1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:03,720 Seán Hewitt: The Glimpse. 2 00:00:05,820 --> 00:00:08,370 Martina Evans: And I realized poetry can do everything. So if it 3 00:00:08,370 --> 00:00:14,820 was point of view, if it was plot, if it was dialogue, character, I 4 00:00:14,820 --> 00:00:18,030 could find them in all the poems. And that was a real revelation to 5 00:00:18,030 --> 00:00:18,360 me. 6 00:00:20,370 --> 00:00:23,100 Seán Hewitt: Welcome to The Glimpse, I'm your host Seán Hewitt. 7 00:00:23,820 --> 00:00:29,280 Martina Evans treasures voice, humor, and cats in her works. She's 8 00:00:29,280 --> 00:00:33,690 the author of 13 books of poetry and prose. Her latest narrative 9 00:00:33,690 --> 00:00:37,320 poem, "The Coming Thing," was shortlisted for the Derek Walcott 10 00:00:37,320 --> 00:00:42,420 Prize for Poetry, born in Cork and now living in London, Martina is 11 00:00:42,420 --> 00:00:46,290 the poetry critic for The Irish Times and our guest today on The 12 00:00:46,290 --> 00:00:46,980 Glimpse. 13 00:00:51,010 --> 00:00:54,760 In her poems, Martina Evans has one of the most distinctive voices I 14 00:00:54,760 --> 00:01:00,070 know: self-deprecating, demotic, erudite, but never showy, rich with 15 00:01:00,070 --> 00:01:04,930 a humor that sings off the page. To listen to Martina read is to feel 16 00:01:04,960 --> 00:01:09,400 animated, to feel in the best company, to be sat down and told 17 00:01:09,400 --> 00:01:13,510 wonderful gossip, to feel voices from history and daily life 18 00:01:13,540 --> 00:01:19,840 revivified in an almost uncanny way. Witty, humane, subversive and 19 00:01:19,840 --> 00:01:24,700 always attuned to the minutiae of the spoken word, these poems fill 20 00:01:24,700 --> 00:01:29,320 our heads with voices that are indelible. Welcome. Martina, thank 21 00:01:29,320 --> 00:01:30,040 you for being here. 22 00:01:30,550 --> 00:01:31,390 Martina Evans: Thank you, Sean, 23 00:01:30,620 --> 00:01:34,936 Seán Hewitt: The thing I love about all of your poems is how I can hear 24 00:01:31,000 --> 00:01:34,660 Martina Evans: Absolutely. I just love the sound of the way people 25 00:01:34,660 --> 00:02:00,940 speak, what they don't say, how they circle around the subtext, the 26 00:01:35,011 --> 00:01:39,700 you so clearly in the voice of them, even when the voice is the 27 00:01:39,774 --> 00:01:44,389 voice of another person or an animal. And I wanted to start by 28 00:01:44,463 --> 00:01:49,376 asking you about how those voices come to you and how you go about 29 00:01:49,450 --> 00:01:51,460 capturing them on the page. 30 00:02:00,940 --> 00:02:07,120 music of a voice. And I'm very interested in place, the way place 31 00:02:07,210 --> 00:02:10,780 and voice are connected. Place runs through the voice. 32 00:02:11,170 --> 00:02:14,290 Seán Hewitt: I think the idea of a of the human voice as an instrument 33 00:02:14,500 --> 00:02:18,610 is a really great one. And I think it captures something about how you 34 00:02:18,610 --> 00:02:23,290 go about, you know, learning the instrumentation of capturing a 35 00:02:23,290 --> 00:02:28,000 voice and dialect and the way people speak, and that comes 36 00:02:28,000 --> 00:02:31,600 through in the poems: not only just in the sort of language that they 37 00:02:31,600 --> 00:02:35,740 use, but even in intonation and syntax and the way you punctuate a 38 00:02:35,740 --> 00:02:41,590 poem. And I wondered if, if you would call it research, the sort of 39 00:02:41,740 --> 00:02:46,570 eavesdropping or reading that you do to try and capture a voice. 40 00:02:46,000 --> 00:02:49,690 Martina Evans: Yes, I honestly think it's something you inherit. 41 00:02:49,690 --> 00:02:53,260 Because I think my mother comes in a lot to this, because one of the 42 00:02:53,260 --> 00:02:58,180 things I absolutely love is cockney, cockney language and how 43 00:02:58,180 --> 00:03:01,870 it keeps changing, and it's very much influenced by the West Indian 44 00:03:01,900 --> 00:03:07,600 music. You know, since the early 20th century, there's a huge change 45 00:03:07,630 --> 00:03:13,240 in how Londoners speak, and I think it's just absolutely wonderful. And 46 00:03:13,240 --> 00:03:16,630 I would love to be able to put that into writing, but I know I'd get it 47 00:03:16,630 --> 00:03:21,220 wrong. You know, if I tried to speak with a Cockney accent, or 48 00:03:21,220 --> 00:03:24,880 even if I was trying to do Northern Ireland, I might be able to get one 49 00:03:24,880 --> 00:03:29,200 or two or three words right, but I wouldn't attempt to do a monologue, 50 00:03:29,740 --> 00:03:32,380 because just wouldn't hear it right. 