00:00:23.190 - 00:00:34.950

Morton Marcus: Good evening everybody this is Mort Marcus and tonight we have a double interview with Claire Braz-Valentine and Bruce Cutler, two poets I'm sure you're familiar with. You've probably read their poems or read their

00:00:34.950 - 00:00:52.260

books, or have heard them on the Poetry Show in the past. And it is serendipitous, it is deja vu, whatever it may be, that both of them should be on tonight, not just because this Tuesday, both will read together at the Bookshop Santa Cruz at 8pm in

00:00:52.260 - 00:01:09.060

the ongoing National Writer's Union readings, but because both of them in some way have crossed my paths, one at 30 thousand feet in the air because the movie today on my way back from the East Coast was, you guessed it Claire, Godzilla. And because

00:01:09.120 - 00:01:25.830

on November the 11th, though it will be celebrated officially tomorrow, is Veterans Day used to be Armistice Day but all those veterans celebrate the wars this country has participated in tomorrow. And Bruce Cutler's latest book,

00:01:26.160 - 00:01:46.050

which is called, "Seeing the Darkness: Naples 1943 to 1945," is about World War II in and around Sicily. We are going to talk to both poets at the same time tonight. And this should be an interesting experiment. So we will begin, as many of you

00:01:46.050 - 00:02:01.560

probably know, Claire Braz-Valentine is a playwright who has written, "This One Thing I Do," which is about Susan B. Anthony, "Blue Skies Forever," about Amelia Earhart, and, "When Will I Dance?" the wonderful, I'd like to say it's a duet,

00:02:01.950 - 00:02:19.230

about Frida Kahlo old and young, a brilliant conception with marvelous language. And I think, so as one of the only two people plays that just kept me wrapped from the first word on, it was just marvelous concept. Bruce Cutler is actually a playwright

00:02:19.230 - 00:02:38.250

also, but is much better known for his poetry. And he has of course written many books. The one before this last one, "The Massacre at Sand Creek," was nominated for a National Book Award and, "Seeing the Darkness: Naples 1943-1945," has been out

00:02:38.250 - 00:02:56.160

since I believe last spring and another one will be out come winter, a repeat of- a reprint of one of his 1960s books. Welcome both of you, big introduction, you people have done so much. Claire has also worked of course with women in

00:02:56.160 - 00:03:11.030

prison, an her production of "Women Behind the Walls," I guess this is the latest thing we've seen in Santa Cruz? Claire Braz-Valentine: Yes, yeah. And in fact, that play has recently had monologues performed in Portland and in

00:03:11.420 - 00:03:25.070

Grand Forks, North Dakota. And there's a theater in Portland that's thinking very seriously of producing it and it actually was produced last year in San Jose at The Stage. Morton Marcus: Great, marvelous. Claire, let's just start right

00:03:25.070 - 00:03:37.370

off here because I love to let people out there know that the work that's really being done here in Santa Cruz is not just local. I mean, many of us are going in many different places, and have recognition throughout the country, not only Portland,

00:03:37.640 - 00:03:49.310

not only Grand Forks, but you've just got back from New York City. Why don't you tell us a little bit about that? Claire Braz-Valentine: Yes, interestingly enough, maybe we had the same airline because I was on my way to New York to

00:03:49.310 - 00:04:07.010

have one of my plays performed, and saw the Godzilla movie on the way and figured, well, why go because it's been destroyed. But actually I won an international competition for a reading sponsored by the International League of Women

00:04:07.010 - 00:04:22.790

Playwrights to have my Frida Kahlo play, "When Will I Dance," read at the 42nd Street Theatre Workshop, which is actually on Theater Row, on Broadway. It's like five doors down from, "The Lion King," so I felt it was really, really wonderful, had a

00:04:22.790 - 00:04:39.020

great reading. They're going to return it for a special workshop production and they're talking about doing it in several different East Coast venues. So, it's really a great opportunity for me. That play actually got translated into Finnish last

00:04:39.020 - 00:04:50.430

year and had an eight month run in Helsinki, Finland. Morton Marcus: Oh, great, marvelous. This is great, great news for everyone out there. If people wonder what we're talking about when we talked about Godzilla. It is because Claire

00:04:50.430 - 00:05:07.410

has written over the years a series of poems about Godzilla, and I'm sure we're going to be hearing them very, very shortly. Claire, I know that you write a regular newspaper column, you're a playwright and you're a poet, but do you have any order that

00:05:07.410 - 00:05:20.360

you consider yourself as writer? Do you consider yourself possibly a poet first? Claire Braz-Valentine: I used to think that I probably was, but actually- I mean, even though my earliest recollection is a first

00:05:20.900 - 00:05:42.860

in writing structured pieces was writing poetry. I think because I'm, "not trained" as a writer, no one really told me that I should pick one. So I just, I write whatever- I let the writing take whatever shape it wants to take. And in fact, I

00:05:42.860 - 00:05:56.540

brought some things tonight, some poems that actually turned into plays. So, sometimes I don't know where they're going to- where it's going to take me, I think I'm getting away with about six lines and really what I'm doing is committing two

00:05:56.540 - 00:06:09.000

years of my life. Morton Marcus: You know, that doesn't surprise me because what is impressive about any dramatic production it seems to me is the language. So, this is what the actor luxuriates in and waits

00:06:09.000 - 00:06:21.070

for and certainly it is what attracts some writers and I just remember that the language in the Frida Kahlo play, the play between two characters is marvelous. Claire Braz-Valentine: Well, that's, I think the highest

00:06:21.070 - 00:06:33.780

praise a playwright can get is that the language is poetic. And I look upon that play actually as a poem. I feel when I was writing it, I felt like I was writing a poem for two voices. Morton Marcus: Sounds great, a duet.

