WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:02.760 align:middle line:90% [APPLAUSE] 00:00:02.760 --> 00:00:03.460 align:middle line:90% 00:00:03.460 --> 00:00:03.960 align:middle line:90% Damn. 00:00:03.960 --> 00:00:06.600 align:middle line:90% 00:00:06.600 --> 00:00:07.270 align:middle line:90% That was great. 00:00:07.270 --> 00:00:10.760 align:middle line:90% 00:00:10.760 --> 00:00:12.840 align:middle line:90% So it's good to see all of you. 00:00:12.840 --> 00:00:19.360 align:middle line:84% My job is to make some jokes between the serious poems. 00:00:19.360 --> 00:00:20.900 align:middle line:90% I'm Ander Monson. 00:00:20.900 --> 00:00:22.540 align:middle line:90% I wear a lot of hats. 00:00:22.540 --> 00:00:24.560 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:00:24.560 --> 00:00:25.608 align:middle line:90% So I'm trying a thing. 00:00:25.608 --> 00:00:26.900 align:middle line:90% I've not practiced this at all. 00:00:26.900 --> 00:00:28.605 align:middle line:90% OK, there we go. 00:00:28.605 --> 00:00:29.980 align:middle line:84% I'm going to put these over here, 00:00:29.980 --> 00:00:33.120 align:middle line:84% and we're going to see how this goes. 00:00:33.120 --> 00:00:36.400 align:middle line:84% There are two ways I'm not supposed to be here tonight 00:00:36.400 --> 00:00:38.880 align:middle line:90% to introduce Richard Siken-- 00:00:38.880 --> 00:00:44.680 align:middle line:90% one big way and one small way. 00:00:44.680 --> 00:00:46.120 align:middle line:90% The big one. 00:00:46.120 --> 00:00:50.320 align:middle line:84% I got some bad health news almost exactly three years ago. 00:00:50.320 --> 00:00:52.440 align:middle line:84% As a result of that, it seemed more than possible 00:00:52.440 --> 00:00:55.720 align:middle line:84% that I would not be standing in front of you this evening. 00:00:55.720 --> 00:00:58.740 align:middle line:84% Turns out I still am, though, which is big. 00:00:58.740 --> 00:01:00.910 align:middle line:90% [CHEERING] 00:01:00.910 --> 00:01:01.410 align:middle line:90% Yeah. 00:01:01.410 --> 00:01:04.152 align:middle line:90% [APPLAUSE] 00:01:04.152 --> 00:01:05.530 align:middle line:90% 00:01:05.530 --> 00:01:07.370 align:middle line:84% That's kind of changed my relationship 00:01:07.370 --> 00:01:11.130 align:middle line:84% with time and with waking up and with everything else 00:01:11.130 --> 00:01:16.530 align:middle line:84% to some degree, which might feel small but is in fact big. 00:01:16.530 --> 00:01:19.990 align:middle line:84% So here's the small way I wasn't supposed to be here tonight. 00:01:19.990 --> 00:01:22.730 align:middle line:90% Today, my dad turns 80. 00:01:22.730 --> 00:01:24.530 align:middle line:84% To celebrate the occasion, my brother and I 00:01:24.530 --> 00:01:27.370 align:middle line:84% were planning on throwing him a party up in our hometown 00:01:27.370 --> 00:01:28.690 align:middle line:90% in upper Michigan. 00:01:28.690 --> 00:01:30.410 align:middle line:90% We had done a lot of planning. 00:01:30.410 --> 00:01:32.090 align:middle line:90% We put the effort in. 00:01:32.090 --> 00:01:33.270 align:middle line:90% It was hard to get to. 00:01:33.270 --> 00:01:35.490 align:middle line:84% Even in good weather in October is always 00:01:35.490 --> 00:01:37.330 align:middle line:90% a bit of a question mark. 00:01:37.330 --> 00:01:39.430 align:middle line:84% We weren't sure if we should even tell him. 00:01:39.430 --> 00:01:42.870 align:middle line:84% Maybe we should just show up and do it as a surprise. 00:01:42.870 --> 00:01:46.770 align:middle line:84% But we did decide to tell him, which was the right call. 00:01:46.770 --> 00:01:49.030 align:middle line:84% He didn't like the idea much, however. 00:01:49.030 --> 00:01:51.890 align:middle line:84% And for unclear reasons, he called it off. 00:01:51.890 --> 00:01:54.050 align:middle line:90% I wish I could tell you why. 00:01:54.050 --> 00:01:57.770 align:middle line:90% This is just a small thing. 00:01:57.770 --> 00:02:02.130 align:middle line:84% Big shapes move through the peripheries of our lives. 