51 00:03:32,620 --> 00:03:37,990 And, you know, I started in Cork, and like you, Sean, you started 52 00:03:37,990 --> 00:03:41,920 your Irish sojourn in Cork, and then went to Dublin. And as soon as 53 00:03:41,920 --> 00:03:45,400 I went to Dublin, they were taking off my Cork accent, but I could 54 00:03:45,400 --> 00:03:47,710 hear they weren't getting it right. And of course, then I came to 55 00:03:47,710 --> 00:03:51,670 London, where they take off Irish accents. And of course, to a 56 00:03:51,670 --> 00:03:55,450 native, when someone tries to do somebody else's accent, it sounds 57 00:03:55,450 --> 00:04:02,710 so bad. I used to just feel sorry for them, rather than angry. So I 58 00:04:02,710 --> 00:04:05,620 think there's a sensitivity there, and it's affected my writing, 59 00:04:05,620 --> 00:04:08,860 actually, because at the beginning, I was writing a lot more novels, 60 00:04:08,860 --> 00:04:12,430 and I did find it frustrating because I realized I had to stick 61 00:04:12,430 --> 00:04:14,680 close to the voice I knew. 62 00:04:15,730 --> 00:04:18,400 Seán Hewitt: And one of the things that you do more than a lot of 63 00:04:18,400 --> 00:04:23,740 poets, I think, is inject humor into the poems and also work with 64 00:04:23,830 --> 00:04:28,240 narrative. Was that something that you always felt drawn to in the 65 00:04:28,240 --> 00:04:35,200 poem? Humor is, I think, more than comedy in your poems, because it is 66 00:04:35,200 --> 00:04:39,730 also a way of getting to the heart of the local, the particular 67 00:04:39,730 --> 00:04:45,070 grievances of a person or the character of a person. Did you 68 00:04:45,070 --> 00:04:47,170 start off with narratives? 69 00:04:47,510 --> 00:04:49,580 Martina Evans: That's what I wanted. That's what I thought I 70 00:04:49,580 --> 00:04:53,450 would write. I, you know--poetry didn't occur to me because I 71 00:04:53,450 --> 00:04:57,950 thought that was just a specialized thing that I wouldn't be equipped 72 00:04:57,950 --> 00:05:02,060 for. And I had... even though I Ioved poetry, you know, novels were 73 00:05:02,060 --> 00:05:08,930 what I was attracted to. And I think in a way, over decades, I 74 00:05:08,930 --> 00:05:14,750 have somehow come back to writing novels and poems. They are related, 75 00:05:15,200 --> 00:05:19,730 and I think gradually I am mixing the two together. And I had to find 76 00:05:19,730 --> 00:05:22,820 my own form and the long narrative poems to mix the two of them 77 00:05:22,820 --> 00:05:26,720 together. But I think with some of my poems, I think, are kind of 78 00:05:26,720 --> 00:05:29,660 related to those kind of Irish laments that can be kind of funny 79 00:05:29,660 --> 00:05:33,050 as well. And when I'm being funny, I'm being very, very serious, 80 00:05:33,650 --> 00:05:37,850 really, I know it's when I'm at my most serious, because humor is a 81 00:05:37,850 --> 00:05:41,840 way of dealing with things, isn't it? Difficult things. And I think 82 00:05:41,840 --> 00:05:43,610 it's like a kind of gallows humor. 83 00:05:43,000 --> 00:05:47,050 Seán Hewitt: Yeah, I think that's right, that comes through so, so 84 00:05:47,050 --> 00:05:50,050 well in your poems, that I love the idea of a poem as kind of a 85 00:05:50,050 --> 00:05:56,320 crystallized form of everything you might do in a novel. You know, we 86 00:05:56,410 --> 00:06:00,640 began by speaking about instrumentation, or the voice as an 87 00:06:00,640 --> 00:06:07,450 instrument, and the musicality or or the rhythm of poetry must be a 88 00:06:07,450 --> 00:06:12,670 great source of opportunity for capturing story and voice in a way 89 00:06:12,670 --> 00:06:17,500 that I know you can have musical prose or poetic prose, but perhaps 90 00:06:17,590 --> 00:06:21,130 poetry lends itself to speaking in voices? 