00:06:33.870 - 00:06:45.280

Claire Braz-Valentine: Yes. Morton Marcus: Absolutely. Bruce, let me just ask you a question here then I'm going to have you both read poems. I've never done this tandem interview, so it's probably

00:06:45.280 - 00:07:00.720

going to drive the people out there crazy, and may drive me crazy before the evening is over. But a question again, connected with Veterans Day: why write a poem about World War II? Bruce Cutler: Yeah, well, this is- I've thought a lot about

00:07:00.720 - 00:07:19.230

that before I started. This book is about 15 years in the making, so I had plenty of time to think about it. There are a lot of reasons. First of all, do you have a particular reason, personal inner reason for writing a book of this kind? And

00:07:20.370 - 00:07:39.630

you could either have been a combat person who was there at the time or you could, in the case of my first wife, my late wife Bea, somebody who was a civilian during all this time and spent most of the rest of her life trying to educate her

00:07:39.690 - 00:07:50.670

American husband about what it's like to be on the other side and lose. Morton Marcus: So your first wife was Italian? Bruce Cutler: She was from Naples. And so that's a personal

00:07:50.670 - 00:08:07.050

reason but there are other- there are other things too. I think Americans are not really good on the subject of war. I don't think American literature has been particularly good about it. They, you know, there's like there's one respectable novel

00:08:07.050 - 00:08:24.810

about the Civil War that was written 30 years after the war was over. There are some novels about World War I and some about World War II. But it hasn't been exactly the high point in American literature and the American poetry, I mean, World

00:08:24.810 - 00:08:40.050

War II, there was Carl Shapiro's, "V-letter," which won the Pulitzer Prize. And then there was James Dickie bombing the hell out of the Germans, which I was never really a great fan of. And then, you know, occasional pieces. There was

00:08:40.050 - 00:08:56.580

some about the Vietnam War, but it was- well I never got the feeling that it did the war justice and World War II is a very odd occasion in American history. It was supposedly the good war, you know, this is the war in which the Japanese

00:08:56.580 - 00:09:17.310

attacked us and we responded by, you know, taking care of the Germans, the Italians and the Japanese. And it took maybe 40 years for a lot of people to come to realize that it was a good war in a sense, but it was a dirty war in most senses. And

00:09:17.910 - 00:09:39.120

eventually, the outlines of the story and the nature of conflict came to be clearer. I think clarity is, it's always desirable.It's hard to get because there are a lot of things to interfere with it. And for a poet, what you mostly get

00:09:39.120 - 00:09:54.090

is interference. I think it's very hard to focus particularly when you feel that there's nobody around who's particularly interested in it. American poetry has been very much concerned with confessing. We have confessed about everything

00:09:54.090 - 00:10:11.550

there is to confess it has gotten really boring in the last few years because you know, a good priest can tell you a lot better things than most poets. And, you know, the inner life, the person, etc. And it's valuable, it's worth it, you

00:10:11.550 - 00:10:28.490

know, people do it well, but it neglects a whole part of our history, which I think is also important. Morton Marcus: Yeah and it also neglects a much larger view of both society and the world. And I think you and I have talked

00:10:28.490 - 00:10:41.480

about the fact that I went down to the graduate program at the University of Arkansas last year, and none of the graduate poets even knew that there was any other kind of poem except the personal confession. That's redundancy. And it was just

00:10:41.480 - 00:11:01.850

astonishing to both me and Al Young who were doing the workshops down there. Why don't you read us one of the poems from the book, and- hear what's happened with these poems because, as people who may not know, Bruce was not in the war.

00:11:02.390 - 00:11:18.510

Yeah, so this is an even more of an interesting experiment. Claire Braz-Valentine: There's a page of credits at the beginning of this book, all my Italian relatives who put me straight on the subject. I'll read a poem. The title is, "A War Pastoral,"

00:11:18.510 - 00:11:37.370

it's a poem in which- it's a you know, nice, pretty, kind of lovely little scene out in the country, which has a turn to it. Bruce Cutler: A WAR PASTORAL When they came, they came like honey from a jar, spilling down

00:11:37.370 - 00:11:57.800

the hillside in lazy swirls and eddies and all the bleating. It was as if a raspy choir of the death was warming up, bobbing and baaing, they came over the banks of a gully through a copse. There must have been 1000 in the flock, and you could see

00:11:57.800 - 00:12:15.500

their fleece hanging down in heavy locks and feel the little thud of their legs, their shanks, their hocks. When 50 feet short of the road, they began to trip the mines. In that instant, you would have thought they were running over hammocks,

00:12:15.920 - 00:12:37.010

tens of them rising hip high off the ground. Then the ground began to shake, and it was blood in the air, blood and wool and bone, and the rising screams of what once were sheep, careening off their fellows flanks. In front, behind, driven, we could

00:12:37.010 - 00:13:01.900

see now, by infantry, stalking like shadows in the flaring bloody sun. Morton Marcus: A pastoral indeed and inverted pastoral. Let us get to Claire and what I would like to ask you, as you said

00:13:01.900 - 00:13:09.190

before, that you had poems that became plays? Claire Braz-Valentine: Yes, I do. Morton Marcus: Let's, let's hear some of this, then talk about the emotion.

