WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:00.520 align:middle line:90% 00:00:00.520 --> 00:00:02.360 align:middle line:84% We've done this before, Julia, where 00:00:02.360 --> 00:00:03.920 align:middle line:90% we've been in conversation. 00:00:03.920 --> 00:00:04.900 align:middle line:90% And he's wonderful. 00:00:04.900 --> 00:00:06.920 align:middle line:90% No wonder he got a Genius Grant. 00:00:06.920 --> 00:00:09.760 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:00:09.760 --> 00:00:13.900 align:middle line:84% Plus, the book, Consequences is seriously one of my favorites. 00:00:13.900 --> 00:00:16.700 align:middle line:84% I'm not just saying this because I'm on a stage. 00:00:16.700 --> 00:00:22.820 align:middle line:84% It has that tenderness imbued in the language and the characters. 00:00:22.820 --> 00:00:24.800 align:middle line:90% And it's really special. 00:00:24.800 --> 00:00:29.640 align:middle line:90% A very-- I call him a Chekhov. 00:00:29.640 --> 00:00:30.780 align:middle line:90% Yes. 00:00:30.780 --> 00:00:31.840 align:middle line:90% Thank you, Julia. 00:00:31.840 --> 00:00:32.900 align:middle line:90% No, seriously. 00:00:32.900 --> 00:00:36.400 align:middle line:84% But I get it all from poetry, I'm going to say. 00:00:36.400 --> 00:00:38.800 align:middle line:90% Yeah, I'm going to say. 00:00:38.800 --> 00:00:43.900 align:middle line:84% But in our conversation in Santa Fe, I made note. 00:00:43.900 --> 00:00:46.200 align:middle line:84% And also Edwidge Danticat has said the same 00:00:46.200 --> 00:00:48.080 align:middle line:84% in Poets and Writers, the article I 00:00:48.080 --> 00:00:53.480 align:middle line:84% mentioned as well, there is a straightforward 00:00:53.480 --> 00:00:57.520 align:middle line:84% bravery in how you're thinking about mortality. 00:00:57.520 --> 00:00:59.600 align:middle line:84% The last two titles of the books that 00:00:59.600 --> 00:01:03.990 align:middle line:84% came before this were Afterlife and The Cemetery of Untold 00:01:03.990 --> 00:01:05.910 align:middle line:90% Stories. 00:01:05.910 --> 00:01:08.390 align:middle line:84% You're facing this head on, but you're 00:01:08.390 --> 00:01:13.190 align:middle line:84% facing it in a way that is quite remarkable. 00:01:13.190 --> 00:01:16.150 align:middle line:84% It's redemptive, it's rooted in memory 00:01:16.150 --> 00:01:21.230 align:middle line:84% and how powerful it is to go back and remember. 00:01:21.230 --> 00:01:24.590 align:middle line:90% And painful, I'm sure. 00:01:24.590 --> 00:01:27.290 align:middle line:90% There is a poem. 00:01:27.290 --> 00:01:33.310 align:middle line:84% We have to remember that elegy is such a combination of beauty 00:01:33.310 --> 00:01:34.830 align:middle line:90% and loss-- 00:01:34.830 --> 00:01:36.610 align:middle line:90% --and pain. 00:01:36.610 --> 00:01:40.870 align:middle line:84% There's a wonderful poem in here called The Long and Short of It. 00:01:40.870 --> 00:01:42.850 align:middle line:84% Would it be OK to ask you to read this one? 00:01:42.850 --> 00:01:43.550 align:middle line:90% Yeah. 00:01:43.550 --> 00:01:50.790 align:middle line:84% This is how elegies sometimes come out. 00:01:50.790 --> 00:01:55.430 align:middle line:84% And [CLEARS THROAT] we were four girls in my family, 00:01:55.430 --> 00:02:00.110 align:middle line:84% and there is a poem of many sections 00:02:00.110 --> 00:02:03.710 align:middle line:84% called the Four Girls because especially the first three of us 00:02:03.710 --> 00:02:09.970 align:middle line:84% were 11 months apart and we were sometimes called the triplets. 00:02:09.970 --> 00:02:13.790 align:middle line:84% So we were so different and yet we 00:02:13.790 --> 00:02:17.710 align:middle line:90% were all a unit, the four girls. 00:02:17.710 --> 00:02:20.530 align:middle line:84% It wasn't-- we didn't have our individual names, 00:02:20.530 --> 00:02:22.430 align:middle line:90% it was just the four girls. 00:02:22.430 --> 00:02:23.590 align:middle line:90% The four girls. 