:90% "He would tear off her clothes. 00:24:06.300 --> 00:24:11.070 align:middle line:84% She stares out the window as if waiting to breathe. 00:24:11.070 --> 00:24:14.990 align:middle line:84% His hips would move fast as a boy's. 00:24:14.990 --> 00:24:17.570 align:middle line:84% She hears him explain an idea has 00:24:17.570 --> 00:24:21.410 align:middle line:90% walls and floors below ground. 00:24:21.410 --> 00:24:27.020 align:middle line:84% His hips would move faster than she remembers later." 00:24:27.020 --> 00:24:29.218 align:middle line:90% Four. 00:24:29.218 --> 00:24:32.520 align:middle line:84% "One says young girls imagine themselves 00:24:32.520 --> 00:24:36.150 align:middle line:84% more real than their mothers who retire calmly 00:24:36.150 --> 00:24:37.845 align:middle line:90% at night in flannel gowns." 00:24:37.845 --> 00:24:40.880 align:middle line:90% 00:24:40.880 --> 00:24:42.000 align:middle line:90% Five. 00:24:42.000 --> 00:24:46.460 align:middle line:84% "The other surrounds her as though each of his limbs 00:24:46.460 --> 00:24:47.060 align:middle line:90% were a body." 00:24:47.060 --> 00:24:49.800 align:middle line:90% 00:24:49.800 --> 00:24:50.910 align:middle line:90% Six. 00:24:50.910 --> 00:24:53.730 align:middle line:84% "Or does he breach of her fingers gently?" 00:24:53.730 --> 00:24:56.390 align:middle line:90% 00:24:56.390 --> 00:24:57.720 align:middle line:90% Seven. 00:24:57.720 --> 00:25:02.000 align:middle line:84% "Surely she moves and forces him to dance. 00:25:02.000 --> 00:25:05.780 align:middle line:84% Does he wave his arms and say, darling? 00:25:05.780 --> 00:25:09.830 align:middle line:84% Do his hands close and open against his will? 00:25:09.830 --> 00:25:12.140 align:middle line:84% Who removes the water and the broken glass? 00:25:12.140 --> 00:25:15.050 align:middle line:90% 00:25:15.050 --> 00:25:20.390 align:middle line:84% At the next table, a woman crosses and recrosses her legs. 00:25:20.390 --> 00:25:25.340 align:middle line:84% A stone on a chain hangs between the waitress's breath. 00:25:25.340 --> 00:25:30.320 align:middle line:84% A single stone warm as a finger sinks and rises 00:25:30.320 --> 00:25:31.760 align:middle line:90% as she hands him a glass." 00:25:31.760 --> 00:25:39.180 align:middle line:90% 00:25:39.180 --> 00:25:42.405 align:middle line:84% I feel like reading you more cohesive poems suddenly. 00:25:42.405 --> 00:25:55.600 align:middle line:90% 00:25:55.600 --> 00:25:57.748 align:middle line:84% I guess this hasn't happened very often, 00:25:57.748 --> 00:26:00.040 align:middle line:84% but it's a kind of a neat thing I want to keep in mind. 00:26:00.040 --> 00:26:02.248 align:middle line:84% Some of the things I've written or some of the things 00:26:02.248 --> 00:26:05.863 align:middle line:84% that have most impressed me emotionally 00:26:05.863 --> 00:26:07.780 align:middle line:84% have come out of friendships and have come out 00:26:07.780 --> 00:26:10.210 align:middle line:84% of very close interactions, intense talking, 00:26:10.210 --> 00:26:13.150 align:middle line:84% but also just an emotional openness to another person that 00:26:13.150 --> 00:26:15.100 align:middle line:84% comes out of a certain kind of friendship. 00:26:15.100 --> 00:26:17.393 align:middle line:84% And I have one friend, probably the first person 00:26:17.393 --> 00:26:19.060 align:middle line:84% I ever had this kind of friendship with, 00:26:19.060 --> 00:26:19.838 align:middle line:90% who, when she-- 00:26:19.838 --> 00:26:21.880 align:middle line:84% at one point, I realized when she was telling you 00:26:21.880 --> 00:26:24.730 align:middle line:84% about herself, I would really be internalizing a sense of what 00:26:24.730 --> 00:26:25.790 align:middle line:90% it felt like to be her. 00:26:25.790 --> 00:26:27.640 align:middle line:90% It was kind of a neat feeling. 00:26:27.640 --> 00:26:29.777 align:middle line:84% And I guess it's like reading or seeing a movie, 00:26:29.777 --> 00:26:31.360 align:middle line:84% but it's more intense, because there's 00:26:31.360 --> 00:26:34.240 align:middle line:84% a certain amount of affection involved and, therefore, more 00:26:34.240 --> 00:26:36.280 align:middle line:90% empathy. 00:26:36.280 --> 00:26:38.685 align:middle line:84% She told me about an image that she saw. 00:26:38.685 --> 00:26:40.810 align:middle line:84% And it happened when she was driving through Europe 00:26:40.810 --> 00:26:43.840 align:middle line:84% with her husband and small child and she was very, very tired. 00:26:43.840 --> 00:26:46.210 align:middle line:84% And she was driving past a park where 00:26:46.210 --> 00:26:48.190 align:middle line:84% a group of [? hydrocephalic ?] children 00:26:48.190 --> 00:26:49.450 align:middle line:90% were being taken for a walk. 00:26:49.450 --> 00:26:51.880 align:middle line:84% And they were all in a big group and they 00:26:51.880 --> 00:26:55.450 align:middle line:84% had a nurse or a keeper and they were dressed very formally. 00:26:55.450 --> 00:26:57.040 align:middle line:84% And it just seemed very odd to her. 00:26:57.040 --> 00:27:00.100 align:middle line:84% But she saw it just driving and went on driving. 00:27:00.100 --> 00:27:03.010 align:middle line:84% And the way she described the image, 00:27:03.010 --> 00:27:04.870 align:middle line:90% it just made it very vivid. 00:27:04.870 --> 00:27:07.340 align:middle line:84% And she also mentioned the frame of mind she was in, 00:27:07.340 --> 00:27:10.670 align:middle line:84% which was a kind of extreme fatigue and depression, 00:27:10.670 --> 00:27:13.170 align:middle line:84% the kind of thing you can get when you're traveling too long 00:27:13.170 --> 00:27:16.480 align:middle line:84% and are taking care of people at the same time. 00:27:16.480 --> 00:27:18.760 align:middle line:84% I don't remember any more of the context of the image, 00:27:18.760 --> 00:27:21.610 align:middle line:84% but it did haunt her and she told me how it haunted her. 00:27:21.610 --> 00:27:24.460 align:middle line:84% And I guess I must have taken it home 00:27:24.460 --> 00:27:25.730 align:middle line:90% and it wanted to be in a poem. 00:27:25.730 --> 00:27:27.520 align:middle line:84% It wanted to have a poem built around it. 00:27:27.520 --> 00:27:30.228 align:middle line:90% So I made it into a situation. 00:27:30.228 --> 00:27:32.020 align:middle line:84% I gave it a beginning and I gave it an end. 00:27:32.020 --> 00:27:33.610 align:middle line:84% I wrote a sort of narrative poem. 00:27:33.610 --> 00:27:35.735 align:middle line:84% But I was really getting into her point of view 00:27:35.735 --> 00:27:36.610 align:middle line:90% in order to write it. 00:27:36.610 --> 00:27:38.883 align:middle line:84% And when I showed her the poem later, 00:27:38.883 --> 00:27:41.050 align:middle line:84% it turned out that a lot of the things I had made up 00:27:41.050 --> 00:27:43.820 align:middle line:84% were pretty much true, literally true as well as emotionally 00:27:43.820 --> 00:27:44.320 align:middle line:90% true. 00:27:44.320 --> 00:27:46.957 align:middle line:84% And it just seemed like a wonderful kind of transference 00:27:46.957 --> 00:27:48.790 align:middle line:84% in which the self gets out of the way, which 00:27:48.790 --> 00:27:51.580 align:middle line:84% I think is a very good thing for the self to do in this writing, 00:27:51.580 --> 00:27:56.410 align:middle line:84% and where I really did link up with her feeling, 00:27:56.410 --> 00:27:58.420 align:middle line:84% with looking at things through her eyes. 00:27:58.420 --> 00:28:01.690 align:middle line:84% So it was a nice experience for me, kind of a liberating thing. 00:28:01.690 --> 00:28:06.106 align:middle line:84% This is called In Barcelona You Tried to Scream. 00:28:06.106 --> 00:28:10.450 align:middle line:84% "You had spent the day looking at paintings. 00:28:10.450 --> 00:28:16.210 align:middle line:84% The real park was too green, still dappled at twilight. 00:28:16.210 --> 00:28:20.770 align:middle line:84% The crippled children sat too quietly. 00:28:20.770 --> 00:28:24.460 align:middle line:84% Someone had dressed them in lace and gabardine, 00:28:24.460 --> 00:28:30.610 align:middle line:84% like the antique figures you'd seen through a haze of fatigue. 00:28:30.610 --> 00:28:33.850 align:middle line:84% You covered your daughter's eyes. 00:28:33.850 --> 00:28:37.180 align:middle line:84% You stared at the children under the trees 00:28:37.180 --> 00:28:40.780 align:middle line:84% who stared at nothing, their incurable lives. 00:28:40.780 --> 00:28:43.360 align:middle line:90% 00:28:43.360 --> 00:28:46.360 align:middle line:84% Their deaths seemed to rise inside them like the sleep 00:28:46.360 --> 00:28:49.060 align:middle line:90% of the newly born. 00:28:49.060 --> 00:28:52.510 align:middle line:90% Their nurse gazed over the pond. 00:28:52.510 --> 00:28:57.130 align:middle line:90% Your husband said, just drive. 00:28:57.130 --> 00:29:02.020 align:middle line:84% And you held the wheel like a pair of shoulders. 00:29:02.020 --> 00:29:04.210 align:middle line:90% Tonight, you dine in Paris. 00:29:04.210 --> 00:29:08.950 align:middle line:84% Without turning, you know the street outside glitters, 00:29:08.950 --> 00:29:13.090 align:middle line:84% that people speak cheerfully into the wind. 00:29:13.090 --> 00:29:17.560 align:middle line:84% If you close your eyes, you can see the women's faces 00:29:17.560 --> 00:29:20.860 align:middle line:90% floating like orchids. 00:29:20.860 --> 00:29:24.670 align:middle line:84% Your husband offers you a light and you lean forward 00:29:24.670 --> 00:29:29.680 align:middle line:84% in your fragile chair in the middle of Paris. 00:29:29.680 --> 00:29:32.950 align:middle line:84% In an invisible France, people you'll never meet 00:29:32.950 --> 00:29:36.280 align:middle line:84% are lighting lamps for their frightened children, 00:29:36.280 --> 00:29:42.250 align:middle line:84% or driving too fast, or selling everything. 00:29:42.250 --> 00:29:45.760 align:middle line:84% In Barcelona, you tried to scream. 00:29:45.760 --> 00:29:49.780 align:middle line:84% In Paris, your husband offers you a light 00:29:49.780 --> 00:29:53.560 align:middle line:84% and his hands carve themselves in one motion 00:29:53.560 --> 00:29:54.730 align:middle line:90% behind your eyes." 00:29:54.730 --> 00:30:07.080 align:middle line:90% 00:30:07.080 --> 00:30:11.220 align:middle line:84% This next poem is more about an experience 00:30:11.220 --> 00:30:12.300 align:middle line:90% that really happened. 