00:13:09.340 - 00:13:25.900

Claire Braz-Valentine: All right. This is a poem called, "The Broken Column, which is the name of one of Frida Kahlo's paintings, in which she portrays herself naked, the center of her body being open, and it is a column that is crushed and

00:13:25.900 - 00:13:43.930

cracked. Frida had 27 spinal surgeries and I was trying to write this play after I'd had my third spinal surgery. And actually, I had given up writing the play. I thought, I'll just write some poems and then sort of get over it because I can't

00:13:43.930 - 00:13:59.630

write the play. And eventually the poems ended up in the play. So this poem, slightly edited, is in the play. This is called: THE BROKEN COLUMN It is spring, I am in a cast, the iron hands, the holder, it

00:13:59.630 - 00:14:20.870

makes me still, quiets me. When the earth fills with flowers, while the earth sings, pulls out its fruit, I am alone in these braces of pain except for the cracking in the center of my being. Oh Lord, I wanted to run, I want wind on this body, I want

00:14:20.870 - 00:14:44.060

to roll down hillsides and throw back my head in laughter. The downstairs voices plan my food, dough as a blank canvas. I need a small basket with food from my hands to take to Diego, to take to the great wall, to sit by him and think of my life. Why am I

00:14:44.060 - 00:15:05.870

forced into this stillness? Oh life, is this little death a piece of you? Or is this little life a piece of death? I want out of here. I cannot, will not, won't stay in this trap, this container anymore. Give me brushes, give me something. I

00:15:05.870 - 00:15:29.570

paint. I paint my freedom. I paint my captive plaster prison. I paint everything, I paint life. I am life. Viva la Vida. Morton Marcus: Lovely. You know one thing I've been wanting to say to you, in your plays, you are so much more lyrical than in

00:15:29.570 - 00:15:40.250

the poems that concern Godzilla or putting men in their place. And it really is interesting. It's like there you can open up through the characters. Claire Braz-Valentine: Yes.

00:15:40.400 - 00:15:49.030

Morton Marcus: And you know, I never knew that you had spinal operations but obviously, this became your connection with Frida. Claire Braz-Valentine: I'm a very shy person. I don't talk a

00:15:49.030 - 00:16:06.040

lot about myself personally, even though I write poems that kind of reveal some things, but I love doing it on the stage because I can have those characters saying things that are my life, my beliefs. So that's a wonderful thing about

00:16:06.040 - 00:16:15.130

theater. Morton Marcus: Mhm, great, beautiful. Claire Braz-Valentine: Thank you. Morton Marcus: Great stuff. Bruce, back to you. Let's hear

00:16:15.130 - 00:16:29.050

some- another poem from the book and make comment on it. Let me ask something about the the sheep. Now, was this your imagination or did one of your relatives actually describe the pastoral scene?

00:16:29.180 - 00:16:44.840

Claire Braz-Valentine: Oh, that's, oh, that was- I mean until you ran out of sheep, that was a standard practice for clearing a minefield. In the war between Iraq and Iran, it was 14 year old boys that went in to do it. In this case, it was

00:16:44.840 - 00:17:04.670

sheep. Naples, the reason I took guys focused on Naples in this in this particular book of poetry is partly because it was the first major European city to be liberated in the Second World War. And the Italians were in a very particular situation at

00:17:04.670 - 00:17:20.780

that time, because technically, they had been with the Germans. And then they made an armistice with the Allied Powers. And they thought that that would bring them home free, but the the Allied Powers did not regard them as being friendly, they

00:17:20.780 - 00:17:40.430

regarded them as a sort of indeterminant unit and so they were not provided for. And when it was October the first, 1943, when American and Allied Forces liberated Naples. And by Christmas time, I was there in Naples to look in the records,

00:17:40.430 - 00:17:57.710

and there were exactly five days worth of food in the city. And most of it was not in the hands of people who were willing to distribute it to the people who needed it. So this is a poem about that period and the title is:

00:17:57.710 - 00:18:17.660

Bruce Cutler: LANDSCAPE WITH FOOD The dump runs down a wide ravine, swelling, filling with the flow of cans and crates. Holding an obscene rawhide whip, a negro MP stands his guard. At the gate, a crowd is gathering.

00:18:18.410 - 00:18:37.850

He cracks it yelling, "no, no" at the late arrivals. But then a truck backs in, they all lunge past him. He takes a can of gasoline down the slope to set a sea of fires and burn up every beam and every can. It's not enough. The barbed wire couldn't

00:18:37.850 - 00:19:01.310

hold them back. The blacksnake whip, the flaming stuff they must not eat, nothing holds them back and standing in that stinking stream of spam, potato peels, pickles, cream, grease, they eat. They eat it all. Hip deep in flames, they eat it all.

00:19:04.220 - 00:19:11.720

Morton Marcus: And was that something that it was told to you? Bruce Cutler: Yeah, that was, yeah. Morton Marcus: Let me give them the readers out there a

00:19:11.720 - 00:19:28.400

different perspective on why you would even write this poem. Bruce is particularly, and correct me if I'm saying this incorrectly, Bruce is particularly outraged by war because he has been a practicing quaker most of his life.

00:19:29.120 - 00:19:39.050

Bruce Cutler: Oh, yeah, that's true, but I wasn't born that way. I had this- Morton Marcus: Just an acquired taste, is that what you're saying?

00:19:38.730 - 00:19:50.330

Bruce Cutler: Well, you get your arm twisted, you come to see the Claire Braz-Valentine: Well, I want to thank you for writing light! But I want to agree with Claire and- in that I really find it- it's a kind of wonderful experience to get out

00:19:50.400 - 00:20:32.490

of yourself and into another character and in my poems, I do write as as if I were myself sometimes, but in this book, there are a lot of different characters. And I came to the this book as a mother of three sons, I think we need more poems

00:20:02.700 - 00:20:20.100

conclusion after I finished this book after all those years of work, that really, other people are more interesting than I am. I don't know why I was going through life thinking that I was really important. I mean, yeah, sure, you know, in some ways, I

00:20:20.170 - 00:20:39.810

guess I am. But the stories and the experiences of other people are really, that's where the life is. like this. I mean, that was my greatest fear of raising them was that I was raising them for fodder for the fields somewhere.

