WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:03.250 align:middle line:90% 00:00:03.250 --> 00:00:04.360 align:middle line:90% OK. 00:00:04.360 --> 00:00:08.260 align:middle line:90% So this next poem I'm going to-- 00:00:08.260 --> 00:00:12.430 align:middle line:84% it has a dedication, but I'm dedicating it to Ander Monson 00:00:12.430 --> 00:00:13.930 align:middle line:90% actually. 00:00:13.930 --> 00:00:15.850 align:middle line:84% This poem resulted as a challenge. 00:00:15.850 --> 00:00:18.050 align:middle line:84% And I will apologize ahead of time, 00:00:18.050 --> 00:00:21.130 align:middle line:90% this poem is in terrible taste. 00:00:21.130 --> 00:00:24.880 align:middle line:84% And I just have to fully acknowledge that it arose out 00:00:24.880 --> 00:00:26.800 align:middle line:90% of a challenge. 00:00:26.800 --> 00:00:30.550 align:middle line:84% I was having a conversation with two wonderful writers, Stacey 00:00:30.550 --> 00:00:32.840 align:middle line:84% D'Erasmo and the poet Donika Kelly. 00:00:32.840 --> 00:00:37.600 align:middle line:84% And Stacey was recalling an experience she had 00:00:37.600 --> 00:00:42.220 align:middle line:84% of coming across a pornographic novel, which 00:00:42.220 --> 00:00:47.230 align:middle line:84% was called Morning Glory Farm, a Sweet and Steamy Monster Romance 00:00:47.230 --> 00:00:47.820 align:middle line:90% book. 00:00:47.820 --> 00:00:50.770 align:middle line:84% Now, we were having a conversation 00:00:50.770 --> 00:00:52.930 align:middle line:84% as writers about how the kinds of books 00:00:52.930 --> 00:00:56.990 align:middle line:84% that sell thousands, thousands and thousands of copies. 00:00:56.990 --> 00:00:59.890 align:middle line:84% And this is one of them, this book, Morning Glory Farm, 00:00:59.890 --> 00:01:02.740 align:middle line:84% a Sweet and Steamy Romance, a monster romance book 00:01:02.740 --> 00:01:03.740 align:middle line:90% is one of those. 00:01:03.740 --> 00:01:06.800 align:middle line:84% Though she erroneously identified the title, 00:01:06.800 --> 00:01:09.550 align:middle line:84% she thought the title was Milking the Minotaur, which 00:01:09.550 --> 00:01:12.190 align:middle line:90% is actually the plot. 00:01:12.190 --> 00:01:16.990 align:middle line:84% And it is a story of a young woman 00:01:16.990 --> 00:01:20.090 align:middle line:90% who answers an ad for a job. 00:01:20.090 --> 00:01:26.860 align:middle line:84% And she gets this job at a farm, where the livestock of the farm 00:01:26.860 --> 00:01:28.540 align:middle line:90% are minotaurs. 00:01:28.540 --> 00:01:32.360 align:middle line:84% And it is her job to milk the minotaurs. 00:01:32.360 --> 00:01:36.040 align:middle line:84% But the minotaurs are male, so she is extracting semen 00:01:36.040 --> 00:01:38.200 align:middle line:90% from the minotaurs. 00:01:38.200 --> 00:01:40.850 align:middle line:90% It is a romance novel. 00:01:40.850 --> 00:01:46.910 align:middle line:84% It has sold hundreds of thousands of copies. 00:01:46.910 --> 00:01:49.770 align:middle line:84% But I thought this title, Milking the Minotaur, 00:01:49.770 --> 00:01:52.950 align:middle line:84% was one of the most hilarious things that I had ever heard. 00:01:52.950 --> 00:01:57.470 align:middle line:84% And so Donika said, I think you should write a poem called 00:01:57.470 --> 00:01:58.365 align:middle line:90% Milking the Minotaur. 00:01:58.365 --> 00:02:00.740 align:middle line:84% And I said to her, I think you should write a poem called 00:02:00.740 --> 00:02:01.680 align:middle line:90% Milking the Minotaur. 00:02:01.680 --> 00:02:05.580 align:middle line:84% And so we signed a pact that we were both going to do it. 00:02:05.580 --> 00:02:06.420 align:middle line:90% And indeed, we did. 00:02:06.420 --> 00:02:09.440 align:middle line:90% So this is the poem. 00:02:09.440 --> 00:02:12.360 align:middle line:84% It is, as I said, it's in very poor taste. 00:02:12.360 --> 00:02:18.780 align:middle line:84% And it is called "Milking the Minotaur." 00:02:18.780 --> 00:02:22.650 align:middle line:90% A gloss here, Bear Week. 00:02:22.650 --> 00:02:24.930 align:middle line:84% Does anybody know what Bear Week is? 00:02:24.930 --> 00:02:25.850 align:middle line:90% Maybe not. 00:02:25.850 --> 00:02:28.870 align:middle line:84% Bear Week takes place in Provincetown, Massachusetts, 00:02:28.870 --> 00:02:33.630 align:middle line:84% a gay resort where large-bodied and hairy men and those 00:02:33.630 --> 00:02:35.970 align:middle line:84% who like them gather all together 00:02:35.970 --> 00:02:38.200 align:middle line:90% to appreciate each other. 