00:30:12.300 --> 00:30:14.175 align:middle line:84% And one of the things that was funny about it 00:30:14.175 --> 00:30:16.600 align:middle line:84% is that I wished it wasn't happening as it was happening, 00:30:16.600 --> 00:30:21.270 align:middle line:84% which it had to do with overhearing somebody moaning 00:30:21.270 --> 00:30:23.640 align:middle line:84% in an apartment across the way from mine. 00:30:23.640 --> 00:30:26.820 align:middle line:84% And I couldn't tell if she was in ecstasy or being killed. 00:30:26.820 --> 00:30:31.260 align:middle line:84% And I realized at that point that vicarious experience 00:30:31.260 --> 00:30:33.370 align:middle line:84% is great as long as it's in your imagination. 00:30:33.370 --> 00:30:34.350 align:middle line:84% It's a little bit uncomfortable when 00:30:34.350 --> 00:30:36.390 align:middle line:84% you start having to deal with it more directly, 00:30:36.390 --> 00:30:39.000 align:middle line:90% but I wrote about it anyway. 00:30:39.000 --> 00:30:44.160 align:middle line:84% This is called Last Night, They Heard the Woman Upstairs. 00:30:44.160 --> 00:30:49.340 align:middle line:84% "Last night, they heard the woman upstairs moaning. 00:30:49.340 --> 00:30:50.870 align:middle line:90% They lay in bed. 00:30:50.870 --> 00:30:55.010 align:middle line:84% And she did not stop, and she did not stop, 00:30:55.010 --> 00:30:59.060 align:middle line:90% and she did not grow louder. 00:30:59.060 --> 00:31:02.540 align:middle line:84% The husband saw her once, moon-faced and ample 00:31:02.540 --> 00:31:04.820 align:middle line:90% on the stairs. 00:31:04.820 --> 00:31:09.050 align:middle line:84% The wife did not move her hand along his thigh, 00:31:09.050 --> 00:31:13.070 align:middle line:90% for hairs springing there. 00:31:13.070 --> 00:31:18.380 align:middle line:84% For a moment, she pictured him not in the bed, not alive, 00:31:18.380 --> 00:31:24.410 align:middle line:84% and a scream cracking like some withered thing from her lips. 00:31:24.410 --> 00:31:27.470 align:middle line:90% Tonight, the husband is reading. 00:31:27.470 --> 00:31:31.040 align:middle line:90% The wife bites into a peach. 00:31:31.040 --> 00:31:34.790 align:middle line:84% The woman upstairs slammed the door. 00:31:34.790 --> 00:31:39.950 align:middle line:84% The building takes back its silence, like breath. 00:31:39.950 --> 00:31:44.480 align:middle line:84% Last night, they heard her moaning and they waited. 00:31:44.480 --> 00:31:47.840 align:middle line:84% And they thought their skin was visible through the sheets 00:31:47.840 --> 00:31:49.940 align:middle line:90% and the drawn shade. 00:31:49.940 --> 00:31:53.990 align:middle line:84% And the husband said, she must make love slowly, 00:31:53.990 --> 00:31:55.685 align:middle line:90% the way she climbs the stairs." 00:31:55.685 --> 00:32:08.440 align:middle line:90% 00:32:08.440 --> 00:32:10.930 align:middle line:84% Another thing that I felt comfortable 00:32:10.930 --> 00:32:12.460 align:middle line:84% with for a long time is I don't know 00:32:12.460 --> 00:32:13.480 align:middle line:90% how to talk about recent poems. 00:32:13.480 --> 00:32:14.980 align:middle line:84% But at least while I'm in this book, 00:32:14.980 --> 00:32:17.320 align:middle line:84% I can give you some writerly tidbits. 00:32:17.320 --> 00:32:20.830 align:middle line:84% I know that, in many cases, it helps me to feel 00:32:20.830 --> 00:32:22.690 align:middle line:90% that I'm telling a story. 00:32:22.690 --> 00:32:26.140 align:middle line:84% The task for me is always taking images, 00:32:26.140 --> 00:32:28.840 align:middle line:84% which are my way of translating feelings, and then trying 00:32:28.840 --> 00:32:30.250 align:middle line:90% to find a way to organize them. 00:32:30.250 --> 00:32:33.490 align:middle line:84% And it's usually either picking a voice, 00:32:33.490 --> 00:32:38.650 align:middle line:84% or stumbling across a voice, or letting one evolve, 00:32:38.650 --> 00:32:42.460 align:middle line:84% or finding some kind of chronology or deliberate 00:32:42.460 --> 00:32:43.660 align:middle line:90% destruction of chronology. 00:32:43.660 --> 00:32:47.110 align:middle line:84% In other words, using the narrative 00:32:47.110 --> 00:32:50.410 align:middle line:84% trajectory in some way for organizing the images. 00:32:50.410 --> 00:32:52.300 align:middle line:84% And very often, just a simple telling 00:32:52.300 --> 00:32:54.070 align:middle line:84% of a story and sketching of a scene 00:32:54.070 --> 00:32:55.570 align:middle line:90% has been a good way out for me. 00:32:55.570 --> 00:32:57.910 align:middle line:84% This next poem makes use of that. 00:32:57.910 --> 00:33:00.610 align:middle line:84% Also, while I was working on it, I 00:33:00.610 --> 00:33:04.270 align:middle line:84% found a quote that seemed to express the emotion that I 00:33:04.270 --> 00:33:06.550 align:middle line:90% was trying to make concrete. 00:33:06.550 --> 00:33:09.970 align:middle line:84% So I stuck it in as an epigram and that is "she felt free, 00:33:09.970 --> 00:33:12.470 align:middle line:84% but there was nothing she could do about it." 00:33:12.470 --> 00:33:14.320 align:middle line:84% That's Peter Handke's story about his mother 00:33:14.320 --> 00:33:16.180 align:middle line:90% called A Sorrow Beyond Dreams. 00:33:16.180 --> 00:33:17.290 align:middle line:90% It's a wonderful story. 00:33:17.290 --> 00:33:19.610 align:middle line:90% And I stole half the title. 00:33:19.610 --> 00:33:22.685 align:middle line:84% I just kept the beyond dreams part. 00:33:22.685 --> 00:33:25.750 align:middle line:90% "She calls on herself. 00:33:25.750 --> 00:33:28.510 align:middle line:84% She loosens her hair before the woman 00:33:28.510 --> 00:33:31.420 align:middle line:84% in the mirror who smiles as a man would 00:33:31.420 --> 00:33:33.655 align:middle line:90% smile at such long hair. 00:33:33.655 --> 00:33:36.160 align:middle line:90% 00:33:36.160 --> 00:33:40.810 align:middle line:84% She picks up a shell that seems to pull the walls of the room 00:33:40.810 --> 00:33:45.730 align:middle line:84% toward itself, like a woman carrying a child. 00:33:45.730 --> 00:33:48.250 align:middle line:84% She touches it as she might touch 00:33:48.250 --> 00:33:52.420 align:middle line:90% every part of the man's body. 00:33:52.420 --> 00:33:56.860 align:middle line:84% At dusk, she eats as though someone else is eating, 00:33:56.860 --> 00:34:00.100 align:middle line:84% as though the man has poured the wine 00:34:00.100 --> 00:34:02.920 align:middle line:84% and she has brought them into a safe hunger. 00:34:02.920 --> 00:34:05.530 align:middle line:90% 00:34:05.530 --> 00:34:07.750 align:middle line:84% And when the man arrived, looking 00:34:07.750 --> 00:34:13.300 align:middle line:84% for someone slender, someone smelling of petals, someone 00:34:13.300 --> 00:34:17.980 align:middle line:84% whose hands might follow the curve of his great sadness, 00:34:17.980 --> 00:34:22.239 align:middle line:84% he finds strands of long hair in the brush, long dresses 00:34:22.239 --> 00:34:27.820 align:middle line:84% in the closet, himself in the mirror with a young girl 00:34:27.820 --> 00:34:32.560 align:middle line:84% who keeps rising to touch books and small objects, who 00:34:32.560 --> 00:34:35.994 align:middle line:84% keeps looking out the window as if someone were waiting." 00:34:35.994 --> 00:34:41.590 align:middle line:90% 00:34:41.590 --> 00:34:43.540 align:middle line:84% I'm going to move over to some new poems now. 00:34:43.540 --> 00:34:49.120 align:middle line:84% I feel these are strange to me still to read, even though some 00:34:49.120 --> 00:34:51.580 align:middle line:84% of them aren't that new, because I think 00:34:51.580 --> 00:34:53.650 align:middle line:84% they are, in various ways, I'm trying 00:34:53.650 --> 00:34:56.260 align:middle line:84% to deal more directly with my own feelings 00:34:56.260 --> 00:34:59.110 align:middle line:84% or go backwards and fish things out that really are mine 00:34:59.110 --> 00:35:01.930 align:middle line:84% and that I'm conscious of as being mine. 00:35:01.930 --> 00:35:04.360 align:middle line:84% And I don't know if that's what happens when you get older 00:35:04.360 --> 00:35:05.652 align:middle line:90% or when you get self-indulgent. 00:35:05.652 --> 00:35:07.630 align:middle line:84% I don't know what it means, except that I 00:35:07.630 --> 00:35:09.350 align:middle line:90% think it's good to take risks. 00:35:09.350 --> 00:35:12.310 align:middle line:84% And I guess I was very afraid to risk being sentimental, 00:35:12.310 --> 00:35:14.860 align:middle line:84% because, like you, I was very highly trained 00:35:14.860 --> 00:35:15.920 align:middle line:90% by a lot of workshops. 00:35:15.920 --> 00:35:18.020 align:middle line:84% And there were certain things I just felt were real no no's. 00:35:18.020 --> 00:35:19.520 align:middle line:84% And I think these are the things I'm 00:35:19.520 --> 00:35:21.657 align:middle line:84% trying to [INAUDIBLE] I'm just try 00:35:21.657 --> 00:35:23.740 align:middle line:84% to see to what degree I can let them into my poems 00:35:23.740 --> 00:35:26.200 align:middle line:90% without self-destructing. 00:35:26.200 --> 00:35:28.450 align:middle line:84% To various degrees, you'll see this in these poems. 00:35:28.450 --> 00:35:29.200 align:middle line:90% I don't know. 00:35:29.200 --> 00:35:30.783 align:middle line:84% Now that I've said all that, maybe you 00:35:30.783 --> 00:35:34.090 align:middle line:84% should just forget it and listen to the poem. 00:35:34.090 --> 00:35:36.920 align:middle line:84% I can't be too articulate about the recent past. 00:35:36.920 --> 00:35:40.870 align:middle line:84% This poem was an attempt to do something 00:35:40.870 --> 00:35:43.120 align:middle line:84% that I've enjoyed giving out as an assignment, which 00:35:43.120 --> 00:35:49.300 align:middle line:84% is to take an experience that you had as a child. 