00:20:40.260 - 00:20:54.540

And I'm grateful to you for doing this. Well, World War II, by the way was- that was maybe the last time in American history, maybe the last time in American history when large numbers of people went off willingly or

00:20:54.540 - 00:21:13.140

even enthusiastically to war. It was a whole lot less in the Korean War, that was a really unpopular war. And then by the time you get to Vietnam, I mean, it gets to be a huge problem. And so part of the, what I'm in this book for and about World

00:21:13.140 - 00:21:27.340

War II is the collision of high ideals with the reality of what happened. Morton Marcus: And you actually have written several books in what we call masks, actually, they're dramatic books through

00:21:27.340 - 00:21:41.890

characters. Claire Braz-Valentine: Yeah, the Sand Creek book is a series of of views, points of view on the massacre from widely different perspectives. And you piece it together like a mosaic, I mean I

00:21:41.890 - 00:21:55.240

don't tell you what to think, you just look at it and you see the pattern for yourself and then you figure what it's about. Morton Marcus: On this coming Tuesday, and by the way, if you just tuned in, we're talking with Bruce Cutler and Claire

00:21:55.240 - 00:22:07.930

Braz-Valentine, who will be reading on Tuesday evening at the Bookshop Santa Cruz at eight o'clock as part of the National Writers Union readings. On Tuesday, are you going to read from the Sand Creek book as well as the new one?

00:22:08.080 - 00:22:16.930

Claire Braz-Valentine: Well, I thought I'd focus on the new one because I did have a shot there with the other book last year, you know. Morton Marcus: I think it'd be a nice- I don't know if it's

00:22:16.930 - 00:22:28.000

contrast but a nice range of things. Claire, what what are you planning on doing on Tuesday? Claire Braz-Valentine: Well, I think if I don't read a few Godzilla poems, I'll be run out of town.

00:22:28.690 - 00:22:43.500

Morton Marcus: Hollywood certainly will be very unhappy. Claire Braz-Valentine: Yes, and I think I'm going to read some new things that I haven't read before. I've been working on some poems about my family. Which, you know, I'm kind of

00:22:43.530 - 00:22:51.230

tentative about but I think I'll bring them and probably do them. Morton Marcus: Do want to try one right now? Claire Braz-Valentine: I didn't want to bring them tonight. See, I left in a hurry.

00:22:51.650 - 00:23:00.350

Morton Marcus: You knew what I'd do. Claire Braz-Valentine: I know. Morton Marcus: You know me too well. What about a Godzilla poem? People have never heard one of Claire's Godzilla poem,

00:23:00.350 - 00:23:12.940

so they should. Claire Braz-Valentine: All right. I will read you the poem, Mort, that I wrote to get Godzilla out of my system, because he was popping up in a few of my poems and another poet

00:23:12.940 - 00:23:28.330

said, "Claire, just write a poem to him and get it over with and then you'll be done with that and you can go on." Well, it's, you know, that's when I opened the door and he came in and he's never left. So, this is the poem that started the total

00:23:28.330 - 00:23:41.700

obsession. I was trying to explain what you meant to me here. This is called, "Godzilla: The Messiah." GODZILLA THE MESSIAH Big green and sweating, he lumbers through the town, taking

00:23:41.730 - 00:23:59.790

a Sunday stroll. His little arms, swatting helicopters, his eyelids flapping slowly in the sunlight, one out of sync with the other. Godzilla is misunderstood. He's just an amphibian with a glandular problem looking for a good time.

00:24:00.210 - 00:24:17.100

He's fought off Mothra and a smog monster, he's picked up passenger trains to peer inside while looking for his friends and then drop them after a while, the trains never his friends. He's covered with warts. His legs are so fat, he

00:24:17.100 - 00:24:34.440

can barely walk anymore. His tail flies up at the oddest moments. And every time he leans on a building, it falls over. People run through the streets in terror at the mention of his name. His reputation has preceded him, he never gets a

00:24:34.440 - 00:24:52.980

party invitation, no one ever buys him a beer, he's never taken EST classes, he doesn't know his sign. Godzilla smokes and shits in the street. Godzilla belches fire. Godzilla isn't fooling when he gets angry, he's eaten all those

00:24:52.980 - 00:25:13.440

nuclear reactors in downtown Tokyo after all. But Godzilla serves his purpose, he's on a mission, he bears us a message. He levels Japanese cities in one afternoon, he vaporizes people, he kills innocents and then pretends he couldn't help it.

00:25:14.010 - 00:25:29.010

Godzilla is radioactive. Godzilla was sent to remind us, we are human, he isn't. Morton Marcus: And that last part is actually true. And that is how the Godzilla poems began was because they just kept

00:25:29.520 - 00:25:41.100

popping up in your psyche in different areas, party invitations and things like that. Claire Braz-Valentine: Yeah and he becomes more and more human. And- except, you know, in this last film, that one that you saw

00:25:41.100 - 00:25:48.480

today in the airplane. Morton Marcus: I didn't see it and I'll tell you why. I'm not going to mention the name of the airlines, they were charging $5 for the headset.

00:25:48.480 - 00:26:03.870

Claire Braz-Valentine: Oh, wasn't worth it, Mort. I'm glad. Morton Marcus: Economy "über alles." Anyway, how did it actually start? Do you remember the very, very first time when you said something like Godzilla lives or something?

00:26:04.980 - 00:26:23.640

Claire Braz-Valentine: Well, I think it's an unusual story, perhaps I shouldn't even tell you. My father was dying of cancer and he was very ill. And so, I was providing him with some herbs, quote, to help him get through his chemotherapy and

00:26:23.640 - 00:26:39.300

I was packaging these herbs. And at that time, there was a TV show called "Creature Features" and it took me in- I had, it was very hard for me to find these herbs, took a long time, but anyway, I'd had some connections through some graduate students.

00:26:39.810 - 00:26:56.640

And so, I tried one out one morning. At two in the morning as I was making this little package to mail to my father, and a Godzilla movie came on TV. And it was if I had an awakening, I realized that Godzilla was a monster that was

00:26:56.640 - 00:27:14.070

invented by the Japanese people as their answer to what we did to their cities, and something that they could control, you know. You make your joke out of your own worst nightmare. And I didn't continue with herbs but I continued with the view on

00:27:14.070 - 00:27:26.070

Godzilla and it was- he was never the same for me again. Morton Marcus: And- but in the Japanese films, he becomes more and more friendly, more humane, and the one with his child is just adorable.