91 00:06:21,840 --> 00:06:24,420 Martina Evans: Yes, I think it does. And I think we have to 92 00:06:24,420 --> 00:06:28,830 remember that the novel is such a new form. You know, in the early 93 00:06:28,830 --> 00:06:32,160 part of the 19th century, Walter Scott and Byron, they were the best 94 00:06:32,160 --> 00:06:35,340 sellers with their long narrative poems like Don Juan. 95 00:06:35,660 --> 00:06:38,540 Seán Hewitt: Yeah, I think, you know, we forget the recent 96 00:06:38,540 --> 00:06:43,310 popularity of of poetry, by which I mean, not only in the 19th century, 97 00:06:43,310 --> 00:06:47,780 but a sort of resurgence that we're having now, particularly now, I 98 00:06:47,780 --> 00:06:53,180 think that's driven by poetry as a spoken form, and the acceptance of 99 00:06:53,180 --> 00:06:57,890 poetry as a form of speaking, or song, as it might have been called. 100 00:06:58,970 --> 00:07:03,410 For our listeners, full disclosure, I used to work with Martina 101 00:07:03,500 --> 00:07:07,250 reviewing poetry for The Irish Times. and aside from everything 102 00:07:07,250 --> 00:07:11,240 else, one of my favorite parts of that job was having phone calls 103 00:07:11,300 --> 00:07:17,210 with Martina, and Martina would give me updates on the cats. So 104 00:07:17,210 --> 00:07:22,070 I am delighted to hear directly from one of them in this poem 105 00:07:22,070 --> 00:07:23,630 today, Martina, would you read it for us? 106 00:07:23,000 --> 00:07:28,340 Martina Evans: "The Day My Cat Spoke to Me" for Geraldine More 107 00:07:28,430 --> 00:07:29,090 O'Ferrell 108 00:07:30,440 --> 00:07:32,180 I was surprised not so much by the fact that she spoke but by the high 109 00:07:32,180 --> 00:07:39,230 opinion she had of me. 'I think you're great,' she said and it was 110 00:07:39,230 --> 00:07:43,760 at this point I looked at her in surprise. 'I mean,' she continued 111 00:07:44,090 --> 00:07:47,840 'the way you've managed to write anything at all! Fourteen court 112 00:07:47,840 --> 00:07:51,230 hearings and that horrible barrister, the way she looked at 113 00:07:51,230 --> 00:07:55,040 you.' 'But you weren't there.' I said. 'Oh, but I can imagine it,' 114 00:07:55,040 --> 00:07:59,330 said, Eileen, her yellow eyes opening wide before narrowing into 115 00:07:59,330 --> 00:08:04,220 benevolent slits. 'I only had to look at you, gulping down your red 116 00:08:04,220 --> 00:08:07,760 lentil soup when you came home after nearly three hours in the 117 00:08:07,760 --> 00:08:12,200 witness box defending your right to write.Did anyone ever hear the 118 00:08:12,200 --> 00:08:17,330 like? I could see it all in every swallow you took, her butty legs 119 00:08:17,330 --> 00:08:20,840 and her manly shoulders in that black suit, did she have dandruff? 120 00:08:21,410 --> 00:08:26,000 I hope not, because it really shows up on black. Saying those things to 121 00:08:26,000 --> 00:08:30,050 you. Oh Miss Cotter we would all like the luxury of sitting at home 122 00:08:30,050 --> 00:08:34,460 writing books! Holding up paper evidence between finger and thumb 123 00:08:34,790 --> 00:08:38,810 Here is another job you failed to get, Miss Cotter. Trying to make 124 00:08:38,810 --> 00:08:42,680 you go out to work with radiation in a hospital and who would take 125 00:08:42,680 --> 00:08:47,330 care of us? What would the cats of this house do without the sound of 126 00:08:47,330 --> 00:08:52,190 your pen scratching on paper, the hum of your computer, your lovely 127 00:08:52,190 --> 00:08:56,600 lap and the sound of you on the telephone? The big dyed blond head 128 00:08:56,600 --> 00:09:00,470 of her! And where did she think she was going? Well earning a lot of 129 00:09:00,470 --> 00:09:03,950 money for her own words by the looks of things. And saying them to 130 00:09:03,950 --> 00:09:08,600 you! The best writer that ever heaved a can of Tuna or opened a 131 00:09:08,600 --> 00:09:13,130 pack of Science Plan. And as Mary Jenkins said about him who paid for 132 00:09:13,130 --> 00:09:17,180 the horrible utterances. It's just as well that Shakespeare wasn't 133 00:09:17,180 --> 00:09:18,020 married to him. 134 00:09:19,220 --> 00:09:23,240 And