00:02:02.130 --> 00:02:05.030 align:middle line:84% Sometimes we get caught on them, eaten by them, 00:02:05.030 --> 00:02:06.850 align:middle line:90% plowed under by them. 00:02:06.850 --> 00:02:10.350 align:middle line:84% They're sometimes so big, they can even be-- 00:02:10.350 --> 00:02:13.730 align:middle line:84% they cannot even be recognized, much less named until after 00:02:13.730 --> 00:02:16.410 align:middle line:90% the fact, if at all. 00:02:16.410 --> 00:02:19.230 align:middle line:84% It reminds me of this video game I've been playing, 00:02:19.230 --> 00:02:21.730 align:middle line:84% rain world, which is a platformer style 00:02:21.730 --> 00:02:24.210 align:middle line:84% game in which you play a weird little creature called 00:02:24.210 --> 00:02:28.530 align:middle line:84% a slugcat, a combination slug and cat, more cat 00:02:28.530 --> 00:02:32.810 align:middle line:84% than slug, happily, accidentally separated from its family, 00:02:32.810 --> 00:02:35.810 align:middle line:84% trying to survive in a big, rundown, and beautiful 00:02:35.810 --> 00:02:39.650 align:middle line:84% postindustrial world filled with creatures, many very 00:02:39.650 --> 00:02:43.890 align:middle line:84% big and very strange, mostly trying to eat or kill you. 00:02:43.890 --> 00:02:46.490 align:middle line:84% But you don't matter to them, except as food. 00:02:46.490 --> 00:02:49.910 align:middle line:84% You encounter big G Gods in this game. 00:02:49.910 --> 00:02:52.730 align:middle line:84% But you don't know what they are as they move through the world 00:02:52.730 --> 00:02:55.650 align:middle line:84% and you move through the world in unrelated ways. 00:02:55.650 --> 00:02:58.180 align:middle line:84% And you don't need to understand what is happening. 00:02:58.180 --> 00:03:00.300 align:middle line:90% You just need to survive. 00:03:00.300 --> 00:03:02.620 align:middle line:84% Your goal is to find enough food in the time you 00:03:02.620 --> 00:03:05.920 align:middle line:84% have in each cycle, usually between 6 and 14 00:03:05.920 --> 00:03:09.620 align:middle line:84% minutes before the rain comes and everything floods, as it 00:03:09.620 --> 00:03:13.220 align:middle line:84% might do this weekend, which is big. 00:03:13.220 --> 00:03:17.180 align:middle line:84% If you find a safe place to hibernate until the next cycle, 00:03:17.180 --> 00:03:21.520 align:middle line:84% your reward is you get to keep going, doing it again and again. 00:03:21.520 --> 00:03:23.660 align:middle line:84% And you try to find your way to new areas 00:03:23.660 --> 00:03:26.300 align:middle line:84% to maybe hopefully, maybe eventually reunite 00:03:26.300 --> 00:03:30.100 align:middle line:84% with your family of slugcats, who probably miss you a lot. 00:03:30.100 --> 00:03:34.060 align:middle line:84% So you keep doing it, except when you don't, which is often. 00:03:34.060 --> 00:03:35.460 align:middle line:90% It is a very hard game. 00:03:35.460 --> 00:03:37.677 align:middle line:84% And it is very easy to be killed. 00:03:37.677 --> 00:03:39.260 align:middle line:84% And that means you lose your progress. 00:03:39.260 --> 00:03:39.980 align:middle line:90% And you wake up. 00:03:39.980 --> 00:03:42.660 align:middle line:90% And you try the level again. 00:03:42.660 --> 00:03:45.300 align:middle line:84% I am not religious, but I do find 00:03:45.300 --> 00:03:50.940 align:middle line:84% it moving to be very small, among very big things in a game. 00:03:50.940 --> 00:03:55.060 align:middle line:84% Most games are power fantasies where you are special or awesome 00:03:55.060 --> 00:03:57.620 align:middle line:84% and have powers and are chosen, or you 00:03:57.620 --> 00:04:01.860 align:middle line:84% learn to kick ass and beat bosses and win wins and save 00:04:01.860 --> 00:04:03.140 align:middle line:90% worlds. 00:04:03.140 --> 00:04:05.920 align:middle line:84% In most games, you may be physically small. 00:04:05.920 --> 00:04:08.980 align:middle line:84% But in the ways that matter, you end up being big. 00:04:08.980 --> 00:04:10.600 align:middle line:90% But this game is different. 