00:35:49.300 --> 00:35:53.853 align:middle line:84% I'm going along the theory that children perceive very strongly 00:35:53.853 --> 00:35:55.270 align:middle line:84% and lodge things in their memories 00:35:55.270 --> 00:35:57.670 align:middle line:84% and are very cognizant of certain things that 00:35:57.670 --> 00:36:00.250 align:middle line:84% are going on around them before they can talk, 00:36:00.250 --> 00:36:03.490 align:middle line:84% before they can really understand language completely, 00:36:03.490 --> 00:36:04.865 align:middle line:84% and before they can use language. 00:36:04.865 --> 00:36:06.240 align:middle line:84% Nevertheless, they're functioning 00:36:06.240 --> 00:36:07.450 align:middle line:90% and they're storing memories. 00:36:07.450 --> 00:36:09.628 align:middle line:84% Or maybe they're even thinking in language, 00:36:09.628 --> 00:36:10.670 align:middle line:90% but they're not using it. 00:36:10.670 --> 00:36:12.700 align:middle line:90% I don't know. 00:36:12.700 --> 00:36:15.380 align:middle line:84% But what happens when you have things you want to express 00:36:15.380 --> 00:36:17.890 align:middle line:90% and you're too small to do it? 00:36:17.890 --> 00:36:20.305 align:middle line:84% I decided to ask my students and I also asked myself, 00:36:20.305 --> 00:36:22.257 align:middle line:84% to try to put words or try to find images 00:36:22.257 --> 00:36:24.340 align:middle line:84% to [AUDIO OUT] something that maybe you were never 00:36:24.340 --> 00:36:26.230 align:middle line:84% able to talk about when it happened. 00:36:26.230 --> 00:36:29.882 align:middle line:84% And this poem is about a phenomenon 00:36:29.882 --> 00:36:31.840 align:middle line:84% that I was never able to explain to my parents. 00:36:31.840 --> 00:36:33.632 align:middle line:84% It had to do with being afraid of the dark, 00:36:33.632 --> 00:36:35.500 align:middle line:84% but there was nothing I could name. 00:36:35.500 --> 00:36:39.628 align:middle line:90% There was no monster, no dream. 00:36:39.628 --> 00:36:41.170 align:middle line:84% There's nothing about the dark itself 00:36:41.170 --> 00:36:42.253 align:middle line:90% that really frightened me. 00:36:42.253 --> 00:36:44.950 align:middle line:84% But it had something to do with the fact 00:36:44.950 --> 00:36:47.897 align:middle line:84% that when the room was dark, I could still see pictures 00:36:47.897 --> 00:36:48.730 align:middle line:90% in front of my eyes. 00:36:48.730 --> 00:36:51.430 align:middle line:84% Somebody had told me if I wanted not to be bored in the dark-- 00:36:51.430 --> 00:36:55.490 align:middle line:84% somehow, I learned that I could make myself see pictures. 00:36:55.490 --> 00:36:56.500 align:middle line:90% And it wasn't that nice. 00:36:56.500 --> 00:36:57.430 align:middle line:84% I would be able to see something. 00:36:57.430 --> 00:36:58.870 align:middle line:84% I wouldn't have to lie down in the dark being 00:36:58.870 --> 00:37:00.310 align:middle line:90% bored and feeling deserted. 00:37:00.310 --> 00:37:02.800 align:middle line:84% But I learned that once I got the pictures going, 00:37:02.800 --> 00:37:04.240 align:middle line:90% I couldn't make them go away. 00:37:04.240 --> 00:37:05.740 align:middle line:84% And so I'd yell for my father, but I 00:37:05.740 --> 00:37:06.850 align:middle line:90% didn't know what to say to him. 00:37:06.850 --> 00:37:08.080 align:middle line:90% I must have been able to talk. 00:37:08.080 --> 00:37:09.955 align:middle line:84% I must have been able to understand language. 00:37:09.955 --> 00:37:12.610 align:middle line:84% But I never could tell him why I was so terrified, because it 00:37:12.610 --> 00:37:16.390 align:middle line:84% simply had to do with something in my own head that seemed 00:37:16.390 --> 00:37:17.860 align:middle line:90% to be a visual phenomenon. 00:37:17.860 --> 00:37:21.610 align:middle line:84% And once I evoked it, I couldn't make it stop. 00:37:21.610 --> 00:37:25.720 align:middle line:84% It was like having to hear music that won't go away. 00:37:25.720 --> 00:37:27.220 align:middle line:84% Now I'm not sure if that's accurate. 00:37:27.220 --> 00:37:28.780 align:middle line:84% And I don't even know if the poem 00:37:28.780 --> 00:37:30.110 align:middle line:90% deals with that very directly. 00:37:30.110 --> 00:37:31.485 align:middle line:84% But that's what started the poem. 00:37:31.485 --> 00:37:34.270 align:middle line:84% I decided I wanted to try to re-evoke the situation, which 00:37:34.270 --> 00:37:35.320 align:middle line:90% meant making things up. 00:37:35.320 --> 00:37:38.020 align:middle line:84% The father in this poem is a lot more articulate and poetic 00:37:38.020 --> 00:37:42.100 align:middle line:84% than my father, who's an engineer-- was. 00:37:42.100 --> 00:37:44.445 align:middle line:84% He helped me a lot, but he didn't say all these things 00:37:44.445 --> 00:37:45.070 align:middle line:90% about the dark. 00:37:45.070 --> 00:37:48.160 align:middle line:84% So I took a lot of poetic license here. 00:37:48.160 --> 00:37:51.540 align:middle line:90% This is called Private Act. 00:37:51.540 --> 00:37:56.530 align:middle line:84% "My father promised as he shut my room dark night was 00:37:56.530 --> 00:37:59.860 align:middle line:90% the sun's eye blinking. 00:37:59.860 --> 00:38:04.480 align:middle line:84% I promised I wouldn't chew paper again or leave the damp wads 00:38:04.480 --> 00:38:08.110 align:middle line:90% like amulets under the bed. 00:38:08.110 --> 00:38:09.970 align:middle line:90% I shut my eyes. 00:38:09.970 --> 00:38:12.340 align:middle line:84% The guests raised their drinks and told 00:38:12.340 --> 00:38:17.560 align:middle line:84% stories downstairs, laughing in their bracelets, their rings 00:38:17.560 --> 00:38:19.210 align:middle line:90% of smoke. 00:38:19.210 --> 00:38:24.160 align:middle line:84% Their strange breath bloomed with attention. 00:38:24.160 --> 00:38:28.840 align:middle line:84% I opened my eyes, but the paisley sofa print rose still, 00:38:28.840 --> 00:38:31.420 align:middle line:84% a copper wave that filled and kept 00:38:31.420 --> 00:38:36.040 align:middle line:90% filling my eye's black room. 00:38:36.040 --> 00:38:39.070 align:middle line:84% I crept to the stairs where light floated up. 00:38:39.070 --> 00:38:44.680 align:middle line:84% And sometimes, a string of words I would wear for the night. 00:38:44.680 --> 00:38:47.260 align:middle line:90% He tucked me in again. 00:38:47.260 --> 00:38:50.380 align:middle line:84% He promised me dark as a pair of arms, 00:38:50.380 --> 00:38:55.360 align:middle line:84% rocking water, a blanket on my thighs. 00:38:55.360 --> 00:39:00.580 align:middle line:84% The paper tasted salty, the taste of my first lie. 00:39:00.580 --> 00:39:03.340 align:middle line:84% Then I crept among scented furs on the bed 00:39:03.340 --> 00:39:06.820 align:middle line:90% no one made my parents sleep in. 00:39:06.820 --> 00:39:10.060 align:middle line:84% No, I slept all night in the bed where 00:39:10.060 --> 00:39:14.560 align:middle line:84% I belonged while turquoise threads branched like bits 00:39:14.560 --> 00:39:18.250 align:middle line:84% of sky through my mother's water-colored gown 00:39:18.250 --> 00:39:22.990 align:middle line:84% and morning came slow, gray through every window at once." 00:39:22.990 --> 00:39:33.740 align:middle line:90% 00:39:33.740 --> 00:39:35.420 align:middle line:84% I've lived in El Paso for three years. 00:39:35.420 --> 00:39:39.560 align:middle line:84% And from the very beginning, I was struck by the Southwest. 00:39:39.560 --> 00:39:42.590 align:middle line:84% It has a kind of drama, physical drama, especially sunsets, 00:39:42.590 --> 00:39:45.073 align:middle line:90% that it's just so overwhelming. 00:39:45.073 --> 00:39:46.490 align:middle line:84% I've really gotten involved in it. 00:39:46.490 --> 00:39:48.950 align:middle line:84% And I have never really wanted to write about it. 00:39:48.950 --> 00:39:52.040 align:middle line:84% Although, I have thought about it a lot. 00:39:52.040 --> 00:39:55.112 align:middle line:84% But suddenly, this fall, I found myself 00:39:55.112 --> 00:39:56.570 align:middle line:84% wanting to deal with the landscape. 00:39:56.570 --> 00:40:01.023 align:middle line:84% And it's really hard to write description. 00:40:01.023 --> 00:40:03.440 align:middle line:84% You feel like you're writing a greeting card or something. 00:40:03.440 --> 00:40:04.970 align:middle line:84% It's when you try to describe something that's 00:40:04.970 --> 00:40:07.130 align:middle line:84% blatantly beautiful and everybody knows about 00:40:07.130 --> 00:40:08.960 align:middle line:90% and see pictures of. 00:40:08.960 --> 00:40:11.552 align:middle line:84% And I hope I'm going to try more of this, 00:40:11.552 --> 00:40:13.760 align:middle line:84% because what was interesting is I had to find-- well, 00:40:13.760 --> 00:40:15.020 align:middle line:90% I guess you always do. 00:40:15.020 --> 00:40:16.040 align:middle line:84% If you're going to talk about something, 00:40:16.040 --> 00:40:17.750 align:middle line:84% you have to find another thing you're going 00:40:17.750 --> 00:40:19.042 align:middle line:90% to talk about at the same time. 00:40:19.042 --> 00:40:23.178 align:middle line:84% And somehow, by just juxtaposing those, things you can add depth 00:40:23.178 --> 00:40:25.220 align:middle line:84% to the thing you thought you wanted to talk about 00:40:25.220 --> 00:40:26.970 align:middle line:84% and you can also trick yourself in talking 00:40:26.970 --> 00:40:28.550 align:middle line:90% about something else. 00:40:28.550 --> 00:40:30.057 align:middle line:90% I think that's helped me a lot. 00:40:30.057 --> 00:40:31.640 align:middle line:84% I'm not sure about that, but I'll just 00:40:31.640 --> 00:40:32.983 align:middle line:90% hand it out as a possibility. 00:40:32.983 --> 00:40:35.150 align:middle line:84% And that certainly helped me, because you can't just 00:40:35.150 --> 00:40:35.840 align:middle line:90% write description. 00:40:35.840 --> 00:40:38.257 align:middle line:84% Any fiction writer knows you can't just write description. 00:40:38.257 --> 00:40:41.150 align:middle line:90% You have to break it up. 00:40:41.150 --> 00:40:45.050 align:middle line:84% This is called Rain in the Desert. 00:40:45.050 --> 00:40:48.800 align:middle line:84% "It leaves this city suddenly porous, 00:40:48.800 --> 00:40:51.950 align:middle line:90% all windows thrown open. 00:40:51.950 --> 00:40:55.700 align:middle line:84% Whatever grows out there in the sand closes in now, 00:40:55.700 --> 00:41:00.110 align:middle line:84% breathing like the gray horse that once detached himself 00:41:00.110 --> 00:41:04.160 align:middle line:84% at dusk from the dark end of a pasture. 