WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:01.010 align:middle line:90% 00:00:01.010 --> 00:00:08.470 align:middle line:84% I'm going to read poems recent and poems new. 00:00:08.470 --> 00:00:15.400 align:middle line:84% So I will begin by reading a couple of poems 00:00:15.400 --> 00:00:17.210 align:middle line:90% from my most recent book. 00:00:17.210 --> 00:00:22.940 align:middle line:90% This was a pandemic book. 00:00:22.940 --> 00:00:26.770 align:middle line:84% It came out in the height of the pandemic. 00:00:26.770 --> 00:00:32.530 align:middle line:84% And its publication date, January 6. 00:00:32.530 --> 00:00:35.816 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:00:35.816 --> 00:00:38.740 align:middle line:90% 00:00:38.740 --> 00:00:40.690 align:middle line:84% Yeah, there was something else happening 00:00:40.690 --> 00:00:45.160 align:middle line:84% that day that drew people's attention away 00:00:45.160 --> 00:00:47.723 align:middle line:84% from my important volume of poetry. 00:00:47.723 --> 00:00:50.320 align:middle line:90% 00:00:50.320 --> 00:00:54.970 align:middle line:84% So anyway, so let's just say that every time I 00:00:54.970 --> 00:00:57.290 align:middle line:84% get to read from this book, it feels like a birthday. 00:00:57.290 --> 00:00:59.290 align:middle line:90% So there you go. 00:00:59.290 --> 00:01:04.220 align:middle line:84% I'm going to start by reading the first poem in the book. 00:01:04.220 --> 00:01:09.460 align:middle line:84% And the title of this poem is my last name. 00:01:09.460 --> 00:01:12.500 align:middle line:84% My last name, Wunderlich, in German, 00:01:12.500 --> 00:01:14.450 align:middle line:90% it's pronounced "von-der-lesh." 00:01:14.450 --> 00:01:17.360 align:middle line:84% You will hear it both ways in this poem. 00:01:17.360 --> 00:01:22.170 align:middle line:84% And I'm often asked, does your name-- what does your name mean? 00:01:22.170 --> 00:01:25.120 align:middle line:90% Does your name mean wonderful? 00:01:25.120 --> 00:01:29.150 align:middle line:84% And no, indeed, that's not what that word means. 00:01:29.150 --> 00:01:29.920 align:middle line:90% It's not. 00:01:29.920 --> 00:01:33.490 align:middle line:84% So this is a poem about the meaning of my name. 00:01:33.490 --> 00:01:35.200 align:middle line:90% "Wunderlich." 00:01:35.200 --> 00:01:38.000 align:middle line:90% 'The name means 'odd.' 00:01:38.000 --> 00:01:40.820 align:middle line:90% The name means 'queer.' 00:01:40.820 --> 00:01:44.310 align:middle line:90% It can denote an 'odd fish.' 00:01:44.310 --> 00:01:47.620 align:middle line:90% It suggests a 'queer chap.' 00:01:47.620 --> 00:01:50.150 align:middle line:90% Sometimes it means 'capricious.' 00:01:50.150 --> 00:01:52.370 align:middle line:90% It can also mean 'peevish.' 00:01:52.370 --> 00:01:54.400 align:middle line:90% It's a synonym for 'singular.' 00:01:54.400 --> 00:01:56.800 align:middle line:90% It is thought to be poetic. 00:01:56.800 --> 00:02:02.150 align:middle line:84% The Pied Piper of Hamlin was called 'ein wunderlicher Kauz,' 00:02:02.150 --> 00:02:06.380 align:middle line:84% With his colorful clothing, come to pipe the rats away. 00:02:06.380 --> 00:02:10.970 align:middle line:84% He drowned them in the Weser, or so the stories go. 00:02:10.970 --> 00:02:13.280 align:middle line:90% When the mayor withheld payment 00:02:13.280 --> 00:02:17.650 align:middle line:84% He took the children and drowned them with the rats, 00:02:17.650 --> 00:02:20.320 align:middle line:84% Or perhaps they went into the mountains, 00:02:20.320 --> 00:02:24.060 align:middle line:90% Or they moved to Transylvania. 00:02:24.060 --> 00:02:28.230 align:middle line:84% 'It is 100 years since our children left,' says 00:02:28.230 --> 00:02:30.885 align:middle line:84% the crumbling book found in the church-- 00:02:30.885 --> 00:02:36.540 align:middle line:90% 00:02:36.540 --> 00:02:41.140 align:middle line:84% That is what it means to be a Wunderlich. 