00:27:26.070 - 00:27:41.360

Claire Braz-Valentine: Wonderful. Morton Marcus: Pretty amazing. Did I ever tell you- do you know why they made those Godzilla films? The Japanese film industry hired a whole load of miniature cabinet makers, that

00:27:41.360 - 00:27:56.660

is, they made miniatures because they could not show the Japanese landings all over Asia in World War II. These people would make miniatures of the islands and these cities that the Japanese were taking, so they were used in the film industry. When the

00:27:56.660 - 00:28:08.570

Americans walked in after the war, they had all of these hundreds of people with no jobs and so then they [unintelligible] [cross talk] Yeah, that's how it started. They could make Tokyo and then they could destroy it and make

00:28:08.570 - 00:28:17.750

it again. Anyways, that's a true story; that's my film historian's side. Claire Braz-Valentine: No, it didn't bore me. Morton Marcus: Bruce.

00:28:18.680 - 00:28:39.320

Bruce Cutler: Well, I'll come in with something that's very altogether human. We tend to forget that before Hitler invented National Socialism there was fascism, fascism was his model in some respects and that we tend to think of the

00:28:39.320 - 00:28:51.200

fascist as having been clowns and you know, stupid and all that, but actually they were not stupid, they were lucky. They were not stupid anymore than our politicians are stupid. Morton Marcus: Our politicians?

00:28:51.380 - 00:29:10.370

Bruce Cutler: Yes, of course. This is a piece of- this is a kind of a prose poem called "Final Examination" and it's a sort of my treatment of how town-gown relationships can make a difference. We know there's a lot of impetus nowadays to have

00:29:10.370 - 00:29:21.520

close relationships between the faculty and the community. And this is: FINAL EXAMINATION He's lucky. He's a young partisan who has been captured

00:29:21.790 - 00:29:39.100

not by the German SS, who have just arrived at the outskirts of Naples, but by the fascist police. He undergoes the usual beatings. The police commissioner holds an adjunct professorship in the University Law School. And after a few

00:29:39.100 - 00:29:53.590

hours hearing that the young partisan is a university student, he steps in and personally takes over the interrogation. After three days of questioning, the young partisans still remain silent. So the police commissioner makes

00:29:53.590 - 00:30:09.250

him an offer. He tells him that this will be his final examination. To complete it, he must choose between two alternatives: 1) If he betrays the hiding places of his comrades, he will be sentenced to death but the sentence will

00:30:09.250 - 00:30:24.550

not be carried out, he will live and eventually have his freedom. If the young partisan chooses this alternative, the police commissioner promises to plant false documents in the files, proving that the information came from other sources. In this

00:30:24.550 - 00:30:40.930

way, his reputation will remain untarnished. And in an anti-fascist victory, he will be in line for all the honors due a hero of the resistance. On the other hand, if the young partisan refuses to give him the information about his comrades,

00:30:41.290 - 00:30:54.490

the police commissioner tells him he's confident that in a few days, as a result of the terror caused by the arrival of the German SS, all his comrades will be rounded up, after which they will be shot.

00:31:38.730 - 00:34:50.610

Unknown: [music] Morton Marcus: And that of course was Billie Holiday singing, "God Save the Child." This is the Poetry Show and tonight our guests are Claire Braz-Valentine and Bruce Cutler

00:34:50.610 - 00:35:10.860

and music, very apropos, selected by our co-host Kim Nelson, because we have all been talking about war and certainly we are concerned with our children who will be the next warriors and no matter what culture we're coming from. As we

00:35:10.860 - 00:35:23.760

get back into this interview I- before we do, I want to make several announcements. First of all, Claire and Bruce are here tonight because they will be reading this coming Tuesday, November the 10th, at 8pm at the Bookshop Santa Cruz, as part of

00:35:23.760 - 00:35:37.410

the National Writers Union readings, monthly reading, so do make it. it'll be a marvelous reading, as I'm sure their presence here tonight makes clear. I also want to say that several nights later at the Thunderbird Bookstore in the

00:35:37.410 - 00:35:56.730

Barnyard in Carmel, Nancy Martin and Elliot Thompson will be reading for the National Writers Union down on the other side of the bay, so keep that in mind as well. And then this weekend, a premier event, which is something you really should know

00:35:56.730 - 00:36:12.180

about, I announced it last week. The Santa Cruz writer's retreat, which will take place on Friday, Saturday and Sunday at the Happy Valley Conference Center in Santa Cruz, California, and in which one of the many participants will be Claire

00:36:12.180 - 00:36:34.530

Braz-Valentine, such people as Robert Sward, Don Monkerude, Amber Coverdale Sumrall, Maude Meehan, just looking here, Phil Slater, as I said, Claire, Steve Turner, Jean and Jim Houston, just many, many people, Sandra March, the wonderful mystery

00:36:34.530 - 00:36:52.350

writer talking about language, that's Laurie King, just marvelous series, the several series that she has, and I would just urge you to find out more about this information. I'm looking for a telephone number here and I'm not finding it. Do

00:36:52.350 - 00:37:01.250

you happen to have one, Claire? Claire Braz-Valentine: No, I'm sorry, that's very bad that I didn't bring the phone number. It should be on that flyer [unintelligible] Juliet Chiapella(?).

00:37:01.430 - 00:37:28.460

Morton Marcus: Yeah. No, I don't see it here. I don't see it here. No, it's probably right down here. There it is. Okay, if you want more information about the Santa Cruz Writer's Retreat, it's 469-3764, 469-3764 or 469-7874, 469-7874. And already,

00:37:28.760 - 00:37:38.510

Claire, you said that there are 200 people signed up? Claire Braz-Valentine: I think so. Morton Marcus: It should be quite an event and we're all looking forward to seeing you there, so try to make it down.