00:41:04.160 --> 00:41:08.510 align:middle line:84% I'd thought he was a shed or a pile of birch. 00:41:08.510 --> 00:41:13.940 align:middle line:84% And I want to laugh again having been right this time all day 00:41:13.940 --> 00:41:17.120 align:middle line:84% as my temples closed over grievance, 00:41:17.120 --> 00:41:21.350 align:middle line:84% fat around the heart, then flared. 00:41:21.350 --> 00:41:25.010 align:middle line:84% I wanted sudden stones across old water, 00:41:25.010 --> 00:41:29.435 align:middle line:84% a vein of pure logic, someone to grab my hands. 00:41:29.435 --> 00:41:32.000 align:middle line:90% 00:41:32.000 --> 00:41:35.810 align:middle line:84% Now the sun offers the last of itself. 00:41:35.810 --> 00:41:41.360 align:middle line:84% A bruised light, horizon has pulled the sky apart. 00:41:41.360 --> 00:41:44.090 align:middle line:84% And the beaten streets, dark rivers 00:41:44.090 --> 00:41:47.960 align:middle line:90% shine as though through tears. 00:41:47.960 --> 00:41:51.260 align:middle line:84% Now the houses have disappeared, leaving 00:41:51.260 --> 00:41:57.050 align:middle line:84% their windows full of land, leaving these low hills resting 00:41:57.050 --> 00:41:57.680 align:middle line:90% under lamps." 00:41:57.680 --> 00:42:03.630 align:middle line:90% 00:42:03.630 --> 00:42:05.630 align:middle line:84% One thing that was happening when I wrote that-- 00:42:05.630 --> 00:42:08.260 align:middle line:84% I often find that after I'm through with a poem 00:42:08.260 --> 00:42:11.420 align:middle line:84% or at least through with one writing of it, 00:42:11.420 --> 00:42:15.200 align:middle line:84% I have a very large physical picture of the whole situation. 00:42:15.200 --> 00:42:16.782 align:middle line:84% The whole room has been furnished, 00:42:16.782 --> 00:42:18.490 align:middle line:84% even though I'm only writing about what's 00:42:18.490 --> 00:42:21.170 align:middle line:84% happening on the sofa, that kind of thing. 00:42:21.170 --> 00:42:22.840 align:middle line:84% And I know that while writing this poem, 00:42:22.840 --> 00:42:27.130 align:middle line:84% I just kept retracing the sense of how-- 00:42:27.130 --> 00:42:29.000 align:middle line:84% well, sometimes, sunsets and sometimes 00:42:29.000 --> 00:42:31.000 align:middle line:84% with weather in the desert, at least in El Paso, 00:42:31.000 --> 00:42:33.375 align:middle line:84% there's a lot of mountain ranges to look at all the time. 00:42:33.375 --> 00:42:34.833 align:middle line:84% But when the weather changes there, 00:42:34.833 --> 00:42:37.170 align:middle line:84% you often feel that you're in two times of day at once. 00:42:37.170 --> 00:42:38.962 align:middle line:84% It can be night over here and you can still 00:42:38.962 --> 00:42:39.980 align:middle line:90% see sun over there. 00:42:39.980 --> 00:42:42.760 align:middle line:84% [INAUDIBLE] over here and you can see clear weather 00:42:42.760 --> 00:42:43.480 align:middle line:90% over there. 00:42:43.480 --> 00:42:45.470 align:middle line:84% And I just had never seen that before. 00:42:45.470 --> 00:42:47.200 align:middle line:84% So I really had the sense of dual time. 00:42:47.200 --> 00:42:48.670 align:middle line:84% And I don't know if that's in the poem or not, 00:42:48.670 --> 00:42:50.770 align:middle line:84% but it was it's something I'll never forget, 00:42:50.770 --> 00:42:52.750 align:middle line:84% because I had to live with that-- 00:42:52.750 --> 00:42:55.690 align:middle line:84% I did live with that vision for a while. 00:42:55.690 --> 00:42:56.550 align:middle line:90% [INAUDIBLE] 00:42:56.550 --> 00:43:12.010 align:middle line:90% 00:43:12.010 --> 00:43:17.620 align:middle line:84% I'm going to read this poem that was on the little reading 00:43:17.620 --> 00:43:19.182 align:middle line:84% sheet, the one called Flash Flood. 00:43:19.182 --> 00:43:21.140 align:middle line:84% One of the things I wanted to mention about it, 00:43:21.140 --> 00:43:23.723 align:middle line:84% there's an image at the end about a child staring 00:43:23.723 --> 00:43:24.640 align:middle line:90% from his mother's lap. 00:43:24.640 --> 00:43:27.040 align:middle line:84% And I got that image from the photograph of Transtromer 00:43:27.040 --> 00:43:27.742 align:middle line:90% in Ironwood. 00:43:27.742 --> 00:43:29.200 align:middle line:84% We were talking about that earlier. 00:43:29.200 --> 00:43:31.075 align:middle line:84% There's this wonderful picture of Transtromer 00:43:31.075 --> 00:43:33.160 align:middle line:84% and his wife and his first child. 00:43:33.160 --> 00:43:34.780 align:middle line:84% And they just are looking directly 00:43:34.780 --> 00:43:37.360 align:middle line:84% out at the audience at the camera. 00:43:37.360 --> 00:43:39.650 align:middle line:84% And that child just looks so sure of himself. 00:43:39.650 --> 00:43:42.910 align:middle line:84% He just looks like he can handle anything-- she. 00:43:42.910 --> 00:43:46.810 align:middle line:84% And this poem started out with an attempt 00:43:46.810 --> 00:43:50.020 align:middle line:84% to write about feelings clustered around 00:43:50.020 --> 00:43:51.520 align:middle line:84% how, when you're grown up, you still 00:43:51.520 --> 00:43:54.020 align:middle line:84% have this [AUDIO OUT] that you really haven't come very far. 00:43:54.020 --> 00:43:56.472 align:middle line:84% Your parents still have a sort of awful hold on you, 00:43:56.472 --> 00:43:58.930 align:middle line:84% even though it only comes up in subtle situations, the kind 00:43:58.930 --> 00:44:02.830 align:middle line:84% of vulnerability that an adult feels, I think, 00:44:02.830 --> 00:44:04.570 align:middle line:90% when their child self comes out. 00:44:04.570 --> 00:44:06.070 align:middle line:84% And while I was working on the poem, 00:44:06.070 --> 00:44:08.230 align:middle line:84% I was also teaching Transtromer and I 00:44:08.230 --> 00:44:10.855 align:middle line:84% was using that issue of Ironwood for my class. 00:44:10.855 --> 00:44:13.480 align:middle line:84% And I just found myself looking in that picture again and again 00:44:13.480 --> 00:44:16.150 align:middle line:84% and thinking, this kid looks like they'll never 00:44:16.150 --> 00:44:17.180 align:middle line:90% have this problem. 00:44:17.180 --> 00:44:19.277 align:middle line:84% And so that kid came into the poem. 00:44:19.277 --> 00:44:21.610 align:middle line:84% I wouldn't say this, because I'm assuming most of you've 00:44:21.610 --> 00:44:23.402 align:middle line:84% seen the poem before, so I'm not ruining it 00:44:23.402 --> 00:44:25.720 align:middle line:84% by where that image came from, because, in a way, 00:44:25.720 --> 00:44:28.207 align:middle line:90% it doesn't matter. 00:44:28.207 --> 00:44:29.290 align:middle line:90% I also did for this poem-- 00:44:29.290 --> 00:44:31.220 align:middle line:90% I spliced two things. 00:44:31.220 --> 00:44:34.840 align:middle line:84% I made up phone conversations that never took place verbatim, 00:44:34.840 --> 00:44:37.420 align:middle line:84% but there is a mood to the phone conversation 00:44:37.420 --> 00:44:39.350 align:middle line:90% that is autobiographical. 00:44:39.350 --> 00:44:41.853 align:middle line:84% And there's also the fact that, one night when 00:44:41.853 --> 00:44:44.020 align:middle line:84% I was living in Kansas City, we had a terrible flood 00:44:44.020 --> 00:44:45.400 align:middle line:90% that made national news. 00:44:45.400 --> 00:44:46.900 align:middle line:84% And it was happening two blocks from my house. 00:44:46.900 --> 00:44:48.442 align:middle line:84% And I didn't realize it was happening 00:44:48.442 --> 00:44:52.090 align:middle line:84% down there until people started calling me up long distance 00:44:52.090 --> 00:44:54.070 align:middle line:90% and saying, are you all right? 00:44:54.070 --> 00:44:56.470 align:middle line:84% You're killed all over the place where you live. 00:44:56.470 --> 00:44:58.720 align:middle line:84% And I was really shocked that I had been so unaware. 00:44:58.720 --> 00:45:01.330 align:middle line:84% All I could hear was the rain, deafening rain. 00:45:01.330 --> 00:45:05.560 align:middle line:84% So I spliced the two things together. 00:45:05.560 --> 00:45:07.090 align:middle line:84% I ended up splicing them together. 00:45:07.090 --> 00:45:09.715 align:middle line:84% I thought I was going to try to do a lot more ambitious things, 00:45:09.715 --> 00:45:11.080 align:middle line:90% but I had to give up. 00:45:11.080 --> 00:45:13.060 align:middle line:90% Flash Flood. 00:45:13.060 --> 00:45:16.960 align:middle line:84% "My parents call to say, are you all right? 00:45:16.960 --> 00:45:18.550 align:middle line:90% You shouldn't be alone. 00:45:18.550 --> 00:45:21.070 align:middle line:90% We can't sleep. 00:45:21.070 --> 00:45:25.120 align:middle line:84% Again, I tell them, I live on a hill. 00:45:25.120 --> 00:45:27.790 align:middle line:84% I tell them, it's only rain beating 00:45:27.790 --> 00:45:30.760 align:middle line:90% like robbers at the window. 00:45:30.760 --> 00:45:34.480 align:middle line:84% They tell me, we've never liked you living alone. 00:45:34.480 --> 00:45:37.580 align:middle line:90% When are you coming home? 00:45:37.580 --> 00:45:40.090 align:middle line:84% And now I remember all the beaus who 00:45:40.090 --> 00:45:44.800 align:middle line:84% borrowed money, the bath I once left running, 00:45:44.800 --> 00:45:49.150 align:middle line:84% the ceiling cracking under where I should have been, 00:45:49.150 --> 00:45:52.765 align:middle line:84% the tantrums, the anniversaries, the notes of thanks. 00:45:52.765 --> 00:45:55.390 align:middle line:90% 00:45:55.390 --> 00:45:58.990 align:middle line:84% And now, the President rises from an [AUDIO OUT] meal 00:45:58.990 --> 00:46:01.930 align:middle line:84% where food lies on his plate like an abandoned 00:46:01.930 --> 00:46:04.330 align:middle line:90% village, prodded and intact. 00:46:04.330 --> 00:46:06.880 align:middle line:90% 00:46:06.880 --> 00:46:09.250 align:middle line:90% I rise to fix a sandwich. 