00:04:10.600 --> 00:04:12.260 align:middle line:90% You are no hero. 00:04:12.260 --> 00:04:14.040 align:middle line:90% You are no God. 00:04:14.040 --> 00:04:18.260 align:middle line:84% You are small, small, forgotten, abandoned, of no consequence, 00:04:18.260 --> 00:04:21.140 align:middle line:84% except as a small meal to everything else 00:04:21.140 --> 00:04:22.740 align:middle line:90% you encounter in the game. 00:04:22.740 --> 00:04:26.140 align:middle line:84% But your smallness gives you power too. 00:04:26.140 --> 00:04:29.260 align:middle line:84% You can creep through cracks and climb through the world 00:04:29.260 --> 00:04:33.540 align:middle line:84% unnoticed and try to avoid the big gods and the big predators 00:04:33.540 --> 00:04:36.500 align:middle line:84% and the big killing, flooding, everything, rain. 00:04:36.500 --> 00:04:40.260 align:middle line:84% And you explore and find beautiful, abandoned things. 00:04:40.260 --> 00:04:42.100 align:middle line:84% Some of these beautiful abandoned things 00:04:42.100 --> 00:04:45.000 align:middle line:84% are big, like the industrial wastes. 00:04:45.000 --> 00:04:48.820 align:middle line:84% And some of them are small, like flowers and mushrooms. 00:04:48.820 --> 00:04:51.900 align:middle line:84% You can fight and kill enemies, both small, 00:04:51.900 --> 00:04:53.660 align:middle line:90% and if you're lucky, big. 00:04:53.660 --> 00:04:58.190 align:middle line:84% Or you can avoid them, which is mostly what you do. 00:04:58.190 --> 00:04:59.590 align:middle line:84% One of the most remarkable things 00:04:59.590 --> 00:05:02.570 align:middle line:84% about growing up or living in upper Michigan, where I'm from, 00:05:02.570 --> 00:05:06.470 align:middle line:84% is being surrounded by big, beautiful, abandoned things. 00:05:06.470 --> 00:05:10.710 align:middle line:84% The landscape is an overgrown ruin of extractive capitalism. 00:05:10.710 --> 00:05:12.510 align:middle line:84% Go into a forest, and you might stumble 00:05:12.510 --> 00:05:16.190 align:middle line:84% on an only probably boarded up copper or iron ore 00:05:16.190 --> 00:05:19.410 align:middle line:84% mine, or huge chunk of mining equipment, 00:05:19.410 --> 00:05:23.090 align:middle line:84% question mark, rusted and mossed and snowed over, 00:05:23.090 --> 00:05:26.430 align:middle line:84% or strange holes you find sometimes in the ground, 00:05:26.430 --> 00:05:29.997 align:middle line:84% or the carcinogenic mine tailings, big mining 00:05:29.997 --> 00:05:31.830 align:middle line:84% dumped in the lakes that you're not supposed 00:05:31.830 --> 00:05:34.410 align:middle line:90% to swim in or eat fish from. 00:05:34.410 --> 00:05:36.430 align:middle line:90% But a lot of people do anyway. 00:05:36.430 --> 00:05:39.130 align:middle line:84% It is a big ruined world, I mean. 00:05:39.130 --> 00:05:42.910 align:middle line:84% And we, small people, live in the past of it, which 00:05:42.910 --> 00:05:45.190 align:middle line:90% is also the present of it. 00:05:45.190 --> 00:05:49.770 align:middle line:84% This is, of course, also our big ruined world in Tucson, 00:05:49.770 --> 00:05:52.150 align:middle line:84% where we try to get by and go to poetry readings 00:05:52.150 --> 00:05:54.790 align:middle line:84% in the shadow of big international strip mining 00:05:54.790 --> 00:05:58.130 align:middle line:84% conglomerates and big missile manufacturers. 00:05:58.130 --> 00:06:01.590 align:middle line:84% And we smalls, you and I and Richard Siken and Mathias 00:06:01.590 --> 00:06:05.270 align:middle line:84% Svalina and Susan Briante and Tyler Meier and all of us 00:06:05.270 --> 00:06:07.110 align:middle line:84% here in the room, just live in it 00:06:07.110 --> 00:06:10.830 align:middle line:84% and try to survive long enough to do it again tomorrow. 