00:37:40.460 - 00:37:59.870

We just ended with a devastating poem by Bruce from his new book, which is, "Seeing the Darkness." And Claire said during the break, I've had a call that I want to put in a sort of a segue, so why don't you tell us about that?

00:38:00.050 - 00:38:17.630

Claire Braz-Valentine: Okay, the last poem that Bruce read he had mentioned a gun and it's amazing to me sometimes how things just sort of fit together, even though mine is quite a bit different, but I offer workshops in the state prisons, I think

00:38:17.630 - 00:38:35.360

you know that, Mort. And I'm always affected by the fact that the prisons have such beautiful gardens, they're tended by the inmates and I always walk through the garden when I go into Soledad prison to meet with my writing class. And I would

00:38:35.360 - 00:38:51.680

like to say a special hello to those men in my poetry, class in Soledad and this is a poem called: PRISON GARDEN The soil beneath is almost clean, no leaf, no petal is

00:38:51.680 - 00:39:13.250

allowed to rest here. The blue clothed inmates work in the garden and talk to the plants, sweet voices, soft. The guard above them in the tower has a gun pointed down there. Nothing is left to chance, there are no excuses in prison. When you are

00:39:13.250 - 00:39:33.200

given a job, you do it exactly as you are told. You do not ask questions. The guard has spent his weekend at rifle practice. These roses are an easy target, every bush, every flower is a perfect specimen. There are not enough branches for the roses.

00:39:33.200 - 00:39:54.290

There are so many blooms. These roses are not stupid, they know where they are, what they are meant to do. An M-16 rifle is better than Miracle Gro any day at Soledad prison. Morton Marcus: Good. Now let's see, can you think of a poem

00:39:54.290 - 00:40:09.930

Bruce that would just continue this series? Impossible situations, this is the thing guests hate- oh my lord, what's he doing now? Claire Braz-Valentine: No, but there is a different side to the

00:40:09.930 - 00:40:30.690

book I wrote which is what happens you know when after the hostilities are over and people begin to pick up the pieces of their life again. And it's not easy because the destruction and the chaos that follow any kind of a war aren't helped when

00:40:30.720 - 00:40:50.940

you're officially not, you know a friendly country so therefore, you just live the best way you can. This is a poem called, "Wheel." It's an institutional poem, Claire, a different kind of institution, however, and you'll get some idea about it.

00:40:50.940 - 00:41:09.000

There's a reference here to General Juin who was the commanding general of the French provincial force of Goums, those were northern North African Berber troops who were very good fighters but had a terrible reputation when they hit town.

00:41:09.720 - 00:41:27.130

Bruce Cutler: THE WHEEL Outside: night. You can barely breathe. There's a howl down at the end of the street, the blind end where the Goums of General Juin are dancing with daggers in their mouths. A mandolin is

00:41:27.130 - 00:41:49.570

gutting right along against their stream of Berber curses. Around, above and room after room in blackness, babies, our a little hopes, cry, fall silent, cry, fall silent, tentative as candles, flickering, fading out. The door of the convent of the

00:41:49.570 - 00:42:06.340

Little Sisters is lit but signed off limits. Those who know say there are days when if you knock, you'll hear, "What do you want?" You say, "One blessing, sister," and a door will open in the wall, you can put your little hope inside and the door

00:42:06.340 - 00:42:22.210

closes, and the wheel within that wall will turn. And suddenly your little hope is gone, gone to the other side. Some of the girls come carrying their hopes all the way back from the German labor camps. Most of them get their hopes

00:42:22.210 - 00:42:40.150

right here. No matter, the wheel turns, their hopes go off, they disappear. But you, you stand right here, you want to know what happens to a hope. It's a mystery, the sisters say, it's not to ask. But you aren't dancing, and you don't want to

00:42:40.150 - 00:42:55.780

dance, you want to know. Morton Marcus: Are you going to be reading any new poems written after the book on Tuesday as well as the book? Claire Braz-Valentine: Oh, I haven't thought about that. I've

00:42:55.810 - 00:43:15.310

got- the new poems that I've been working on are kind of long, and they're nice poems. I like them, but they're not really organized for a half-hour reading. There's a series titled, "The Fifth Gospel," I have this curious hubris. And I

00:43:15.310 - 00:43:36.160

thought maybe what we really needed in religion was not four gospels but five, and I supply the fifth. And one part of it has been published already and another part is being published next year. But you know, it's a lot of work to do these things,

00:43:36.160 - 00:43:47.300

you have to sort of have a bit of an evening of one thing, and otherwise it doesn't fit very well. Morton Marcus: Don't you say it's a lot of work? I think people out there might be interested in just how long it

00:43:47.840 - 00:44:01.590

takes you to write a poem, but also how long it took you to write, "Seeing the Darkness? Claire Braz-Valentine: Well, hmm. Yeah, I always enter into these things with this naive thought that well, you know, I'm

00:44:01.590 - 00:44:16.770

gonna start and then by Christmas something will be there you know. Many Christmases pass and I was inching along like a snail and I have a lot of things that I've started and don't like and a few things that I think I've finished and it's

00:44:16.770 - 00:44:39.210

not enough. There are two ways, there are two dimensions I think in art and each has a pull on the artist and they're really not easy or even maybe possible to reconcile. One comes from trying to deal with the present, doing something that would have

00:44:39.210 - 00:44:54.720

some kind of influence with people right now, like with you and you. And so, you know, you get it published and then people talk about it and maybe they like it and maybe they don't like it and so on and so forth, but it's in the time now and

00:44:54.810 - 00:45:08.160

there's a lot of pressure to do that, you know, you feel like you should be producing. But then there's another side of it, where it doesn't really make much difference whether you do very much now or not, I mean, a lot of great, really great poets

00:45:08.160 - 00:45:22.940

have done very little in their times. And after they were dead suddenly, "But hey, that's a good one right there." I'm counting on it. I always heard you know, that in the cemetery in Rome, where John

00:45:22.940 - 00:45:39.680

Keats is buried, his gravestone carries his famous inscription which he wanted and have carved on it and but I had never thought that by going there and looking at it would be so moving. But here he is buried next to his friend Joseph

00:45:39.680 - 00:45:57.440

Severn. And on his gravestone is written, "Here lies one whose name was writ in water." Poor guy, he just died, he never knew, it wasn't worth it. So, of course, in the process of time, a lot of stuff gets lost too. I mean, there are poets that you

00:45:57.440 - 00:46:09.630

wouldn't want to know about in the last hundred years and then they fade out and that's the gamble. Morton Marcus: Well, what does this have to do with whether it will be good to be a famous poet?