00:46:09.250 --> 00:46:13.480 align:middle line:84% I walk softly for the neighbors downstairs 00:46:13.480 --> 00:46:17.650 align:middle line:84% while, somewhere at sea, in a wallet warmed by some sailor's 00:46:17.650 --> 00:46:22.540 align:middle line:84% hip, a child stares boldly in his mother's lap 00:46:22.540 --> 00:46:27.070 align:middle line:84% as though the camera were an eye just opening the world to him." 00:46:27.070 --> 00:46:36.320 align:middle line:90% 00:46:36.320 --> 00:46:39.500 align:middle line:84% I think I'll read you a fairly long poem in the sense 00:46:39.500 --> 00:46:41.510 align:middle line:84% that it's in three sections, each of which 00:46:41.510 --> 00:46:44.870 align:middle line:84% is about as long as some of the poems I've been reading. 00:46:44.870 --> 00:46:46.370 align:middle line:84% This is really a case that helped 00:46:46.370 --> 00:46:49.160 align:middle line:84% me learn how to superimpose different things on each other 00:46:49.160 --> 00:46:50.990 align:middle line:90% in order to deal with something. 00:46:50.990 --> 00:46:55.460 align:middle line:84% It started out as a poem trying to use a lot of imagery that 00:46:55.460 --> 00:46:56.780 align:middle line:90% had to do with being divorce. 00:46:56.780 --> 00:46:58.400 align:middle line:84% And I've got some interesting images. 00:46:58.400 --> 00:47:00.440 align:middle line:84% But finally, that's one of those subjects, 00:47:00.440 --> 00:47:02.300 align:middle line:84% it's like writing about love or autumn. 00:47:02.300 --> 00:47:04.130 align:middle line:84% You write about divorce, it's pretty hard 00:47:04.130 --> 00:47:08.030 align:middle line:84% to do it with any kind of originality. 00:47:08.030 --> 00:47:10.070 align:middle line:84% It's hard to do it without being self-indulgent. 00:47:10.070 --> 00:47:11.945 align:middle line:84% There's a certain kind of-- a lot of distance 00:47:11.945 --> 00:47:12.710 align:middle line:90% you have to get. 00:47:12.710 --> 00:47:15.110 align:middle line:84% And I didn't know what to do with the images 00:47:15.110 --> 00:47:20.150 align:middle line:84% for a long time, but I ended up finding two things helped. 00:47:20.150 --> 00:47:22.220 align:middle line:84% The one thing, I ended up wanting 00:47:22.220 --> 00:47:24.695 align:middle line:84% to use a lot of images that had to do 00:47:24.695 --> 00:47:26.570 align:middle line:84% with reading The Moviegoer, which is probably 00:47:26.570 --> 00:47:27.710 align:middle line:90% my favorite novel. 00:47:27.710 --> 00:47:31.665 align:middle line:84% And it's probably made a big impression on me 00:47:31.665 --> 00:47:33.290 align:middle line:84% in ways I can't describe at the moment. 00:47:33.290 --> 00:47:34.790 align:middle line:84% But you're going to hear in the poem 00:47:34.790 --> 00:47:36.410 align:middle line:90% some references to that novel. 00:47:36.410 --> 00:47:37.400 align:middle line:90% It's by Walker Percy. 00:47:37.400 --> 00:47:40.520 align:middle line:90% It takes place in Louisiana. 00:47:40.520 --> 00:47:44.000 align:middle line:84% In the middle section of the poem, 00:47:44.000 --> 00:47:45.620 align:middle line:84% there's an italicized section, which 00:47:45.620 --> 00:47:46.940 align:middle line:90% simply refers to the book. 00:47:46.940 --> 00:47:49.470 align:middle line:84% And that's why I just want to explain what's going on. 00:47:49.470 --> 00:47:52.110 align:middle line:84% If you were reading a poem, you would see the italics 00:47:52.110 --> 00:47:54.890 align:middle line:84% and you would get the message that the voice is changing. 00:47:54.890 --> 00:47:58.010 align:middle line:84% Another thing that helped me was to cast this poem in the point 00:47:58.010 --> 00:47:59.420 align:middle line:84% of view of someone who's jogging, 00:47:59.420 --> 00:48:02.082 align:middle line:84% because there's something about the circular flow of thought 00:48:02.082 --> 00:48:03.290 align:middle line:90% that gets going when you run. 00:48:03.290 --> 00:48:05.790 align:middle line:84% You think about something, your mind wanders, it comes back, 00:48:05.790 --> 00:48:06.560 align:middle line:90% it wanders. 00:48:06.560 --> 00:48:09.450 align:middle line:84% And I found that movement was really what I needed. 00:48:09.450 --> 00:48:11.390 align:middle line:84% And that accommodated the divorce imagery, 00:48:11.390 --> 00:48:13.700 align:middle line:84% and it accommodated The Moviegoer, 00:48:13.700 --> 00:48:18.165 align:middle line:84% and it accommodated a narrative line. 00:48:18.165 --> 00:48:20.540 align:middle line:84% I wasn't conscious of all this while I was working on it. 00:48:20.540 --> 00:48:23.990 align:middle line:84% The poem got dismantled many, many times. 00:48:23.990 --> 00:48:25.790 align:middle line:84% But it was a nice arrival, finally. 00:48:25.790 --> 00:48:27.290 align:middle line:84% And it ended up being in three parts 00:48:27.290 --> 00:48:29.165 align:middle line:84% and it ended up having a lot of italics in it 00:48:29.165 --> 00:48:30.230 align:middle line:90% and being rather complex. 00:48:30.230 --> 00:48:33.980 align:middle line:84% But I think I've kind of tied all the strands for you enough. 00:48:33.980 --> 00:48:36.650 align:middle line:90% This is called Running. 00:48:36.650 --> 00:48:38.561 align:middle line:90% One. 00:48:38.561 --> 00:48:42.410 align:middle line:84% "Lately, my neighbor wheezes pounding dough, 00:48:42.410 --> 00:48:46.760 align:middle line:84% her forearm glazed with sweat and flour. 00:48:46.760 --> 00:48:50.780 align:middle line:84% At your age, my mother writes, I wanted babies. 00:48:50.780 --> 00:48:55.790 align:middle line:84% I got pregnant each time one of you learned to walk. 00:48:55.790 --> 00:48:58.610 align:middle line:84% I circle the block again and again 00:48:58.610 --> 00:49:02.690 align:middle line:90% until I run outside my body. 00:49:02.690 --> 00:49:05.420 align:middle line:84% This time last year, my husband's 00:49:05.420 --> 00:49:12.020 align:middle line:84% stalking of the other woman who slept poorly inside him. 00:49:12.020 --> 00:49:15.560 align:middle line:84% She promised in another town to give him up. 00:49:15.560 --> 00:49:18.710 align:middle line:84% All night, she tossed and tried to speak 00:49:18.710 --> 00:49:22.550 align:middle line:84% until he spoke of his father, who drank himself 00:49:22.550 --> 00:49:28.100 align:middle line:84% into the cracked well of his voice and never touched bottom. 00:49:28.100 --> 00:49:31.190 align:middle line:84% She made him wake, sweating and brooding 00:49:31.190 --> 00:49:34.490 align:middle line:84% in the closed room of his departure, 00:49:34.490 --> 00:49:39.560 align:middle line:84% while I ran myself past my neighbor's lawn and loaves, 00:49:39.560 --> 00:49:41.780 align:middle line:84% plump and settling in their heat, 00:49:41.780 --> 00:49:43.535 align:middle line:90% to an early shape of myself." 00:49:43.535 --> 00:49:47.830 align:middle line:90% 00:49:47.830 --> 00:49:50.002 align:middle line:90% Two. 00:49:50.002 --> 00:49:54.040 align:middle line:84% "I'd forgotten whose apartment stretched like a tunnel, 00:49:54.040 --> 00:49:59.380 align:middle line:84% shapeless and dark, the way my good dress hung too large, 00:49:59.380 --> 00:50:03.770 align:middle line:90% a formal body outside my body. 00:50:03.770 --> 00:50:07.480 align:middle line:84% The other men drifted alike behind their drink, 00:50:07.480 --> 00:50:10.120 align:middle line:84% while he stood in one place and spoke 00:50:10.120 --> 00:50:13.210 align:middle line:84% to me of The Moviegoer, which spoke, 00:50:13.210 --> 00:50:14.995 align:middle line:90% he said, to his very soul. 00:50:14.995 --> 00:50:17.820 align:middle line:90% 00:50:17.820 --> 00:50:22.170 align:middle line:84% Sometimes, I run in Louisiana where I've never been, 00:50:22.170 --> 00:50:26.580 align:middle line:84% where the hero saw an egret gather itself over swamp mist 00:50:26.580 --> 00:50:29.880 align:middle line:84% and settle in a single oak that rose to meet it. 00:50:29.880 --> 00:50:32.520 align:middle line:90% 00:50:32.520 --> 00:50:34.830 align:middle line:84% Later, he married his cousin, whose 00:50:34.830 --> 00:50:37.950 align:middle line:84% agile mind wandered, glittering at the family 00:50:37.950 --> 00:50:42.760 align:middle line:90% table, the dense mahogany. 00:50:42.760 --> 00:50:47.070 align:middle line:84% The Black butler wheezed as he passed butter beans. 00:50:47.070 --> 00:50:50.880 align:middle line:84% She couldn't sleep, she said, without pills. 00:50:50.880 --> 00:50:53.910 align:middle line:84% Sometimes, she slept for two days. 00:50:53.910 --> 00:50:56.790 align:middle line:84% She promised she could be like anyone 00:50:56.790 --> 00:51:02.490 align:middle line:84% if he would tell her each morning how to pass that day. 00:51:02.490 --> 00:51:07.170 align:middle line:84% That night, my skin held me like liquid glass. 00:51:07.170 --> 00:51:11.640 align:middle line:84% I wanted to slip my hand beneath his elbow to dance, 00:51:11.640 --> 00:51:14.895 align:middle line:84% to see the other women naked inside their clothes." 00:51:14.895 --> 00:51:19.570 align:middle line:90% 00:51:19.570 --> 00:51:22.090 align:middle line:90% Three. 00:51:22.090 --> 00:51:26.740 align:middle line:84% "Every morning, I run through pollen, late summer haze, 00:51:26.740 --> 00:51:28.960 align:middle line:90% or rain. 00:51:28.960 --> 00:51:33.940 align:middle line:84% My husband is an illness I had in another country. 00:51:33.940 --> 00:51:37.780 align:middle line:84% The day he left again and again, he said none of it 00:51:37.780 --> 00:51:43.000 align:middle line:84% was my fault. I circle the block, pump and sweat, 00:51:43.000 --> 00:51:46.600 align:middle line:90% until I run outside my body. 00:51:46.600 --> 00:51:48.280 align:middle line:90% My ribs ached. 00:51:48.280 --> 00:51:52.630 align:middle line:84% He ran his hands gently over them. 00:51:52.630 --> 00:51:55.360 align:middle line:84% Inside my running, I write to him, 00:51:55.360 --> 00:51:59.770 align:middle line:84% breaking the silence we keep for his new wife. 00:51:59.770 --> 00:52:03.940 align:middle line:84% I saw the sun disappear into mist as it reached the horizon. 00:52:03.940 --> 00:52:07.615 align:middle line:84% I saw an egret airborne, circling all this time. 00:52:07.615 --> 00:52:10.330 align:middle line:90% 00:52:10.330 --> 00:52:13.480 align:middle line:84% The morning bus gathers husbands and children 00:52:13.480 --> 00:52:19.000 align:middle line:84% and leaves for a moment a soft rope of exhaust. 