then when he was in the witness box, he wished you the best of luck 135 00:09:23,240 --> 00:09:27,950 with your writing...' At this point, Eileen paused, closed her 136 00:09:27,950 --> 00:09:32,900 eyes I was waiting for her to say something witty herself. After all 137 00:09:32,900 --> 00:09:37,100 it was a great opportunity for irony which for some reason I have 138 00:09:37,100 --> 00:09:39,050 always associated with cats. 139 00:09:40,040 --> 00:09:43,940 But when she opened her eyes again she requested a scoop of softened 140 00:09:43,940 --> 00:09:48,530 butter after which she licked her lips in detail and hasn't opened 141 00:09:48,530 --> 00:09:53,720 her mouth since if you don't count, yawning, lapping, eating, washing, 142 00:09:53,810 --> 00:09:56,930 miaowing and screeching at intruders. 143 00:09:56,000 --> 00:10:03,290 Seán Hewitt: I love the poem so much, I think it does exactly what 144 00:10:03,290 --> 00:10:06,980 you said your poems do you know it's it has a sort of 145 00:10:07,010 --> 00:10:11,210 telling-it-slant thing going on. It's both funny and serious, 146 00:10:11,210 --> 00:10:16,880 because in some ways it's about the cat Eileen, but in other ways it's 147 00:10:16,880 --> 00:10:20,240 about the speaker's relationship to the cat. It's about the things we 148 00:10:20,240 --> 00:10:25,850 know beyond words about animals or things that we spend time with. But 149 00:10:25,850 --> 00:10:28,940 then in other ways, it's also an account of a life or a period of a 150 00:10:28,940 --> 00:10:33,500 life. There's so much going on there, told through this conceit of 151 00:10:33,500 --> 00:10:37,370 the cat speaking. Did you know where the poem was going when you 152 00:10:37,370 --> 00:10:42,110 started it? I kind of want to know how it arrived. Was it a day with 153 00:10:42,110 --> 00:10:45,050 the cat? You know, were you just sitting beside the cat? Or, you 154 00:10:45,050 --> 00:10:47,240 know, how did this, this poem, come into being? 155 00:10:47,900 --> 00:10:51,830 Martina Evans: I know exactly how it came about, because I'd been in 156 00:10:51,830 --> 00:10:55,820 court a lot, and it had worn me down. And there were many kind of 157 00:10:55,850 --> 00:10:59,870 prongs to the attacks in court, and one of them was that I should be 158 00:10:59,870 --> 00:11:06,050 back at work in my old job as a radiographer. But at that time, I 159 00:11:06,050 --> 00:11:10,040 was working on the second novel. I was teaching creative writing, and 160 00:11:10,040 --> 00:11:14,720 I had a young daughter to take care of, so if the other side were 161 00:11:14,720 --> 00:11:18,680 sending me all these ads for jobs, many of them I wasn't qualified to 162 00:11:18,680 --> 00:11:24,020 do in radiography and, you know, my legal team said it doesn't going to 163 00:11:24,020 --> 00:11:26,270 matter, because they're going to have their day in court with you. 164 00:11:26,270 --> 00:11:29,810 You're going to have to go in and be in the witness box and take all 165 00:11:29,810 --> 00:11:35,270 this stuff and answer it, which was just awful. And this actually 166 00:11:35,270 --> 00:11:39,110 happened to me in real life, in fact, during the court hearing at 167 00:11:39,110 --> 00:11:43,190 one stage, the only time that I took her unawares was when I said, 168 00:11:43,220 --> 00:11:44,690 "Why are you being so mean to me?" 169 00:11:46,760 --> 00:11:50,990 So anyway, that is put away, right? I had that experience, you know, 170 00:11:51,020 --> 00:11:54,650 you get on with things. And I was in the roof studio of the City Lit, 171 00:11:54,650 --> 00:11:59,870 which is a flagship adult ed College in London, and a very well 172 00:11:59,870 --> 00:12:02,870 loved place where they teach everything from Kung Fu to dancing 173 00:12:02,870 --> 00:12:07,040 to poetry. And I had a great class and they'd write every week. And 174 00:12:07,040 --> 00:12:10,580 then I I thought, "Oh, I'll bring the Frank O'Hara one, you know, 175 00:12:10,580 --> 00:12:14,930 where, where the sun speaks to Frank O'Hara and tells him, 'you 176 00:12:14,930 --> 00:12:17,810 know, you're quite good, you're one of the good poets, and keep on 177 00:12:17,810 --> 00:12:20,750 doing what you're doing.'" And I thought it would be quite good if 178 00:12:20,750 --> 00:12:25,760 they got somebody, the sun or a inanimate object, to address them. 179 00:12:25,760 --> 00:12:30,080 And it was the first time my class were struck dumb. They couldn't 180 00:12:30,080 --> 00:12:30,500 write. 