00:02:23.590 --> 00:02:26.870 align:middle line:84% And the only reason that you could tell us each apart 00:02:26.870 --> 00:02:29.670 align:middle line:84% because we did look very similar, 00:02:29.670 --> 00:02:32.190 align:middle line:90% is we each were color coded. 00:02:32.190 --> 00:02:33.350 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:02:33.350 --> 00:02:36.290 align:middle line:84% This was, according to my mother, to prevent fights. 00:02:36.290 --> 00:02:39.990 align:middle line:84% Everybody got the same thing, but my older sister, 00:02:39.990 --> 00:02:43.630 align:middle line:84% her toothbrush was in yellow, mine was in red, 00:02:43.630 --> 00:02:45.470 align:middle line:84% and the third sister was in blue. 00:02:45.470 --> 00:02:51.030 align:middle line:84% And then the little sister came five years later, more planned, 00:02:51.030 --> 00:02:52.530 align:middle line:90% and she wanted all the colors. 00:02:52.530 --> 00:02:53.650 align:middle line:90% She was a problem. 00:02:53.650 --> 00:02:55.470 align:middle line:90% She wanted the rainbow. 00:02:55.470 --> 00:02:58.390 align:middle line:84% And so we-- but anyhow, so my older sister 00:02:58.390 --> 00:03:00.580 align:middle line:90% was 11 months ahead of me. 00:03:00.580 --> 00:03:07.580 align:middle line:84% And anyhow, I lost her to suicide. 00:03:07.580 --> 00:03:17.380 align:middle line:84% And I just couldn't seem to find a way to write about her. 00:03:17.380 --> 00:03:20.500 align:middle line:84% And then I thought about, when someone 00:03:20.500 --> 00:03:23.440 align:middle line:84% dies you think of all the positive things. 00:03:23.440 --> 00:03:27.180 align:middle line:84% And then I thought of how frustrating 00:03:27.180 --> 00:03:35.100 align:middle line:84% she was because you'll hear about it in this poem. 00:03:35.100 --> 00:03:40.540 align:middle line:84% So it's an elegy for Maury, in memoriam. 00:03:40.540 --> 00:03:43.460 align:middle line:90% The Long and the Short of it. 00:03:43.460 --> 00:03:45.500 align:middle line:84% The long and the short of it, she'd 00:03:45.500 --> 00:03:48.660 align:middle line:84% say, as she went on and on, describing 00:03:48.660 --> 00:03:54.420 align:middle line:84% the top she was wearing, the stilettos, my steroid heels. 00:03:54.420 --> 00:03:57.180 align:middle line:84% How the call came as she was going out the door. 00:03:57.180 --> 00:03:59.780 align:middle line:84% The dream she'd had the night before. 00:03:59.780 --> 00:04:02.100 align:middle line:90% The long got longer. 00:04:02.100 --> 00:04:05.740 align:middle line:84% The haiku version of her stories never came. 00:04:05.740 --> 00:04:08.260 align:middle line:90% If she asked, you got a minute? 00:04:08.260 --> 00:04:11.520 align:middle line:84% Plan on an hour or more if God forbid, 00:04:11.520 --> 00:04:15.180 align:middle line:84% you interrupted her to ask, who was it she was going out 00:04:15.180 --> 00:04:16.820 align:middle line:90% the door to see? 00:04:16.820 --> 00:04:20.260 align:middle line:84% Making a long story short was not her forte. 00:04:20.260 --> 00:04:21.980 align:middle line:90% She had to put you there. 00:04:21.980 --> 00:04:23.940 align:middle line:90% Right there, right now. 00:04:23.940 --> 00:04:26.360 align:middle line:90% Retrace the patterns on the rug. 00:04:26.360 --> 00:04:30.140 align:middle line:84% Describe the weaver kneeling before her loom, which brought 00:04:30.140 --> 00:04:32.200 align:middle line:90% down Rumi from her bookshelf. 