I'm going to read you some new poems.
All of you know, except if there's a freshman here.
But here's for him--
him.
It wouldn't be a her.
For him, I would remind you that Icarus
was the son who with his father were fleeing from the island
because the barbarians had conquered it.
And they were going to be killed.
And the father, who was a magician,
made them wings of wax and feathers, and they flew away.
Except Icarus was young and was enjoying himself.
And most critics say, he was vain.
So he flew higher and higher, got close to the sun.
The sun melted of--
the wax, the wet feathers flew off,
and he fell into the ground.
And ever since, it's been tilled-- it's been the--
example, warning you against being extravagant,
teaching you security.
It's called "Failing and Flying."
"Everyone forgets that Icarus also
flew, like when love comes to an end or the marriage fails
and people say, they knew it was a mistake, that everybody
said it would never work, that she was
old enough not to know that.
She was old enough to know better.
But anything really worth doing is worth doing badly.
Being there with Linda, by the summer ocean,
on our deserted side of the island,
where love was fading out of her,
the stars burning so extravagantly those nights
that anyone could tell you they would never last.
Every morning, she was like a visitation, asleep in my bed.
The gentleness in her, like deer standing in the dawn mist.
I watched her every afternoon coming back
through the hot stony field after swimming,
the sea light behind her and the giant sky
on the other side of that.
I listened to her while we ate lunch.
How can they say that that marriage failed?
It's like the people who came back from Provence when
it was still the true Provence it had been, and said,
it was pretty, but the food was greasy.
I believe Icarus was not failing as he fell, but just coming
to the end of his triumph."