00:52:19.000 --> 00:52:21.940 align:middle line:84% I draw breath over breath as the children 00:52:21.940 --> 00:52:25.090 align:middle line:90% must breathe in their sleep. 00:52:25.090 --> 00:52:27.310 align:middle line:84% My neighbor waves from her doorway, 00:52:27.310 --> 00:52:30.860 align:middle line:90% watches my easy stride. 00:52:30.860 --> 00:52:33.520 align:middle line:84% Your waist, she says wistfully, fits 00:52:33.520 --> 00:52:35.425 align:middle line:90% the dress I wore as a bride." 00:52:35.425 --> 00:52:49.960 align:middle line:90% 00:52:49.960 --> 00:52:52.810 align:middle line:84% This next poem is kind of bitchy. 00:52:52.810 --> 00:52:54.010 align:middle line:90% I think it's a persona poem. 00:52:54.010 --> 00:52:55.343 align:middle line:90% I sure hope it's a persona poem. 00:52:55.343 --> 00:52:57.430 align:middle line:84% It sounds like Dorothy Parker wrote it. 00:52:57.430 --> 00:52:59.770 align:middle line:84% It's fun to read, because it's in dialogue. 00:52:59.770 --> 00:53:03.100 align:middle line:84% And, for me, it was a made up situation. 00:53:03.100 --> 00:53:05.350 align:middle line:84% Although, it's probably going to come back to haunt me 00:53:05.350 --> 00:53:08.680 align:middle line:90% when I become salty old dame. 00:53:08.680 --> 00:53:12.550 align:middle line:90% This is called Loyalty. 00:53:12.550 --> 00:53:16.020 align:middle line:84% "Our eyes meet over other couples' shoulders. 00:53:16.020 --> 00:53:19.770 align:middle line:84% And another love song launches its vows. 00:53:19.770 --> 00:53:23.400 align:middle line:84% His body lists in my direction, but not, I 00:53:23.400 --> 00:53:27.210 align:middle line:90% assure myself, without grace. 00:53:27.210 --> 00:53:29.220 align:middle line:90% I offer my ringless hand. 00:53:29.220 --> 00:53:29.940 align:middle line:90% Shall we dance? 00:53:29.940 --> 00:53:32.460 align:middle line:90% 00:53:32.460 --> 00:53:35.040 align:middle line:84% On his waist, my hand meets the roll 00:53:35.040 --> 00:53:39.930 align:middle line:84% of flesh, the wife who let her body go. 00:53:39.930 --> 00:53:46.050 align:middle line:84% I remind myself there's no such thing as a badly made man. 00:53:46.050 --> 00:53:48.210 align:middle line:90% Your eyes, he says. 00:53:48.210 --> 00:53:51.750 align:middle line:84% And my glasses slip into their silk purse. 00:53:51.750 --> 00:53:55.410 align:middle line:90% His chin settles into my neck. 00:53:55.410 --> 00:54:00.720 align:middle line:84% The pearls, I say, were a gift from the man I didn't marry. 00:54:00.720 --> 00:54:03.930 align:middle line:84% Tall, dark, and riddled with beauty, 00:54:03.930 --> 00:54:07.080 align:middle line:84% he spent my ardor to please pressing 00:54:07.080 --> 00:54:10.600 align:middle line:90% any knees under glass tables. 00:54:10.600 --> 00:54:14.340 align:middle line:84% This one breathes in my air with the two step. 00:54:14.340 --> 00:54:18.840 align:middle line:84% I rise to my toes to follow on air. 00:54:18.840 --> 00:54:21.810 align:middle line:84% Oh, I learned to calm on that phone 00:54:21.810 --> 00:54:26.370 align:middle line:84% while a stranger breathes hard words of love. 00:54:26.370 --> 00:54:29.820 align:middle line:90% Now my life is about to change. 00:54:29.820 --> 00:54:33.810 align:middle line:84% He tells me his mistress, all legs and caramel skin, 00:54:33.810 --> 00:54:36.570 align:middle line:90% just left for the coast. 00:54:36.570 --> 00:54:37.770 align:middle line:90% We dance. 00:54:37.770 --> 00:54:38.940 align:middle line:90% We drink. 00:54:38.940 --> 00:54:42.540 align:middle line:84% We doze on each other's shoulders. 00:54:42.540 --> 00:54:46.440 align:middle line:84% We stare at stars, who stay in their dark, 00:54:46.440 --> 00:54:50.723 align:middle line:84% and gather ourselves towards mourning, the rough ride out 00:54:50.723 --> 00:54:51.390 align:middle line:90% of our clothes." 00:54:51.390 --> 00:55:02.600 align:middle line:90% 00:55:02.600 --> 00:55:05.288 align:middle line:84% I hope I'm going to write a lot of dancing poems. 00:55:05.288 --> 00:55:07.580 align:middle line:84% I really feel kind of fascinated with that whole thing. 00:55:07.580 --> 00:55:09.837 align:middle line:84% I have another one to read you, which is written way 00:55:09.837 --> 00:55:10.670 align:middle line:90% after the first one. 00:55:10.670 --> 00:55:13.040 align:middle line:84% But I have a sense that it's a vein 00:55:13.040 --> 00:55:14.360 align:middle line:90% that I want to keep following. 00:55:14.360 --> 00:55:17.210 align:middle line:84% And this one is quite direct, also. 00:55:17.210 --> 00:55:21.470 align:middle line:84% The American Deaf Dance Company came to El Paso last fall. 00:55:21.470 --> 00:55:25.760 align:middle line:84% And in addition to being moved by the beautiful dancing, which 00:55:25.760 --> 00:55:27.380 align:middle line:84% I would have been in any event, I 00:55:27.380 --> 00:55:29.060 align:middle line:84% think one of the things I think about dancers when 00:55:29.060 --> 00:55:31.610 align:middle line:84% I watch them perform is the sense they must be transformed 00:55:31.610 --> 00:55:33.152 align:middle line:84% by what they're doing out there, that 00:55:33.152 --> 00:55:34.670 align:middle line:84% how can they just get off the stage 00:55:34.670 --> 00:55:38.840 align:middle line:84% with a beautiful, perfect body and be ordinary? 00:55:38.840 --> 00:55:39.800 align:middle line:90% Do they drink Cokes? 00:55:39.800 --> 00:55:40.842 align:middle line:90% Do they eat french fries? 00:55:40.842 --> 00:55:44.510 align:middle line:84% I can't imagine it they just look so-- 00:55:44.510 --> 00:55:46.552 align:middle line:84% they're almost mythologizing themselves on stage. 00:55:46.552 --> 00:55:47.968 align:middle line:84% And maybe that's one of the things 00:55:47.968 --> 00:55:49.370 align:middle line:90% I just admire so much about it. 00:55:49.370 --> 00:55:51.980 align:middle line:84% And I kind of like that illusion. 00:55:51.980 --> 00:55:54.710 align:middle line:84% When I was watching the American Deaf Dance Company, 00:55:54.710 --> 00:55:55.700 align:middle line:90% there was no music. 00:55:55.700 --> 00:55:57.320 align:middle line:90% It was just movements. 00:55:57.320 --> 00:56:00.740 align:middle line:84% And I found that fantasy held up better, 00:56:00.740 --> 00:56:03.350 align:middle line:84% because, in a way, when they were finished dancing, 00:56:03.350 --> 00:56:07.250 align:middle line:84% they wouldn't go off stage and start gossiping, or giggling, 00:56:07.250 --> 00:56:10.370 align:middle line:84% or making silly noises, that they would still somehow 00:56:10.370 --> 00:56:13.080 align:middle line:84% be left in that world that they had created, 00:56:13.080 --> 00:56:15.128 align:middle line:90% which is probably not true. 00:56:15.128 --> 00:56:16.670 align:middle line:84% When you watch them do their signing, 00:56:16.670 --> 00:56:17.750 align:middle line:90% that's another kind of dancing. 00:56:17.750 --> 00:56:19.125 align:middle line:84% And it's a very articulate thing. 00:56:19.125 --> 00:56:23.210 align:middle line:84% But I kept the fantasy that what they were doing on stage, 00:56:23.210 --> 00:56:25.075 align:middle line:84% they would keep close to them longer, 00:56:25.075 --> 00:56:26.450 align:middle line:84% because [AUDIO OUT] that in a way 00:56:26.450 --> 00:56:29.060 align:middle line:84% they were protected from mundane life. 00:56:29.060 --> 00:56:31.400 align:middle line:84% And it was that impression that made me write this poem. 00:56:31.400 --> 00:56:34.700 align:middle line:84% I really don't think I'm giving the poem away by saying it. 00:56:34.700 --> 00:56:36.620 align:middle line:84% But I enjoyed my fantasy so much and I just 00:56:36.620 --> 00:56:38.930 align:middle line:90% thought I'd hand it out. 00:56:38.930 --> 00:56:43.520 align:middle line:84% This is called The American Deaf Dance Company: Whistlestop. 00:56:43.520 --> 00:56:45.710 align:middle line:90% Middle section is in italics. 00:56:45.710 --> 00:56:48.700 align:middle line:84% I guess, I want you to think of that as flashbacks. 00:56:48.700 --> 00:56:51.602 align:middle line:84% I don't know how to read flashbacks yet. 00:56:51.602 --> 00:56:55.730 align:middle line:84% "They mark stress as a sting of landing. 00:56:55.730 --> 00:57:00.380 align:middle line:90% Swift kiss, another leap apart. 00:57:00.380 --> 00:57:03.350 align:middle line:90% I lean in my feet missing you. 00:57:03.350 --> 00:57:05.960 align:middle line:90% My knees crack. 00:57:05.960 --> 00:57:09.260 align:middle line:84% Our old dispute loosens its whims, 00:57:09.260 --> 00:57:12.830 align:middle line:84% the words curled on themselves and the trip 00:57:12.830 --> 00:57:16.340 align:middle line:90% to a movie etched for good. 00:57:16.340 --> 00:57:20.420 align:middle line:84% Some couples smoked hurriedly, locking their cars. 00:57:20.420 --> 00:57:24.320 align:middle line:84% Later, we held the plot like ice in our mouths, 00:57:24.320 --> 00:57:28.490 align:middle line:84% walked home melting it down while street lights [AUDIO OUT] 00:57:28.490 --> 00:57:30.260 align:middle line:90% ahead. 00:57:30.260 --> 00:57:32.960 align:middle line:84% Why did we never walk barefoot through that house? 00:57:32.960 --> 00:57:35.480 align:middle line:90% 00:57:35.480 --> 00:57:38.450 align:middle line:84% Bleached denim sweeps their thighs, their breath 00:57:38.450 --> 00:57:41.300 align:middle line:90% the only other sound. 00:57:41.300 --> 00:57:43.700 align:middle line:84% Their eyes never leave the space they 00:57:43.700 --> 00:57:46.550 align:middle line:90% weave as they leave the ground. 00:57:46.550 --> 00:57:50.960 align:middle line:84% And I clap my hands high so they'll see. 00:57:50.960 --> 00:57:54.350 align:middle line:84% She falls again into his sure arms." 00:57:54.350 --> 00:58:06.430 align:middle line:90% 00:58:06.430 --> 00:58:08.510 align:middle line:90% This next poem-- 00:58:08.510 --> 00:58:11.630 align:middle line:84% I find myself when I teach writing telling people 00:58:11.630 --> 00:58:15.380 align:middle line:84% not to try to write too directly about things that consume them 00:58:15.380 --> 00:58:19.400 align:middle line:84% emotionally, because it's usually a pretty bad way 00:58:19.400 --> 00:58:20.450 align:middle line:90% to begin writing a poem. 00:58:20.450 --> 00:58:25.130 align:middle line:84% I've always advocated for myself and for students finding 00:58:25.130 --> 00:58:27.088 align:middle line:84% an area where you are ignorant and fascinated, 00:58:27.088 --> 00:58:28.880 align:middle line:84% and then just going in there and exploring, 00:58:28.880 --> 00:58:30.963 align:middle line:84% and using your writing as a method of exploration. 