WEBVTT

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First, get rid of the jacket.

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Well-- thank you.

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It's wonderful to
be back in Tucson.

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I lived here for a little
over a year researching

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this new book I'm working on my
great aunt, The Saint of Cabora.

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Some of you may have heard me
read about her here and there

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or talk about her.

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And I can tell you some Teresita
gossip later to fill you in.

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I thought I would
give you a little bit

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of a mixed bag of stuff, a
little poetry and a little bit

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maybe from Wandering Time.

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And I wanted to end with a
chapter from one of my Tijuana

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books that I haven't
read much in this area.

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It's hard for me to
read it, but I think--

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I save it for special
events and this

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seems like a really
special event for me.

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So I will share it with you.

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I just wanted to
share one thing.

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People talking the
last couple of days--

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I've been on tour, so I'm a
little bit rocky at this point

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because I've been
doing city after city.

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And it's been a really strange
experience because last time I

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came through,
nobody cared at all.

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And this time I've
come through and there

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are all kinds of people.

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And I'm not sure what happened.

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We were laughing in Oakland--

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the last time I passed
through this one bookstore,

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there were two people
in the audience

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and one guy slept
through my whole reading.

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And this time, it was full.

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So you know.

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But anyway, a lot of people have
been asking me about my writing

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and it's strange to have
people care suddenly.

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People want to know.

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And I've been trying to
formulate a response.

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And somehow, some of the best
responses I can come up with

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are what other writers have said
that I try to take as a credo.

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I was more than delighted
to be upstairs hiding

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in Jon Anderson's office, if
you know him, one of my heroes,

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whom I have never
met by the way.

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But when I was
teaching at Harvard,

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I found a booklet of
his for a quarter,

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Helpful Hints on Writing
Poetry, if you know that book.

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And he has one
writing rule which is,

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"remember the world of
ghosts and small gestures."

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And I think that's such
a beautiful sentence.

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And it sums up everything I
would like to capture in my work

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because I think that the small
moments and the passing memories

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are what is really richest.

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And just one other little thing
before I get into my reading,

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a little quote from Erica
Funkhouser which I think

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is so beautiful that it's become
one of my new writing works.

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I'm starting to get this kind
of Bible of writing rules.

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But it's a little phrase
from one of her poems

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that says, to pay attention
as lovers pay their debts, not

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in currency but in kindness.

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And that seems to me the
ultimate writing rule right now.

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And the last one I want to
share with you is something

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Etheridge Knight said
which sticks in my heart

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and actually
informed my attempts

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to wrestle with the border
issues in my border books.

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He said, you have to be telling
people essentially I love you

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or have no basis for your art.

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So just so you
know, that's where

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I'm coming from-- or trying to.

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I'm not always successful at it.

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I thought I would
read you some poetry

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and I'm not sure
which poems to read.

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How about you guys--
what poem should I read?

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Let's have some
community feedback here.

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Well, I'll just--

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[INTERPOSING VOICES]

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Really?

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It will baffle the
audience right off the bat.

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You want me to read
my most strange poem.

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"A Boy's Life."

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"Boy's Life?"

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You guys are picking all the
ones that put me on the spot.

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To heck with you!

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[LAUGHTER]

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I'll work my way up to it.

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This is a poem called "I Tried
to Write a Poem About This Once

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a Year for 13 Years," which
turns out to be a more humorous

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title than I had intended,
I meant it seriously,

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I kept trying to write a
poem about this experience.

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You mentioned the
absurdities of manhood--

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one of the rules in my
family was to be macho,

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so my dad took me a lot
of places to be macho

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and we experienced a lot of very
strange and unpleasant things,

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which apparently
is what macho is.

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[LAUGHTER]

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And by the way--

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I think I've said this
before, but I just

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have to tell the audience--
the thing about the border,

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in my heart I've used
this as a catch phrase

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that there's a barbed
wire fence dissecting

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my heart because my parents,
being American and Mexican,

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my mother was all-American,
my dad was all-Mexican

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and they raised me
both ways at once.

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I had to be American
and Mexican.

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But apparently,
the Mexican people

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didn't quite understand
the metaphor.

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Because when I got to Mexico
City and was interviewed,

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what they published in the
newspaper in Mexico City was,

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if you cut open Luis
Urrea's chest with a knife,

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you'll find a border patrol
truck idling in his ribs.

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[LAUGHTER]

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Which is one of
the greatest things

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I've ever had written about me,
but I don't know what it means.

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So anyway.

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This is a poem about one
of those macho experiences,

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which was a marathon drive I
went on with my dad in Mexico.

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"I tried to enter the
car, my father driving.

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Interior dim in late desert
night lit by the dash

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by the pumping radio.

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Rancheras beat across
Chihuahua's haunted heat.

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How my little cousin, Melba,
smelled of hair and flesh.

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How my aunt drowsed
and my uncle and father

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murmured in the front seat.

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Manly mysteries I
stayed awake for.

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Cojones, cigarettes,
bulls, and menudo.

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How late it was.

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How my father drove for 20 hours
to show the dark of the dunes

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before us vague and moonlight,
how blue-red lightning flashed

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in the distance.

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So subtle at first you couldn't
tell if they were there

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or your eyes were throwing
nerve sparks from no sleep.

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It took a minute to see the
bolts were on the ground, how

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I said, look out, papa.

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How he slowed down and
how I felt so powerful

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at that instant,
the words I spoke

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could pull the eternal
machine of my father

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back from his speed.

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How slow we came around
the bend and what we saw.

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I always tried to show the
glass, the liquids spread, that,

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through back light,
oil, glass, and blood.

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Men ran the far
side of the road.

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Frantic flashlights
probed among desert trees.

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Mesquite, palo verde, ocotillo.

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What is this, my father said.

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And my uncle, muy
mexicano, ordered my aunt

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to hide Melba's head under
her arm and turn away.

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And the solid wall of
metal and meat before us,

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the split-level passenger bus
welded head-on to the semi,

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12-wheeled 18-wheel drive,
dead still sticking,

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the shoes of the bus driver
hanging from the upraised tomb

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of the dashboard.

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The colorful, fleshy
garlands looping

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from the windows like the
party was about to begin.

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The engine of the bus
knocked out the back,

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lying silent behind smoke.

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Odd mounds scattered indistinct
and the flash, flash, flashing.

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And the smaller details
that never wanted to fit.

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The one cop swinging
a lantern alone,

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how he begged us to
get out of there.

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How he said, they
passed on the curve.

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And, 70, 80 miles an hour.

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And, they're searching
the trees for a baby

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that went out the window.

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And how we drove on
through the night,

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there was nothing between
us but the radio, the tally

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as it was counted.

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Bland voices bouncing
across black lands,

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100 miles from any city.

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One ambulance at each
end of the highway.

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And how we'd hear it
coming four miles away,

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watch it hurtle, recede, return.

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And I could never quite
capture the schoolgirls.

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On a trip into
Mexico coming home,

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15, 20 schoolgirls all my age.

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And you could see them in
their uniforms, holding hands.

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They stood in rough circle out
among the cactus, gray as ash

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in the half light.

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They were singing a hymn.

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The National Anthem,
the school song.

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I don't know.

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All these voices tiny
as ghosts bounced off

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the metal singing and singing.

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Every voice as we left
stolen by the wind."

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That was one of those
pleasant He-Man experiences.

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[APPLAUSE]

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No, no, no, no.

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Thank you kindly.

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Thank you.

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