00:02:38.200 --> 00:02:41.640 align:middle line:90% And it's called Bear Week. 00:02:41.640 --> 00:02:47.100 align:middle line:84% And Sniffies is a hookup app, a GPS hookup app. 00:02:47.100 --> 00:02:51.230 align:middle line:90% I refer to that too, so just. 00:02:51.230 --> 00:02:52.770 align:middle line:90% "Milking the Minotaur." 00:02:52.770 --> 00:02:54.110 align:middle line:90% Apologies in advance. 00:02:54.110 --> 00:02:58.280 align:middle line:84% "Minotaurs aren't real, so they cannot feel it when you milk 00:02:58.280 --> 00:03:01.950 align:middle line:84% them, squeezing the hairy teat of myth. 00:03:01.950 --> 00:03:06.930 align:middle line:84% And wasn't the Minotaur male in this imaginary mammary fantasy? 00:03:06.930 --> 00:03:10.160 align:middle line:84% So maybe milking is extraction in the mode 00:03:10.160 --> 00:03:14.900 align:middle line:84% of man-on-man pornography, in which a veiny male member is 00:03:14.900 --> 00:03:17.180 align:middle line:90% milked into climax? 00:03:17.180 --> 00:03:19.520 align:middle line:90% Do I embarrass you? 00:03:19.520 --> 00:03:21.630 align:middle line:90% But you're already here. 00:03:21.630 --> 00:03:26.910 align:middle line:84% And poetry is so embarrassing, sometimes in the extreme. 00:03:26.910 --> 00:03:30.110 align:middle line:84% Speaking of which, I'm writing this whilst 00:03:30.110 --> 00:03:35.330 align:middle line:84% naked on Herring Cove Beach, the story of this bovine fancy 00:03:35.330 --> 00:03:38.820 align:middle line:84% reaching all the way down this windy strand. 00:03:38.820 --> 00:03:42.270 align:middle line:84% The gods, or so we're told, are dead. 00:03:42.270 --> 00:03:46.290 align:middle line:84% They are also amoral, neither good nor bad, 00:03:46.290 --> 00:03:49.770 align:middle line:90% just moods, plots, urge. 00:03:49.770 --> 00:03:54.360 align:middle line:84% I watch the tide surge against the sandy shore and wonder if I 00:03:54.360 --> 00:03:58.320 align:middle line:84% am perhaps a bit of a milky minotaur myself, 00:03:58.320 --> 00:04:02.850 align:middle line:84% expressing my imaginary milk with the other monsters gazing 00:04:02.850 --> 00:04:08.910 align:middle line:84% on, like at some 60-man Bear Weak Sniffies circle jerk. 00:04:08.910 --> 00:04:11.860 align:middle line:84% I've always known I was a kind of monster, 00:04:11.860 --> 00:04:16.290 align:middle line:84% one whose body is a little ugly and out of control, whose 00:04:16.290 --> 00:04:19.350 align:middle line:84% wants are camped well outside convention 00:04:19.350 --> 00:04:24.720 align:middle line:84% like some forgotten moldy blue tarp Adirondack tent. 00:04:24.720 --> 00:04:29.340 align:middle line:84% What are we meant to do with unauthorized desires, if we 00:04:29.340 --> 00:04:34.020 align:middle line:84% are not, say, some rich, horse-crazy girl, braiding 00:04:34.020 --> 00:04:37.380 align:middle line:84% and unbraiding her chestnut gelding's mane, 00:04:37.380 --> 00:04:40.840 align:middle line:84% before straddling him and taking up the crop, 00:04:40.840 --> 00:04:43.380 align:middle line:84% whipping him into a frothed-up gallop 00:04:43.380 --> 00:04:46.560 align:middle line:84% across daddy's well-groomed terrain? 00:04:46.560 --> 00:04:50.670 align:middle line:84% I can't feign ignorance, affect indifference, 00:04:50.670 --> 00:04:55.780 align:middle line:84% as I don my jockstrap, cock ring, kaftan, and pearls. 00:04:55.780 --> 00:05:00.970 align:middle line:84% Minotaurs, Medusa, old Sycorax imprisoned in a tree, 00:05:00.970 --> 00:05:05.580 align:middle line:84% all the monsters end up pursued by some dumb hero, 00:05:05.580 --> 00:05:09.210 align:middle line:90% clubbed, beheaded, dead. 00:05:09.210 --> 00:05:12.060 align:middle line:84% The myth is there to warn us monsters 00:05:12.060 --> 00:05:17.700 align:middle line:84% of what can be done to us, or in us, or on us, to tell us 00:05:17.700 --> 00:05:22.120 align:middle line:84% we are obscene, with our horns, and hairy tales, 00:05:22.120 --> 00:05:24.810 align:middle line:90% our scalp of writhing snakes. 00:05:24.810 --> 00:05:27.780 align:middle line:84% Everyone's a fake, except us monsters 00:05:27.780 --> 00:05:32.370 align:middle line:84% who are real or just really bad at hiding from main characters 00:05:32.370 --> 00:05:35.970 align:middle line:84% as they blunder confident through their own lives 00:05:35.970 --> 00:05:40.620 align:middle line:84% and through ours, their swords raised in bloody triumph 00:05:40.620 --> 00:05:44.120 align:middle line:84% as they shame themselves with power. 00:05:44.120 --> 00:05:47.000 align:middle line:90%