00:58:30.963 --> 00:58:33.440 align:middle line:84% It sounds wonderful and it does work. 00:58:33.440 --> 00:58:36.133 align:middle line:84% But this poem wanted very much to be about something. 00:58:36.133 --> 00:58:38.300 align:middle line:84% It was probably the first time I ever allowed myself 00:58:38.300 --> 00:58:41.840 align:middle line:84% to use an emotion and just keep working, and working, 00:58:41.840 --> 00:58:44.630 align:middle line:84% and working at it until I got something out of it. 00:58:44.630 --> 00:58:47.420 align:middle line:84% And it came from the experience of having 00:58:47.420 --> 00:58:49.760 align:middle line:84% a close friend of mine call me at 5:00 in the morning 00:58:49.760 --> 00:58:51.980 align:middle line:84% one morning and say, would you mind coming over? 00:58:51.980 --> 00:58:54.110 align:middle line:84% I've been raped and I think I need some help, which 00:58:54.110 --> 00:58:57.830 align:middle line:84% is very calm, but the message was just like a bombshell, 00:58:57.830 --> 00:59:00.440 align:middle line:84% like the ringing of the telephone itself. 00:59:00.440 --> 00:59:05.060 align:middle line:84% And as it turned out, she wasn't damaged unduly by any of it 00:59:05.060 --> 00:59:06.657 align:middle line:90% beyond the event itself. 00:59:06.657 --> 00:59:08.240 align:middle line:84% And she was treated well by the police 00:59:08.240 --> 00:59:09.560 align:middle line:84% and she was treated well by the hospitals. 00:59:09.560 --> 00:59:11.780 align:middle line:84% And everything came out reasonably all right. 00:59:11.780 --> 00:59:14.390 align:middle line:84% But there were shockwaves from just the whole experience 00:59:14.390 --> 00:59:18.890 align:middle line:84% of knowing someone and of being awakened into that so suddenly. 00:59:18.890 --> 00:59:22.730 align:middle line:84% And afterwards, I found that for the first time in my life 00:59:22.730 --> 00:59:24.750 align:middle line:84% I was afraid, as though it had happened to me. 00:59:24.750 --> 00:59:28.280 align:middle line:84% I was suddenly seen seeing the world 00:59:28.280 --> 00:59:30.380 align:middle line:84% through the same sense of vulnerability 00:59:30.380 --> 00:59:32.360 align:middle line:90% as though I had had that happen. 00:59:32.360 --> 00:59:34.280 align:middle line:84% And up until then, it had [AUDIO OUT] home. 00:59:34.280 --> 00:59:36.020 align:middle line:84% I was indignant about it as a phenomenon, 00:59:36.020 --> 00:59:37.560 align:middle line:90% but I had never been hurt by it. 00:59:37.560 --> 00:59:39.770 align:middle line:84% And I still haven't been directly hurt by it. 00:59:39.770 --> 00:59:41.330 align:middle line:84% But after this happened to a friend, 00:59:41.330 --> 00:59:44.570 align:middle line:84% it was something that became part of my emotional makeup 00:59:44.570 --> 00:59:45.410 align:middle line:90% for a while. 00:59:45.410 --> 00:59:46.850 align:middle line:84% It was also during a period where 00:59:46.850 --> 00:59:51.898 align:middle line:84% I was very aware of the flip side: that there's 00:59:51.898 --> 00:59:53.690 align:middle line:84% great tenderness and there's great violence 00:59:53.690 --> 00:59:54.607 align:middle line:90% between men and women. 00:59:54.607 --> 00:59:57.110 align:middle line:84% And in addition to reacting to the rape, 00:59:57.110 --> 00:59:59.210 align:middle line:84% I also just found myself thinking 00:59:59.210 --> 01:00:01.610 align:middle line:90% about that dual nature. 01:00:01.610 --> 01:00:04.433 align:middle line:84% So I tried dealing with all those things in this poem. 01:00:04.433 --> 01:00:06.350 align:middle line:84% And I think the main effort I had writing it-- 01:00:06.350 --> 01:00:07.400 align:middle line:90% I called it The Rapist. 01:00:07.400 --> 01:00:07.940 align:middle line:90% And I have never-- 01:00:07.940 --> 01:00:09.200 align:middle line:84% I've always advocated understatement. 01:00:09.200 --> 01:00:11.492 align:middle line:84% So to have anything with a working title of The Rapist, 01:00:11.492 --> 01:00:15.360 align:middle line:84% I felt constantly that I was breaking my own rule. 01:00:15.360 --> 01:00:18.350 align:middle line:84% And I found that most of the work I had to do was cutting. 01:00:18.350 --> 01:00:21.290 align:middle line:84% Finally, when I had everything down that I thought I needed, 01:00:21.290 --> 01:00:23.090 align:middle line:84% I had to just slash, and slash, and slash, 01:00:23.090 --> 01:00:24.870 align:middle line:84% because the temptation, of course, 01:00:24.870 --> 01:00:27.260 align:middle line:90% was to get melodramatic. 01:00:27.260 --> 01:00:30.350 align:middle line:84% So I ended up with four short sections, each of which 01:00:30.350 --> 01:00:31.680 align:middle line:90% is separated by an asterisk. 01:00:31.680 --> 01:00:33.680 align:middle line:84% So I really need a pause to be a little stronger 01:00:33.680 --> 01:00:34.700 align:middle line:90% than a stanza break. 01:00:34.700 --> 01:00:36.890 align:middle line:84% The second one is in italics, because I [AUDIO OUT] 01:00:36.890 --> 01:00:39.190 align:middle line:90% flashback. 01:00:39.190 --> 01:00:41.600 align:middle line:90% The Rapist. 01:00:41.600 --> 01:00:45.470 align:middle line:84% "You do not know how long he sat by the bed, 01:00:45.470 --> 01:00:48.410 align:middle line:84% moving the hidden parts of your body 01:00:48.410 --> 01:00:51.650 align:middle line:90% to another mattress in his head. 01:00:51.650 --> 01:00:55.010 align:middle line:90% You never saw his face. 01:00:55.010 --> 01:00:58.610 align:middle line:84% Later, police found bits of the kitchen window 01:00:58.610 --> 01:01:01.700 align:middle line:84% cracked with damp soil through every room. 01:01:01.700 --> 01:01:07.090 align:middle line:90% 01:01:07.090 --> 01:01:12.400 align:middle line:84% Your first lover was a large man, soft from years of longing 01:01:12.400 --> 01:01:17.290 align:middle line:84% for extraordinary women and had small hands. 01:01:17.290 --> 01:01:21.250 align:middle line:84% His skin burned easily in the sun. 01:01:21.250 --> 01:01:24.460 align:middle line:84% That first night, pleased and desperate, 01:01:24.460 --> 01:01:27.880 align:middle line:84% he licked parts of your body you'd never seen. 01:01:27.880 --> 01:01:33.290 align:middle line:84% Then shuddered, settled and drifted in your arms. 01:01:33.290 --> 01:01:36.640 align:middle line:90% You were too pleased to sleep. 01:01:36.640 --> 01:01:40.660 align:middle line:84% You arranged yourself over your sore parts. 01:01:40.660 --> 01:01:45.790 align:middle line:84% All night, his eyes moved under soft, blue lids 01:01:45.790 --> 01:01:50.230 align:middle line:84% as though seeking the other woman he leaves asleep. 01:01:50.230 --> 01:01:53.065 align:middle line:84% Awake, you would ease him into daylight. 01:01:53.065 --> 01:02:00.220 align:middle line:90% 01:02:00.220 --> 01:02:03.730 align:middle line:84% The doctor found hairs inside your body. 01:02:03.730 --> 01:02:08.470 align:middle line:84% He found them with tweezers and a pinpoint of light. 01:02:08.470 --> 01:02:12.160 align:middle line:84% The police, he said, will keep them for evidence. 01:02:12.160 --> 01:02:16.970 align:middle line:90% 01:02:16.970 --> 01:02:21.140 align:middle line:84% You keep telling yourself he was not a large man. 01:02:21.140 --> 01:02:27.740 align:middle line:84% In each hot bath, his body loosens from yours like paint. 01:02:27.740 --> 01:02:32.390 align:middle line:84% Night after night, your breaths are weightless in the water. 01:02:32.390 --> 01:02:39.920 align:middle line:84% Neither plants nor animals are laced with stubborn blue veins. 01:02:39.920 --> 01:02:43.340 align:middle line:84% All night, your eyes move under dark lids 01:02:43.340 --> 01:02:47.390 align:middle line:84% as though seeking a familiar woman inside yourself." 01:02:47.390 --> 01:02:54.045 align:middle line:90% 01:02:54.045 --> 01:02:55.670 align:middle line:84% I want to try a couple of poems on you. 01:02:55.670 --> 01:02:58.800 align:middle line:90% And this is always risky. 01:02:58.800 --> 01:03:00.960 align:middle line:84% There are two that I'm in doubt about. 01:03:00.960 --> 01:03:02.630 align:middle line:90% The first one is fun. 01:03:02.630 --> 01:03:03.590 align:middle line:90% It won't be taxing. 01:03:03.590 --> 01:03:06.650 align:middle line:84% And, in fact, what's wrong with it might just 01:03:06.650 --> 01:03:09.272 align:middle line:90% be that it's too easy. 01:03:09.272 --> 01:03:10.230 align:middle line:90% So I hope you enjoy it. 01:03:10.230 --> 01:03:12.800 align:middle line:84% But I also would welcome suggestions. 01:03:12.800 --> 01:03:15.650 align:middle line:84% You're all trained in criticism and I 01:03:15.650 --> 01:03:19.410 align:middle line:90% could use it if you have it. 01:03:19.410 --> 01:03:22.010 align:middle line:84% I also feel that reading poems that aren't finished 01:03:22.010 --> 01:03:24.110 align:middle line:84% isn't necessarily an imposition on people, 01:03:24.110 --> 01:03:25.790 align:middle line:90% as they vanish right away. 01:03:25.790 --> 01:03:28.730 align:middle line:84% But both of these poems I'm sort of trying out on you 01:03:28.730 --> 01:03:30.470 align:middle line:90% speculatively. 01:03:30.470 --> 01:03:34.250 align:middle line:84% And this first one just might be too neat, but it's fun to read. 01:03:34.250 --> 01:03:38.402 align:middle line:90% It's called Domestic Wine. 01:03:38.402 --> 01:03:41.360 align:middle line:84% "My friends are quitting smoking, 01:03:41.360 --> 01:03:43.940 align:middle line:90% being quoted on the news. 01:03:43.940 --> 01:03:46.400 align:middle line:84% Fumbling for eyes [AUDIO OUT] 2:00 AM, 01:03:46.400 --> 01:03:49.940 align:middle line:90% watching every foreign film. 01:03:49.940 --> 01:03:53.540 align:middle line:90% Each plans to leave town soon. 01:03:53.540 --> 01:03:56.120 align:middle line:84% Each is the hero of a story that begins, 01:03:56.120 --> 01:03:59.690 align:middle line:90% I've never told this to anyone. 