181 00:12:30,780 --> 00:12:34,860 So I got on the 38 big, red double decker bus, sitting there thinking, 182 00:12:35,460 --> 00:12:39,720 "Why couldn't they write," you know?And then I found myself 183 00:12:40,020 --> 00:12:44,640 pulling out my folder, and I began to write. And, of course, it was 184 00:12:44,640 --> 00:12:48,030 all the feelings that I had stored up from my court experience; just 185 00:12:48,030 --> 00:12:52,110 came out. But it was because I felt I wanted them to write it, and they 186 00:12:52,110 --> 00:12:55,830 wouldn't write it. So my attitude on the bus was, well, I'll do it. 187 00:12:56,400 --> 00:12:58,290 Seán Hewitt: Yeah, I think sometimes it's a great challenge to 188 00:12:58,290 --> 00:13:00,210 throw yourself, you know, especially if you spend a lot of 189 00:13:00,210 --> 00:13:03,600 time teaching, you know, you come up with these exercises. I do it 190 00:13:03,600 --> 00:13:08,550 too, and then I think, "Oh, could I actually do that?" But I think you 191 00:13:08,550 --> 00:13:13,230 pulled it off brilliantly. Do you often find yourself having that 192 00:13:13,230 --> 00:13:17,070 experience where you read poems or you listen to music, or you know, 193 00:13:17,070 --> 00:13:21,420 you see a piece of art or a film and a poem is jogged out of you. 194 00:13:21,420 --> 00:13:26,100 Or, you know, you open a dialogue with another piece of art. Is that 195 00:13:26,100 --> 00:13:27,240 something that you do often? 196 00:13:27,000 --> 00:13:30,750 Martina Evans: I think so, like it does happen often, and then it 197 00:13:30,750 --> 00:13:34,320 comes in other ways. It can be this, it can be that. It can be 198 00:13:34,320 --> 00:13:39,870 just something somebody said, you know, it depends. I watch a lot of 199 00:13:39,870 --> 00:13:44,370 film, and I think film influences me an awful lot, and I feel my 200 00:13:44,370 --> 00:13:48,720 mother haunts my poems a lot. And it's interesting. I remember when 201 00:13:48,720 --> 00:13:53,250 my second book, All Alcoholics Are Charmers was published, my mother 202 00:13:53,820 --> 00:13:57,450 was very put out. And after she died, I felt she was writing the 203 00:13:57,450 --> 00:14:01,380 books. You know, there's that Milosz quote from his poem, "Ars 204 00:14:01,410 --> 00:14:04,650 Poetica" about "the house is always open, the house of poetry, 205 00:14:04,650 --> 00:14:06,540 and people are coming and leaving at will." 206 00:14:07,260 --> 00:14:11,640 Seán Hewitt: I like the idea of the poem almost as as calling up or 207 00:14:11,640 --> 00:14:17,010 being inhabited by other voices that can kind of wander through it. 208 00:14:17,430 --> 00:14:21,450 There was one thing that kind of echoed in the back of my mind with 209 00:14:21,450 --> 00:14:26,190 "The Day My Cat Spoke to Me," which was obviously it set up a chain of 210 00:14:26,190 --> 00:14:31,260 association, then in my head of cat poems. So I had Christopher Smart 211 00:14:31,290 --> 00:14:35,700 in the back of my head. And then I went all the way back to Pangur Bán 212 00:14:35,910 --> 00:14:40,620 and thinking about the, for those of you who don't know it, this 213 00:14:41,010 --> 00:14:46,980 ninth century Irish poem written by a monk, and his cat is called 214 00:14:46,980 --> 00:14:49,950 Pangur Bán, and is kind of sat on his knee or walking around his 215 00:14:49,980 --> 00:14:55,350 writing desk, and as he writes, the cat's hunting mice becomes kind of 216 00:14:55,350 --> 00:15:00,780 analogous to finding the right word in a poem, or... it's a very feline 217 00:15:01,080 --> 00:15:04,470 text. But I wondered if you think that there's something kind of 218 00:15:04,860 --> 00:15:10,320 inherently feline about poetry or poetic about cats, maybe? 