00:02:41.140 --> 00:02:44.630 align:middle line:84% The name means 'strange things happened to him.' 00:02:44.630 --> 00:02:47.450 align:middle line:84% It means 'he can be disputatious.' 00:02:47.450 --> 00:02:51.370 align:middle line:84% It means he sometimes wears peculiar garments to a party, 00:02:51.370 --> 00:02:56.150 align:middle line:84% That as he aged he seemed younger, less reliable, 00:02:56.150 --> 00:02:59.540 align:middle line:84% More in touch with what he would call 'his soul.' 00:02:59.540 --> 00:03:02.320 align:middle line:84% You might not call it that yourself. 00:03:02.320 --> 00:03:04.600 align:middle line:90% It can mean 'quarrelsome.' 00:03:04.600 --> 00:03:07.310 align:middle line:90% It can mean 'he prefers cats.' 00:03:07.310 --> 00:03:09.880 align:middle line:84% It can mean he has a gnome tattooed 00:03:09.880 --> 00:03:12.170 align:middle line:84% Near the hair underneath his arm. 00:03:12.170 --> 00:03:15.380 align:middle line:84% It means 'he loves Christmas like a simpleton.' 00:03:15.380 --> 00:03:18.250 align:middle line:84% It means 'make sushi out of SPAM.' 00:03:18.250 --> 00:03:22.460 align:middle line:84% The name means 'curious,' as in 'he bought a haunted house,' 00:03:22.460 --> 00:03:26.410 align:middle line:84% And since weaning, he's not touched a woman's breast. 00:03:26.410 --> 00:03:29.570 align:middle line:84% It means 'he loves the color orange.' 00:03:29.570 --> 00:03:32.180 align:middle line:90% It means 'he studied Dutch.' 00:03:32.180 --> 00:03:35.750 align:middle line:84% It means pancakes for supper once again this week, 00:03:35.750 --> 00:03:38.860 align:middle line:84% And that he prefers to knit his own socks. 00:03:38.860 --> 00:03:42.450 align:middle line:84% The name means 'electric organ maestro.' 00:03:42.450 --> 00:03:45.930 align:middle line:84% The name means 'famous botanical illustrator.' 00:03:45.930 --> 00:03:49.040 align:middle line:84% It means the drunken tenor ass-over-teakettle 00:03:49.040 --> 00:03:51.770 align:middle line:90% down a set of Viennese stairs. 00:03:51.770 --> 00:03:55.640 align:middle line:84% It is true there are few of us, that we spread ourselves 00:03:55.640 --> 00:03:57.780 align:middle line:90% thin around the globe; 00:03:57.780 --> 00:04:03.290 align:middle line:84% Find us making wine in Hungary, herding cattle in Namibia, 00:04:03.290 --> 00:04:07.700 align:middle line:84% Captaining a ship somewhere off the Chilean coast. 00:04:07.700 --> 00:04:12.050 align:middle line:84% My Wunderlichs steamed up the long brown Mississippi 00:04:12.050 --> 00:04:15.950 align:middle line:84% In a boat that put them and their peculiarities off 00:04:15.950 --> 00:04:17.040 align:middle line:90% in Wisconsin, 00:04:17.040 --> 00:04:19.490 align:middle line:84% Where the name means a shady farm 00:04:19.490 --> 00:04:22.079 align:middle line:84% Growing a crop of moss on a roof, 00:04:22.079 --> 00:04:25.020 align:middle line:84% An old man with a pistol in his pants, 00:04:25.020 --> 00:04:28.250 align:middle line:84% A child who didn't survive and occupies 00:04:28.250 --> 00:04:32.090 align:middle line:84% A pagan's ashy grave atop a limestone bluff 00:04:32.090 --> 00:04:36.470 align:middle line:84% Where the wind speaks his strange name or worse-- 00:04:36.470 --> 00:04:40.705 align:middle line:84% voices, recognition, an attribution, or a curse." 00:04:40.705 --> 00:04:43.485 align:middle line:90% 00:04:43.485 --> 00:04:46.311 align:middle line:90% [APPLAUSE] 00:04:46.311 --> 00:04:48.600 align:middle line:90% 00:04:48.600 --> 00:04:51.800 align:middle line:84% I love applause, but I will just ask that maybe you hold it 00:04:51.800 --> 00:04:54.230 align:middle line:90% to the end, and we'll-- 00:04:54.230 --> 00:04:55.700 align:middle line:90% but do what you want to do. 00:04:55.700 --> 00:04:56.340 align:middle line:90% It's fine. 00:04:56.340 --> 00:04:58.330 align:middle line:90% Do what you want to do.