01:03:59.690 --> 01:04:02.480 align:middle line:84% My friends at dawn in their running shoes. 01:04:02.480 --> 01:04:07.220 align:middle line:84% My friends after dark in their good skin and turquoise. 01:04:07.220 --> 01:04:10.550 align:middle line:84% My friends who will never marry again. 01:04:10.550 --> 01:04:14.240 align:middle line:84% My friends for whom I open late at night 01:04:14.240 --> 01:04:16.880 align:middle line:90% into an eye that listens. 01:04:16.880 --> 01:04:19.310 align:middle line:90% Their rings catch the light. 01:04:19.310 --> 01:04:21.440 align:middle line:84% Their cheekbones and brows surface 01:04:21.440 --> 01:04:26.390 align:middle line:84% like carving over tables they've stripped and waxed and waxed 01:04:26.390 --> 01:04:28.520 align:middle line:90% again. 01:04:28.520 --> 01:04:32.450 align:middle line:84% Even the air takes shape between their hands as each, 01:04:32.450 --> 01:04:35.570 align:middle line:84% like a bandit, plots the perfect departure. 01:04:35.570 --> 01:04:40.430 align:middle line:90% 01:04:40.430 --> 01:04:42.950 align:middle line:84% My friends who sleep, pretending themselves 01:04:42.950 --> 01:04:45.740 align:middle line:84% held by someone they've never met. 01:04:45.740 --> 01:04:48.260 align:middle line:90% My friends saying, my children. 01:04:48.260 --> 01:04:53.510 align:middle line:84% My friends falling wearily in love over glasses of wine. 01:04:53.510 --> 01:04:57.410 align:middle line:84% One by one, they tell me, finally, I know myself." 01:04:57.410 --> 01:05:01.803 align:middle line:90% 01:05:01.803 --> 01:05:03.720 align:middle line:84% I stumbled there, because, at the last minute, 01:05:03.720 --> 01:05:04.770 align:middle line:90% I switched lines around. 01:05:04.770 --> 01:05:06.520 align:middle line:84% I've been doing first aid on these all day 01:05:06.520 --> 01:05:08.190 align:middle line:90% so I can try to read them. 01:05:08.190 --> 01:05:09.780 align:middle line:84% This next one may still be notes. 01:05:09.780 --> 01:05:11.525 align:middle line:90% I don't know. 01:05:11.525 --> 01:05:12.900 align:middle line:84% There's a lot of images that I've 01:05:12.900 --> 01:05:15.390 align:middle line:84% been trying to organize that have to do with what it feels 01:05:15.390 --> 01:05:19.200 align:middle line:90% like to move, to move away. 01:05:19.200 --> 01:05:22.170 align:middle line:84% And I start out with a very minimal poem and I expanded it 01:05:22.170 --> 01:05:23.970 align:middle line:84% and now I'm trying to cut it back down. 01:05:23.970 --> 01:05:29.820 align:middle line:84% And fairly recently, I decided to divide into short sections. 01:05:29.820 --> 01:05:32.700 align:middle line:84% So I just want to hear what it sounds like. 01:05:32.700 --> 01:05:34.980 align:middle line:84% I don't know if this is the form it's going to take. 01:05:34.980 --> 01:05:37.930 align:middle line:84% And I want to keep a kind of fragmentary feeling to it, 01:05:37.930 --> 01:05:40.410 align:middle line:84% but I might be too fragmentary still. 01:05:40.410 --> 01:05:42.540 align:middle line:90% Moving. 01:05:42.540 --> 01:05:47.250 align:middle line:84% "Every night, these walls seem to twitch once and settle 01:05:47.250 --> 01:05:50.220 align:middle line:90% as the body gives in to sleep. 01:05:50.220 --> 01:05:53.910 align:middle line:90% A painting leans from its nail. 01:05:53.910 --> 01:05:56.910 align:middle line:84% And every morning, you rub the strange stiffness 01:05:56.910 --> 01:06:01.050 align:middle line:84% from your eyes, the corners of your mouth. 01:06:01.050 --> 01:06:05.730 align:middle line:84% Soon, the first cracks will surface like bits of rope 01:06:05.730 --> 01:06:09.225 align:middle line:84% where a child's boat rests underwater, letting go." 01:06:09.225 --> 01:06:12.565 align:middle line:90% 01:06:12.565 --> 01:06:13.065 align:middle line:90% Two. 01:06:13.065 --> 01:06:15.750 align:middle line:90% 01:06:15.750 --> 01:06:19.500 align:middle line:84% "Every morning, you wake out of breath. 01:06:19.500 --> 01:06:22.200 align:middle line:84% Soon, you will leave with water to last, 01:06:22.200 --> 01:06:24.990 align:middle line:84% another walk through a town grown blank 01:06:24.990 --> 01:06:29.760 align:middle line:84% with doors and sunlight slammed into glass. 01:06:29.760 --> 01:06:31.890 align:middle line:90% Keep breathing. 01:06:31.890 --> 01:06:35.415 align:middle line:84% Think of the eye as sealed, a bay fed by spring." 01:06:35.415 --> 01:06:40.410 align:middle line:90% 01:06:40.410 --> 01:06:42.030 align:middle line:90% Three. 01:06:42.030 --> 01:06:46.410 align:middle line:84% "Every summer, people you love go back and get older 01:06:46.410 --> 01:06:49.710 align:middle line:90% with or without you. 01:06:49.710 --> 01:06:53.970 align:middle line:84% At night, the surface, all glass over moon and [AUDIO OUT] 01:06:53.970 --> 01:06:57.750 align:middle line:90% is as warm as your hand. 01:06:57.750 --> 01:07:00.690 align:middle line:90% All winter, no one is around. 01:07:00.690 --> 01:07:04.710 align:middle line:84% The reeds wave and wave under water, its steady wind." 01:07:04.710 --> 01:07:08.690 align:middle line:90% 01:07:08.690 --> 01:07:10.858 align:middle line:90% Four. 01:07:10.858 --> 01:07:15.090 align:middle line:84% "These windows, this seared roof, 01:07:15.090 --> 01:07:18.630 align:middle line:84% these yards that shrink every year in their sparse, 01:07:18.630 --> 01:07:21.090 align:middle line:90% discolored greens. 01:07:21.090 --> 01:07:25.200 align:middle line:84% Soon, you will wonder if you lived here at all. 01:07:25.200 --> 01:07:28.410 align:middle line:84% Every morning, you wake out of breath. 01:07:28.410 --> 01:07:32.850 align:middle line:84% For a while, let your voice go wrong against the ribs, 01:07:32.850 --> 01:07:35.100 align:middle line:90% a slow route hugging the dark." 01:07:35.100 --> 01:07:40.700 align:middle line:90% 01:07:40.700 --> 01:07:46.940 align:middle line:84% I'm going to finish up with one poem out of Natural Histories 01:07:46.940 --> 01:07:47.890 align:middle line:90% that I just like. 01:07:47.890 --> 01:07:52.220 align:middle line:90% 01:07:52.220 --> 01:07:55.550 align:middle line:84% This poem started out with an image, just a single image 01:07:55.550 --> 01:07:59.870 align:middle line:84% that I ended growing a poem around. 01:07:59.870 --> 01:08:03.710 align:middle line:84% And the image came from standing around, waiting 01:08:03.710 --> 01:08:06.500 align:middle line:84% to register my car in the state of Missouri, one January day. 01:08:06.500 --> 01:08:08.480 align:middle line:84% It was altogether a depressing experience 01:08:08.480 --> 01:08:10.060 align:middle line:90% and a depressing day. 01:08:10.060 --> 01:08:12.110 align:middle line:84% And there was a long line and the building 01:08:12.110 --> 01:08:14.982 align:middle line:84% that we were in was lit by fluorescent lights. 01:08:14.982 --> 01:08:17.149 align:middle line:84% And people's boots were dribbling all over the place 01:08:17.149 --> 01:08:18.859 align:middle line:90% and it was just icky. 01:08:18.859 --> 01:08:22.460 align:middle line:84% And the woman waiting on everyone was-- 01:08:22.460 --> 01:08:23.960 align:middle line:84% it was real busy and she was dressed 01:08:23.960 --> 01:08:25.370 align:middle line:90% for action in a pantsuit. 01:08:25.370 --> 01:08:28.819 align:middle line:84% And she had short, brown hair and was medium-- 01:08:28.819 --> 01:08:30.165 align:middle line:90% some kind of indeterminate age. 01:08:30.165 --> 01:08:31.790 align:middle line:84% And she must have been wearing oxfords. 01:08:31.790 --> 01:08:33.289 align:middle line:84% I didn't see her feet, but the whole image 01:08:33.289 --> 01:08:35.210 align:middle line:84% was that she probably was wearing oxfords. 01:08:35.210 --> 01:08:37.670 align:middle line:84% And there's nothing attractive in the room 01:08:37.670 --> 01:08:40.340 align:middle line:84% it was all set up for business and very routine business. 01:08:40.340 --> 01:08:41.600 align:middle line:90% And it was depressing. 01:08:41.600 --> 01:08:43.550 align:middle line:84% But she was wearing a pair of-- it 01:08:43.550 --> 01:08:45.423 align:middle line:84% really look like antique cameo earrings. 01:08:45.423 --> 01:08:47.090 align:middle line:84% I wasn't standing all that close to her. 01:08:47.090 --> 01:08:49.910 align:middle line:84% But the earrings were the one decorative thing in the room 01:08:49.910 --> 01:08:52.160 align:middle line:90% and they just struck me. 01:08:52.160 --> 01:08:54.960 align:middle line:84% And somehow, this poem came out of that image. 01:08:54.960 --> 01:08:59.359 align:middle line:84% And it's called Why There Are Children. 01:08:59.359 --> 01:09:03.420 align:middle line:84% "From inside, every woman lights the candles. 01:09:03.420 --> 01:09:09.290 align:middle line:84% This is the woman sons look for when they leave their wives. 01:09:09.290 --> 01:09:11.810 align:middle line:84% Daughters become wives thinking they 01:09:11.810 --> 01:09:16.609 align:middle line:84% travel backwards to the dresser covered with lace. 01:09:16.609 --> 01:09:22.490 align:middle line:84% The hairpins still scattered there and the cameo earrings. 01:09:22.490 --> 01:09:27.260 align:middle line:84% The same gnarled tree darkens the bedroom window. 01:09:27.260 --> 01:09:30.470 align:middle line:84% The hair coiled in a locket conceals 01:09:30.470 --> 01:09:34.550 align:middle line:90% the hands of men and children. 01:09:34.550 --> 01:09:38.810 align:middle line:84% When a woman shivers on the porch, perhaps, at dusk, 01:09:38.810 --> 01:09:42.439 align:middle line:90% it is the other wanting a shawl. 01:09:42.439 --> 01:09:48.109 align:middle line:84% When a woman in her middle years rises and dresses for work, 01:09:48.109 --> 01:09:51.350 align:middle line:84% the other reaches for the cameos, 01:09:51.350 --> 01:09:57.237 align:middle line:84% remembering a great love and herself on the brink of it." 01:09:57.237 --> 01:09:58.070 align:middle line:90% Thank you very much. 01:09:58.070 --> 01:10:00.520 align:middle line:90% [APPLAUSE] 01:10:00.520 --> 01:10:06.000 align:middle line:90%