219 00:15:11,880 --> 00:15:15,232 Martina Evans: I know it's so strange in a way, that so many 220 00:15:15,307 --> 00:15:19,777 poets like cats. Leonardo da Vinci said that every cat has a 221 00:15:19,852 --> 00:15:24,546 masterpiece. And I do think a lot of poets were just constantly 222 00:15:24,620 --> 00:15:29,761 admiring the masterpiece that is a cat. And I know that Emily Brontë, 223 00:15:29,836 --> 00:15:34,902 herself, a great poet as well as a novelist, said that cats are most 224 00:15:34,976 --> 00:15:39,894 like humans. I think they're very supportive to poetry. And I know 225 00:15:39,968 --> 00:15:44,960 that Dora my cat, she really calms down if I read poems to her, she 226 00:15:45,035 --> 00:15:46,600 likes them very much. 227 00:15:46,600 --> 00:15:48,970 Seán Hewitt: Does she have a favorite poet or poet? 228 00:15:49,360 --> 00:15:52,210 Martina Evans: Well, she's one of the main characters in the poem 229 00:15:52,270 --> 00:15:57,730 "The Coming Thing" Dora and her favorite line is, "Dora was a 230 00:15:57,730 --> 00:15:58,960 fierce intellectual." 231 00:16:01,210 --> 00:16:04,240 Seán Hewitt: She definitely knows what you're saying, I think. 232 00:16:05,140 --> 00:16:08,080 Martina Evans: She definitely knows what I'm saying. And Donny, the 233 00:16:08,080 --> 00:16:12,040 ginger boy, who's now dead, he also always knew, because once when I 234 00:16:12,040 --> 00:16:16,180 couldn't move when I was injured, he was meowing for food, and I 235 00:16:16,180 --> 00:16:19,570 said, "Oh, go and catch a mouse. That's what you're supposed to do, 236 00:16:19,570 --> 00:16:22,630 isn't it?" And He came back a half an hour later with a mouse hanging 237 00:16:22,630 --> 00:16:23,440 out of his mouth. 238 00:16:23,000 --> 00:16:29,540 Seán Hewitt: I think they know more than we think they know. But I like 239 00:16:29,540 --> 00:16:32,690 that, you know, there's, there's something that the poem breaks 240 00:16:32,720 --> 00:16:36,410 through, which is the, not the silence of a cat, because cats are 241 00:16:36,410 --> 00:16:41,510 not silent, but the wordlessness of a cat. And instead, it kind of taps 242 00:16:41,510 --> 00:16:47,840 into the language of a cat, if that makes sense. It has a real focus on 243 00:16:47,870 --> 00:16:54,500 their movement, their irony, the way that they might speak, if, if 244 00:16:54,500 --> 00:16:59,270 they could. And I think, you know, a lot of the time the poem feels 245 00:16:59,270 --> 00:17:03,530 companionable to me, it's about companionship in a way. It's about 246 00:17:03,530 --> 00:17:09,830 being seen by another thing, especially if you feel exposed or 247 00:17:09,950 --> 00:17:13,160 on your own or doubtful. There's something reassuring about the 248 00:17:13,160 --> 00:17:20,690 presence, either of the sun or or a cat, something inanimate or animate 249 00:17:21,020 --> 00:17:23,270 that is just there for us. 250 00:17:23,870 --> 00:17:26,960 Martina Evans: I think the best poems come from the body, you know 251 00:17:27,200 --> 00:17:30,830 and the cinema, of course, is completely tuned into the body with 252 00:17:30,830 --> 00:17:35,240 all its, you know, scenes, slow motion. It's how our bodies work. 253 00:17:35,540 --> 00:17:40,370 And I think the way cats move is incredibly inspirational. And I 254 00:17:40,370 --> 00:17:44,090 remember once reading that Harvey Keitel was given two pages of 255 00:17:44,090 --> 00:17:47,990 dialogue, and he put it to one side and said, I can show that the way I 256 00:17:47,990 --> 00:17:55,670 stand. And I mean, I just think cats, they communicate. I mean, my 257 00:17:55,670 --> 00:17:59,870 cat's annoyed, she just goes and sits, very little movement, but oh 258 00:17:59,870 --> 00:18:04,730 my god, it's just oozing with expression. You know what I'm 259 00:18:04,730 --> 00:18:05,390 talking about? 