00:46:11.700 - 00:46:29.550

Claire Braz-Valentine: I can recall several famous poets in our time who have come like the Halley's Comet across the firmament then disappeared. I can remember when I started writing, I was one of Robert Lowell's first- when he first

00:46:29.550 - 00:46:49.770

came to Iowa, I was one of his students, and I thought he was a terrible teacher but I thought he's a wonderful man and very interesting. And you had to really try hard, you know, to get what he was after. But then, the really well-known or

00:46:49.770 - 00:47:02.380

favorite poems of that time, he was not yet what he became later, have all disappeared. I mean, they're not there anymore. Morton Marcus: And, "The Mills of the Kavanaughs," "Lord Weary's Castle."

00:47:02.380 - 00:47:17.800

Bruce Cutler: He wrote, "The Mills of the Kavanaughs," the year I was there. But I mean, who Winfield Townley Scott? Remember Winfield Townley Scott? Not very many people remember- Morton Marcus: John Holmes, I was just in Boston, John Holmes-

00:47:18.200 - 00:47:31.400

Bruce Cutler: That's not to say they weren't, you know, good poets and all but it's humbling to watch people come and go. I mean, Carl Shapiro was the big one, the big voice of the Second World War, became editor of Poetry, became the poetry

00:47:31.400 - 00:47:44.570

consultant to the Library of Congress. I still think he's a wonderful poet, but he's still here in California, you know. Morton Marcus: Years for years in Davis and no one knew he was here. It's amazing. Yeah, yeah. So, it doesn't mean anything,

00:47:44.570 - 00:47:58.730

right? Claire Braz-Valentine: Well, it just means that in the famous words of the donut shop, keep your eye upon the donut and not upon the hole because, I mean, you really, you can't judge how

00:47:58.730 - 00:48:05.120

it's going to play out in 100 years, all you can do is do your best. Morton Marcus: There you go. Bruce Cutler: And that's the only thing you can do.

00:48:05.510 - 00:48:14.330

Morton Marcus: That's the best advice to a young poet out there you can think of. That's it and you do it because you have to do it. Claire Braz-Valentine: Unfortunately, when you get my age, it gets a

00:48:14.330 - 00:48:29.650

little obsessive. Yeah, I like to say I get up in the morning and make a lot of choices, but I definitely [unidentified] looking at something I've got to work on. Morton Marcus: Claire, next weekend at Santa Cruz Writer's

00:48:29.650 - 00:48:44.710

Retreat, what do you think you're going to be doing there? What are you offering? Claire Braz-Valentine: I'm actually doing two workshops in theater: one on Saturday, Writing Theater for Young

00:48:44.710 - 00:49:05.140

People, which will be a lot of fun. I actually am a Spectre Plus Artists so I am a playwright in residence at a middle school in Watsonville, which is a great joy. And then the one on Sunday morning will be Writing Theater for Adults.

00:49:05.440 - 00:49:14.560

And I'll be talking about 10 minute plays, 1x, 2x. And I'll be giving a reading and you'll be giving a reading, what night is your reading? Morton Marcus: I'm gonna be reading Saturday.

00:49:15.250 - 00:49:29.570

Claire Braz-Valentine: I'll be reading Friday, so maybe we'll get a chance to hear each other. Yeah, that would be nice. Morton Marcus: Actually, I have to be in San Francisco for an interview, so I couldn't make Friday. Okay, well, I think we

00:49:29.570 - 00:49:43.610

got to hear more poems. It's ten off nine already, Claire. Claire Braz-Valentine: Okay. Well, Bruce was talking about how things live on, and will we live on. I have one poem that I just love because, and this is the original that was returned

00:49:43.610 - 00:49:58.940

to me. It won second prize in the county fair, and I have a red ribbon for it. And it hangs above my computer and it's like, I had entered a pig or something, you know, and it won. Now, I would have liked it to be a red ribbon, but I mean a blue

00:49:58.940 - 00:50:14.150

ribbon, but actually David Swanger won that blue ribbon, so that was fine, I went along with that. He had a very good poem. But this was the year we had to write something about our county. And so this is called:

00:50:14.170 - 00:50:32.950

WAITING FOR WHALES: DAVENPORT, CALIFORNIA The same sea as yesterday, the day before. There is no difference yet whales slide underneath, away from our eyes. They are as gentle as airships, nearly touching each other in

00:50:32.950 - 00:50:54.490

excitement as they journey to the warm waters of their lovemaking. The moving blanket of blue satin hides them, where they whisper promises of fidelity and faithfulness, while you and I are quiet. Underneath, in these secret hallways, the

00:50:54.490 - 00:51:09.400

whales glide together, a solemn procession. They are bethrothed, they trust one another, they know nothing but love. I don't want my life without you. Morton Marcus: Beautiful.