00:06:10.830 --> 00:06:14.190 align:middle line:84% Maybe we write some poems in the ruin between the red lobsters 00:06:14.190 --> 00:06:18.230 align:middle line:84% and the rage rooms and, and the Jimmy Johns and, and the First 00:06:18.230 --> 00:06:21.510 align:middle line:84% Amendment sports and, and, and the Wiener Schnitzels 00:06:21.510 --> 00:06:24.630 align:middle line:84% and, and the really way too many numerous mattress stores, 00:06:24.630 --> 00:06:26.090 align:middle line:84% which there are a lot of in Tucson. 00:06:26.090 --> 00:06:28.030 align:middle line:90% I don't know if you've noticed. 00:06:28.030 --> 00:06:30.670 align:middle line:84% After all, what is the alternative? 00:06:30.670 --> 00:06:32.750 align:middle line:84% So, as you may know, Richard Siken 00:06:32.750 --> 00:06:35.150 align:middle line:84% is a graduate of the MFA in Creative Writing 00:06:35.150 --> 00:06:37.190 align:middle line:90% at the U of A, where I teach. 00:06:37.190 --> 00:06:39.750 align:middle line:84% This might be big, or it might be small, depending 00:06:39.750 --> 00:06:42.030 align:middle line:90% on your point of view. 00:06:42.030 --> 00:06:45.070 align:middle line:84% I knew this before I joined the faculty in the year that the hip 00:06:45.070 --> 00:06:49.190 align:middle line:84% hop duo Das Racist released the big, to me, song, 00:06:49.190 --> 00:06:52.360 align:middle line:84% "Combination Pizza Hut and Taco Bell." 00:06:52.360 --> 00:06:56.240 align:middle line:84% Like all of us, Das Racist is, in the long term, small. 00:06:56.240 --> 00:07:00.200 align:middle line:84% And also, Richard Siken is ultimately small by comparison 00:07:00.200 --> 00:07:03.640 align:middle line:84% to the very many big things ruining our world. 00:07:03.640 --> 00:07:07.120 align:middle line:84% But here, I want you to know that Richard Siken's work is 00:07:07.120 --> 00:07:09.200 align:middle line:90% very big. 00:07:09.200 --> 00:07:12.580 align:middle line:84% He too had a bad health crisis a few years ago, 00:07:12.580 --> 00:07:14.760 align:middle line:90% which was and is big. 00:07:14.760 --> 00:07:16.940 align:middle line:84% His world got smaller for a while. 00:07:16.940 --> 00:07:19.520 align:middle line:84% And then slowly, it began to open back up 00:07:19.520 --> 00:07:21.160 align:middle line:90% and get bigger again. 00:07:21.160 --> 00:07:24.600 align:middle line:84% He wrote a book about the smallness and the embiggening-- 00:07:24.600 --> 00:07:26.580 align:middle line:84% it's a perfectly cromulent word-- 00:07:26.580 --> 00:07:28.240 align:middle line:90% which is big. 00:07:28.240 --> 00:07:31.200 align:middle line:84% I Do Know Some Things is a book of poems. 00:07:31.200 --> 00:07:35.880 align:middle line:90% It's also a book of essays. 00:07:35.880 --> 00:07:39.480 align:middle line:84% It's a combination book of poems, book of essays. 00:07:39.480 --> 00:07:42.160 align:middle line:84% I guess it is-- oh, no, I didn't plan this. 00:07:42.160 --> 00:07:45.180 align:middle line:84% I guess it is small, whether that dumb joke lands, 00:07:45.180 --> 00:07:48.120 align:middle line:84% but some days, small things are what you have. 00:07:48.120 --> 00:07:52.160 align:middle line:84% It does matter in a big way that Richard Siken wrote this really 00:07:52.160 --> 00:07:55.580 align:middle line:84% big book, this latest in a series of great books, 00:07:55.580 --> 00:07:59.660 align:middle line:84% which are also all big, and you should read them if you haven't. 00:07:59.660 --> 00:08:01.900 align:middle line:84% It also does matter that I Do Know 00:08:01.900 --> 00:08:04.440 align:middle line:84% Some Things was announced this week as a finalist 00:08:04.440 --> 00:08:06.920 align:middle line:90% for the National Book Award. 00:08:06.920 --> 00:08:12.080 align:middle line:84% Yeah, that's right, they do have taste, it turns out. 00:08:12.080 --> 00:08:15.040 align:middle line:90% Is that small, or is it big? 00:08:15.040 --> 00:08:16.640 align:middle line:90% I'm not sure yet. 00:08:16.640 --> 00:08:18.200 align:middle line:90% It's a big honor. 