260 00:18:05,000 --> 00:18:08,680 Seán Hewitt: Yeah, I do know what you're talking about. I think, you 261 00:18:08,747 --> 00:18:13,296 know, I never, I never grew up with cats. I grew up with dogs, who I 262 00:18:13,363 --> 00:18:17,779 think are very open about their feelings. You know, you can tell a 263 00:18:17,846 --> 00:18:22,396 dog is happy, you can tell a dog is sad and they don't have, I don't 264 00:18:22,463 --> 00:18:27,080 think they have a huge emotional, expressive range in their movements 265 00:18:27,147 --> 00:18:31,496 and how they behave. Nick, my partner, is obsessed with cats, and 266 00:18:31,563 --> 00:18:35,778 I have said to him, "I can't interpret them." And he says, "You 267 00:18:35,845 --> 00:18:40,262 know, once you get to know a cat, you know everything. You know it 268 00:18:40,328 --> 00:18:44,678 will you will never get to the point of not knowing suddenly that 269 00:18:44,745 --> 00:18:48,826 the cat is about to scratch you, because you can tell if it's 270 00:18:48,893 --> 00:18:53,443 annoyed with you." But the thing is, I can't, I can't tell yet. So I 271 00:18:53,510 --> 00:18:57,525 need, I need practice in the language of the cat. Martina, I 272 00:18:57,591 --> 00:19:01,874 think it might be a good time to take a short break, and when we 273 00:19:01,941 --> 00:19:06,557 come back, you're gonna read to us from Frank O'Hara and this poem in 274 00:19:06,624 --> 00:19:08,030 which the sun speaks, 275 00:19:07,580 --> 00:19:08,030 Martina Evans: Okay. 276 00:19:17,990 --> 00:19:20,300 Cathy and Peter Halstead: We hope you're enjoying the second season 277 00:19:20,300 --> 00:19:24,710 of The Glimpse. It's just one small part of the Adrian Brinkerhoff 278 00:19:24,710 --> 00:19:29,540 Poetry Foundation. We're the founders Peter and Cathy Halstead. 279 00:19:29,990 --> 00:19:35,180 Our goal is to make great poetry more accessible to everyone, and we 280 00:19:35,180 --> 00:19:39,890 do that in a variety of ways, through partnerships, our film 281 00:19:39,890 --> 00:19:46,430 series, this podcast and our website, brinkerhoffpoetry.org, we 282 00:19:46,430 --> 00:19:51,020 hope these works will lure you into a parallel universe, the way a 283 00:19:51,020 --> 00:19:55,430 Möbius strip brings you into another dimension without leaving 284 00:19:55,430 --> 00:19:58,490 the page you're on. Thank you so much for listening. 285 00:20:00,680 --> 00:20:04,340 Seán Hewitt: So welcome back. Martina Evans, you've chosen Frank 286 00:20:04,340 --> 00:20:08,510 O'Hara's poem, "A True Account of Talking to the Sun on Fire Island," 287 00:20:08,570 --> 00:20:13,610 as your inspiration, and we've already covered a bit of why this 288 00:20:13,610 --> 00:20:19,280 poem is sitting in the background of your poem. But I wonder if you 289 00:20:19,280 --> 00:20:23,900 could tell us first a little bit about this O'Hara poem, why it 290 00:20:23,900 --> 00:20:28,160 hooks you, and what you think it is that kind of draws you to it. 291 00:20:28,000 --> 00:20:33,670 Martina Evans: I think its movement is really interesting. I mean, I 292 00:20:33,670 --> 00:20:39,970 think he's very interesting in his casual approach. And I think it 293 00:20:39,970 --> 00:20:46,030 starts so conversational, almost throw away. You know, "The sun woke 294 00:20:46,030 --> 00:20:48,850 me up... Hey! I've been trying... Don't be so rude." You know, it's 295 00:20:49,240 --> 00:20:53,080 almost, it's one of those ones where you hear people saying, "Is 296 00:20:53,110 --> 00:20:56,350 this cut-up prose?" A phrase I hate. I mean, what does that even 297 00:20:56,350 --> 00:21:04,120 mean? And then I think it moves into a much darker place, because 298 00:21:04,270 --> 00:21:07,870 it starts off quite casually—the sun is going to look for him—but 299 00:21:08,260 --> 00:21:13,600 then suddenly it gets very, very hot. It's also very funny and it 300 00:21:13,600 --> 00:21:16,690 ends actually in a very dark place, I think, 301 00:21:16,720 --> 00:21:21,130 Seán Hewitt: Yeah, it's a brilliant poem. It moves so far across just a 302 00:21:21,130 --> 00:21:25,990 couple of pages. Now it is quite a long poem, but it's so full of life 303 00:21:26,020 --> 00:21:30,460 I'm I'm going to ask you just to read the opening for us and for our 304 00:21:30,460 --> 00:21:34,450 listeners, you'll be able to find the full poem on The Glimpse 305 00:21:34,630 --> 00:21:40,450 website, yeah, "A True Account of Talking to the Sun at Fire Island." 