I had the pleasure of working with Yevgeny Yevtushenko
in California years ago.
And one of the things that's always
fascinated me about poetry in just about every place--
but in settler countries, countries such as ours,
and Australia, and New Zealand, Canada,
places like that that are new, they
don't have those old, old traditions out
of which poetry bubbles.
So when you used to read about people like Voznesensky
or Yevtushenko getting up in Red Square
and there are 250,000 people there
to hear them read, what you have to keep in mind
is that they were fortunate to have
a tradition that was so old.
As modernists, they just built on what was already there.
It's like our musicians.
No matter how contemporary they are,
if they're American musicians, they're building on the blues
if they're playing American music.
It doesn't matter what they're playing, whether it's
Reba, or Willie Nelson, or George Gershwin, or John
Coltrane, or Kenny G., even.
You're building on something that
was started quite a while ago.
So that in our country, because everything is fragmented
the way that it isn't new, you have
to go to references that everybody knows in common that
are usually in pop culture, either commercials, or pop
music, or something like that.
So I'm always looking for ways to relate to people
with familiar references.
So with that in mind, here's a poem called
Big Bopper For Beginners.
Crazy.
It took post-grad on top of post-grad course,
but finally, he began to understand what we talk
about when we talk about love.
Talk about, tell about, cry about, sing about love.
Oh, baby, that's what I like.
The freshman knew only how to outwit
the lonely part of himself weaned on cinematic champagne
and flowering hearts on grand, green sleeves.
Chantilly lace and a pretty face.
He dwelled in outer space.
Unconscious is far too kind a word.
The fool was dumb.
Today, you'd put it another way.
Now they'd say, the dumbing down of love
would have rolled right off of him like a long-legged goose,
like a duck, like a rubber off his dick.
[LAUGHTER]
He saw beauty, histories of mystery,
eyes that flirt, the heart that hurts, hot hair,
a ponytail dangling down.
His angle, moreover, was to clown
in the back row during lecture, relishing impressions
he longed to lay down hard on this one big-eyed girl he would
build his world around for ages to come.
Dumb?
The boy was tetched.
Too lazy for sections, he sketched and dreamed.
He would ease through blue books and quizzes
by the skin of his curve.
He lasted this way for years, on nerve and juice.
But when it came time to hang and act loose,
to make a run for the border, to take the new order,
I want the house, I want my health care back,
and I'm the one who really needs the Nordic track.
He realized what he had.
His degree was undergrad.
It took post-grad course on top of post-grad course,
but finally, spinally, he began to get it,
to understand what we talk about when we talk about,
hawk about, take tests, invest in, and get psyched about what
we still like about love.
[APPLAUSE]
Thank you.
[APPLAUSE]