00:51:09.700 - 00:51:24.760

Claire Braz-Valentine: Thank you. Morton Marcus: Bruce? Bruce Cutler: Okay, well this is my vegetable poem. One thing about Naples is that horrible things happen, but everybody

00:51:24.760 - 00:51:44.620

tries to have dinner. And that's not always without irony but at any rate, and one of the first things to come back where the markets, although there wasn't much to be sold, and after you know about a year or year and a half, things did begin to appear

00:51:44.620 - 00:51:58.440

in the market. So, this is a rather famous market in Naples, a place called Porta Capuana, where the prison and where the courts are. And this is: THE MARKET AT PORTA CAPUANA

00:52:00.160 - 00:52:19.390

The market at Porta Capuana comes out of the ground, comes out before sunrise with a "scrip, scrip" of bicycles, "zomp" of a handcart's iron stumps, "ish" of willow baskets. Little moons of breath breakout in the dying night air, oofa(?)

00:52:19.840 - 00:52:42.160

the potatoes. Oof, the tomatoes. Your mattress is full of lumps. You know the dark carnations are moving in. In the mouths of shopfronts, squids spread out like soap lather. A zoot suit hangs in public execution, voices argue and they rise

00:52:42.160 - 00:53:02.410

halfway to music. It is the moment when outraged ostrich feathers are arrayed against the cheese in bulbous bunkers. When Zeppelin's of watermelons zero in the pendant powers of salami, when someone starts to sing, a fifth floor window opens.

00:53:02.920 - 00:53:24.340

Reparations, restorations rise in jugs of wine and oil, pasta angel hair and very pure egg noodle stars. Morton Marcus: Great. Bruce, another one. Claire Braz-Valentine: Well okay, since we're in the food

00:53:24.340 - 00:53:36.700

category here. It's not- most Americans don't like to eat anything like an eel, but it's one of the things you learn to eat when you're in Italy, particularly in Naples. And so, this poem is titled

00:53:36.730 - 00:53:51.070

Bruce Cutler: EATING AN EEL He's not your everyday catch, your eel, he doesn't think so either. From the tip of your net, he's all whip and thrust, a kind of slippery missile on its second phase, then he's out of

00:53:51.070 - 00:54:11.470

your hands and into the cradle, 1800 grams of him. His model skin, slick as a piston as he flashes the feathery aileron of his tail, and zooms and flips and tucks in maydays of evasive action, decoded on his microdata brain. In, out, around, through,

00:54:11.560 - 00:54:33.460

arrive, alive, survive, survive. He has eaten his way through at least two lives, spawned in the South Atlantic, he fingers over its alps toward Eldorado and the Spaniards would take him them as a chub for supper snacks with lemon salt. But the ocean yawns,

00:54:33.460 - 00:54:49.810

the nets are thin, other plans have made him. In a couple of years he's knocking around in pools of sharks near Baltimore and New Orleans, working his way up river, taking the fresh water like a retriever. You'd think he was one of the catfish sunfish

00:54:49.810 - 00:55:07.690

gang. But in his heart, there's a tiny tag that reads, thank God that I'm Italian and he's off again sounding in the wake of the SS Rafaello. At Gibraltar, there's a welcome hint of porpoises and camel piss. Farther out the squid and

00:55:07.690 - 00:55:28.480

octopus are inking in. Now it's the social amenities that count, crowds of mullet, caravans of tuna, greening parks of prawns, plus the insistent marsh and sun and salt, marsh and sun and salt. And he's there, right in your net. Well, not quite. There

00:55:28.480 - 00:55:43.900

has to have been at least one shudder in his white and tender flesh, in the spreading of his jaws, in letting the slick and slightly barleyed swamp water sluice a thumb of anchovy in, in the shocks that are the wonder of his skin, which is both home

00:55:43.900 - 00:56:02.770

and habitat. At least one, you think as you hold him fast in yesterday's newspaper, cut his hissing head off. Gut him, cut him into little dancing sections. You see how he's alive in all his bones? He is your meat.

00:56:07.370 - 00:56:21.230

I have to say that, you know, the last poem in this book, which is a little long to read, but it's really not a very nice poem, but people- eating is a kind of obsession, particularly with people who have been through a lot of terrible

00:56:21.230 - 00:56:35.840

events, you know, and they- and eating a meal is, well, I mean, there's a sort of fable there, right? But eating your grandfather's, I think so you have to buy the book to understand what I'm referring to, but the last poem is,

00:56:35.840 - 00:56:53.500

"Grandfather's Tale." And it's a kind of a well-known fable in Naples about that. Morton Marcus: And that book is, "Seeing the Darkness," and will be on sale and Bruce will sign copies of it this Tuesday. But

00:56:53.680 - 00:57:04.180

with the moments that are left with Claire, how about another poem or two? Claire Braz-Valentine: Okay, I'll just read one last poem. And this is- since Bruce's reading about eating, this is a

00:57:04.180 - 00:57:16.850

poem in which Godzilla gives us directions about what not to eat. It's called: THE SECRET OF LIFE Godzilla passed through the town the other day, and I asked him

00:57:16.850 - 00:57:37.790

the secret of life. "Keep your own nest clean," he said. Stand tall, be brave enough to protect those you love. Watch out for low telephone wires, try not to lean against old buildings. Never eat radioactive waste, keep your tail out of the gutter

00:57:38.030 - 00:57:55.390

and try not to step on the good people." Morton Marcus: Thank you. That was Claire Braz-Valentine, who along with Bruce Cutler were our guests tonight. And again, they were our guests tonight, they've been guests here before and will

00:57:55.390 - 00:58:13.000

be here again. Because on Tuesday night, November the 10th at 8pm, they will be reading at the Bookshop Santa Cruz by Cruz. I urge you to attend, I think you will love it. Also, I want to remind you about the Santa Cruz Writer's Retreat, call

00:58:13.000 - 00:58:32.620

469-3764, around 20 Santa Cruz writers of all different genre taking part in this. And I want to remind you to stay tuned after this for Billy Harris's "From the Bookshelf." Kathy Chetkovitch will be reading to us from her book, "Friendly

00:58:32.620 - 00:58:38.380

Fire." Paul Koecher, thank you once more for making this such a smooth show. See you soon, folks.