00:08:18.200 --> 00:08:21.400 align:middle line:84% And it's a big to be recognized for such big work. 00:08:21.400 --> 00:08:24.760 align:middle line:84% But that kind of recognition is small by comparison 00:08:24.760 --> 00:08:27.000 align:middle line:84% with the work that the artist does 00:08:27.000 --> 00:08:30.360 align:middle line:84% in sitting down at the table to write every morning or however 00:08:30.360 --> 00:08:33.400 align:middle line:84% mornings we are writing in after however much coffee 00:08:33.400 --> 00:08:35.440 align:middle line:90% and however much suffering. 00:08:35.440 --> 00:08:40.280 align:middle line:84% I mean, it's small by comparison with waking up and being alive, 00:08:40.280 --> 00:08:44.360 align:middle line:84% which I am and which Richard Siken is, which is big. 00:08:44.360 --> 00:08:48.080 align:middle line:84% It's a combination big and small is what I mean. 00:08:48.080 --> 00:08:52.310 align:middle line:84% It's big to be seen, to be making big work, to be read, 00:08:52.310 --> 00:08:55.130 align:middle line:84% which is small and which is also big. 00:08:55.130 --> 00:08:57.470 align:middle line:90% To be not dead is much bigger. 00:08:57.470 --> 00:09:00.410 align:middle line:84% To be here with you to read that work so many years after 00:09:00.410 --> 00:09:03.730 align:middle line:84% the release of "Combination Pizza Hut and Taco Bell" 00:09:03.730 --> 00:09:05.330 align:middle line:90% is very big. 00:09:05.330 --> 00:09:09.130 align:middle line:84% So happy October 9 to us gathered here today. 00:09:09.130 --> 00:09:11.050 align:middle line:90% And happy birthday to my dad. 00:09:11.050 --> 00:09:14.410 align:middle line:84% You are still alive, dad, and so am I, which is big. 00:09:14.410 --> 00:09:16.690 align:middle line:90% You are what is happening today. 00:09:16.690 --> 00:09:18.810 align:middle line:90% And this is happening today. 00:09:18.810 --> 00:09:21.250 align:middle line:84% In this sentence, I am speaking and you are listening 00:09:21.250 --> 00:09:23.090 align:middle line:90% to all of us together. 00:09:23.090 --> 00:09:25.690 align:middle line:84% And Richard Siken is happening today. 00:09:25.690 --> 00:09:29.130 align:middle line:84% His "Combination Pizza Hut and Taco Bell," book of poems, 00:09:29.130 --> 00:09:32.330 align:middle line:84% and also essays is happening today. 00:09:32.330 --> 00:09:36.770 align:middle line:84% Poems and essays always happen every day, 00:09:36.770 --> 00:09:40.330 align:middle line:84% which is small but sometimes also big. 00:09:40.330 --> 00:09:43.130 align:middle line:84% And I am very, very glad it's Richard Siken day 00:09:43.130 --> 00:09:47.530 align:middle line:84% again here in our hearts, where it's always Richard's Siken day. 00:09:47.530 --> 00:09:50.330 align:middle line:84% Please welcome back to the University of Arizona Poetry 00:09:50.330 --> 00:09:53.290 align:middle line:84% Center, the very big indeed, Richard Siken, 00:09:53.290 --> 00:09:55.070 align:middle line:90% and his big, big work. 00:09:55.070 --> 00:09:58.052 align:middle line:90% [CHEERING, APPLAUSE] 00:09:58.052 --> 00:10:11.490 align:middle line:90% 00:10:11.490 --> 00:10:12.430 align:middle line:90% Yeah, hold on. 00:10:12.430 --> 00:10:14.410 align:middle line:90% OK, sweet. 00:10:14.410 --> 00:10:15.600 align:middle line:90% I get to navigate the water. 00:10:15.600 --> 00:10:19.250 align:middle line:90% 00:10:19.250 --> 00:10:22.194 align:middle line:90% Do you want a hat? 00:10:22.194 --> 00:10:27.850 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:10:27.850 --> 00:10:30.546 align:middle line:84% Now, which one would I pick anyway? 00:10:30.546 --> 00:10:31.890 align:middle line:90% Poetry. 00:10:31.890 --> 00:10:34.050 align:middle line:90% Maybe. 00:10:34.050 --> 00:10:35.460 align:middle line:90% I'm going to leave that. 00:10:35.460 --> 00:10:37.648 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:10:37.648 --> 00:10:41.376 align:middle line:90% 00:10:41.376 --> 00:10:44.370 align:middle line:90% Sounds good? 00:10:44.370 --> 00:10:45.110 align:middle line:90% Yeah, I think so. 00:10:45.110 --> 00:10:45.610 align:middle line:90% OK. 00:10:45.610 --> 00:10:47.560 align:middle line:90% All right.