00:04:32.200 --> 00:04:35.060 align:middle line:84% The poem where he kneels and kisses the ground, 00:04:35.060 --> 00:04:38.840 align:middle line:84% which she would do, mid telling, before she resumed, 00:04:38.840 --> 00:04:39.680 align:middle line:90% where were we? 00:04:39.680 --> 00:04:41.100 align:middle line:90% Oh, yes. 00:04:41.100 --> 00:04:44.460 align:middle line:84% As she was saying, she was on her way to see him, 00:04:44.460 --> 00:04:48.140 align:middle line:84% but instead, pulled over, sat on the roof of her car 00:04:48.140 --> 00:04:51.220 align:middle line:84% to count the stars, which, by the way, 00:04:51.220 --> 00:04:53.980 align:middle line:84% reminded her of this podcast she'd 00:04:53.980 --> 00:04:57.410 align:middle line:84% heard recently about a telescope that could tell you 00:04:57.410 --> 00:05:03.010 align:middle line:84% if you cared to know-- she did-- where we stood in the universe. 00:05:03.010 --> 00:05:05.810 align:middle line:84% So when she died by her own hand, 00:05:05.810 --> 00:05:08.250 align:middle line:90% I could not stand the silence. 00:05:08.250 --> 00:05:11.690 align:middle line:84% It wasn't like her not to stick around and tell you 00:05:11.690 --> 00:05:15.370 align:middle line:84% why she emptied all those bottles in her mouth. 00:05:15.370 --> 00:05:19.450 align:middle line:84% Instead of calling someone, anyone who would listen, really 00:05:19.450 --> 00:05:20.330 align:middle line:90% listen. 00:05:20.330 --> 00:05:24.010 align:middle line:84% Not the ho, hum, multitasking listen 00:05:24.010 --> 00:05:29.210 align:middle line:84% I was good at, cutting her off, insisting she get to the point. 00:05:29.210 --> 00:05:31.930 align:middle line:84% The point was these long ramblings. 00:05:31.930 --> 00:05:34.770 align:middle line:84% Getting lost in the weeds of a story. 00:05:34.770 --> 00:05:39.810 align:middle line:84% Filling our hands with tangents, trifles, details no one 00:05:39.810 --> 00:05:41.770 align:middle line:90% had the time to notice. 00:05:41.770 --> 00:05:45.010 align:middle line:84% Without a roadmap, destination and nothing 00:05:45.010 --> 00:05:48.850 align:middle line:84% else to get to, only this time together, which 00:05:48.850 --> 00:05:51.570 align:middle line:90% was brief enough already. 00:05:51.570 --> 00:05:54.330 align:middle line:90% So why cut it any shorter? 00:05:54.330 --> 00:05:59.738 align:middle line:84% Give it an ending, as she did at last, obliging me. 00:05:59.738 --> 00:06:03.330 align:middle line:90% [CLEARS THROAT] 00:06:03.330 --> 00:06:06.530 align:middle line:90% It's a wonderful poem. 00:06:06.530 --> 00:06:07.930 align:middle line:90% Very moving. 00:06:07.930 --> 00:06:13.250 align:middle line:84% And thank you for reading it and sharing it with us. 00:06:13.250 --> 00:06:18.410 align:middle line:84% Again, in terms of what the book is about: visitations 00:06:18.410 --> 00:06:22.570 align:middle line:84% at this stage in life, thinking about memory, 00:06:22.570 --> 00:06:26.130 align:middle line:84% thinking about who you want to remember, 00:06:26.130 --> 00:06:29.330 align:middle line:84% it fits so extraordinarily well and beautifully well. 00:06:29.330 --> 00:06:31.870 align:middle line:84% I'm also glad that you mentioned the sisters. 00:06:31.870 --> 00:06:35.490 align:middle line:84% If you are familiar with Julia's work, you know the quartet. 00:06:35.490 --> 00:06:39.270 align:middle line:84% It comes in different versions in different books, 00:06:39.270 --> 00:06:42.050 align:middle line:90% and it comes here as well. 00:06:42.050 --> 00:06:44.050 align:middle line:84% And that was one suite of poems I 00:06:44.050 --> 00:06:46.510 align:middle line:84% knew I couldn't split up, because they're all four of them 00:06:46.510 --> 00:06:47.010 align:middle line:90% are there. 00:06:47.010 --> 00:06:47.760 align:middle line:90% They're very long. 00:06:47.760 --> 00:06:50.242 align:middle line:84% There's no way I can ask for just one of them. 00:06:50.242 --> 00:06:51.450 align:middle line:90% We'd have to get all of them. 00:06:51.450 --> 00:06:52.930 align:middle line:90% You get in trouble too. 00:06:52.930 --> 00:06:54.030 align:middle line:90% No favorites. 00:06:54.030 --> 00:06:54.748 align:middle line:90% No favorites. 00:06:54.748 --> 00:06:55.290 align:middle line:90% No favorites. 00:06:55.290 --> 00:06:55.870 align:middle line:90% Yep. 00:06:55.870 --> 00:06:57.420 align:middle line:90% No.