306 00:21:41,560 --> 00:21:44,830 Martina Evans: The Sun woke me this morning loud and clear, saying, 307 00:21:45,040 --> 00:21:49,300 "Hey! I've been trying to wake you up for fifteen minutes. Don't be so 308 00:21:49,300 --> 00:21:53,170 rude. You're only the second poet I've ever chosen to speak to 309 00:21:53,170 --> 00:21:57,640 personally so why aren't you more attentive? If I could burn you 310 00:21:57,640 --> 00:22:01,570 through the window, I would to wake you up. I can't hang around here 311 00:22:01,600 --> 00:22:06,610 all day." "Sorry, Sun, I stayed up late last night talking to Hal." 312 00:22:06,610 --> 00:22:11,050 "When I woke up Mayakovsky, he was a lot more prompt" the Sun said 313 00:22:11,050 --> 00:22:15,010 petulantly. "Most people are up already waiting to see if I'm going 314 00:22:15,010 --> 00:22:19,060 to put in an appearance." I tried to apologize "I missed you 315 00:22:19,060 --> 00:22:22,930 yesterday." "That's better" he said, "I didn't know you'd come 316 00:22:22,930 --> 00:22:27,820 out." "You may be wondering why I've come so close.?" "Yes," I said 317 00:22:27,850 --> 00:22:32,200 beginning to feel hot, wondering if maybe he wasn't burning me anyway. 318 00:22:33,160 --> 00:22:37,000 "Frankly, I wanted to tell you I like your poetry. I see a lot on my 319 00:22:37,000 --> 00:22:40,510 rounds, and you're okay. You may not be the greatest thing on earth, 320 00:22:40,510 --> 00:22:44,560 but you're different. Now, I've heard some say you're crazy, they 321 00:22:44,560 --> 00:22:48,160 being excessively calm themselves to my mind, and other crazy poets 322 00:22:48,250 --> 00:22:52,480 think that you're a boring reactionary. Not me. Just keep on 323 00:22:52,660 --> 00:22:56,470 like I do and pay no attention. You'll find that people always will 324 00:22:56,470 --> 00:23:00,850 complain about the atmosphere, either too hot or too cold too 325 00:23:00,850 --> 00:23:06,010 bright or too dark, days, too short or too long. If you don't appear at 326 00:23:06,010 --> 00:23:11,500 all one day, they think you're lazy or dead, just keep right on. I like 327 00:23:11,500 --> 00:23:11,560 it." 328 00:23:12,680 --> 00:23:16,040 Seán Hewitt: It's so good. I think the character of the sun, you know, 329 00:23:16,040 --> 00:23:21,800 it has such personality. You know, in some ways, this poem seems 330 00:23:21,800 --> 00:23:27,920 to me to be about the pressure of writing or the pressure of living. 331 00:23:28,040 --> 00:23:31,250 In fact, it becomes about the pressure of living, but it begins 332 00:23:31,310 --> 00:23:35,780 perhaps about the pressure of writing or the doubt that we all 333 00:23:35,780 --> 00:23:40,550 feel as writers. Why bother? Why start? There's always someone 334 00:23:40,550 --> 00:23:44,810 better. There's always someone doing something in a in a way that 335 00:23:44,810 --> 00:23:49,880 you think is is more important than the way that you do things. I 336 00:23:49,880 --> 00:23:53,600 wonder if this is a poem that you return to or carry with you through 337 00:23:53,600 --> 00:23:56,720 those doubts. You know, it's sometimes nice to know that Frank 338 00:23:56,720 --> 00:23:59,570 O'Hara doubts himself as well. 339 00:24:00,170 --> 00:24:05,660 Martina Evans: Oh, absolutely. And I think the burning is quite 340 00:24:05,660 --> 00:24:13,550 interesting in it. I spent all my time devoted to this, this art, and 341 00:24:13,550 --> 00:24:18,290 I'm not any good. In some ways, you know, writing is pretty harmless, 342 00:24:18,470 --> 00:24:22,700 but in other ways, you can get burned by it. Winnicott, the 343 00:24:22,730 --> 00:24:28,250 psychologist, talks about artists being people who are caught between 344 00:24:28,250 --> 00:24:33,200 the desire to hide and the desire to be seen. And he says something 345 00:24:33,200 --> 00:24:37,550 like, "it's a joy to be hidden but a disaster not to be found." Yeah. 346 00:24:37,910 --> 00:24:41,900 And I think that sums it up for us, yeah, and there's a lot of hiding 347 00:24:42,170 --> 00:24:47,000 and being seen or not being seen, and the sun, of course, is in the 348 00:24:47,000 --> 00:24:50,870 spotlight being seen, and it's actually terrifying and painful for 349 00:24:50,870 --> 00:24:55,580 us, and we want to hide, and yet somehow we're drawn to get 350 00:24:55,580 --> 00:24:56,300 sunburned. 351 00:24:57,110 --> 00:25:01,010 I loved in the second half, he says, "Thanks, and remember, I'm 352 00:25:01,010 --> 00:25:04,100 watching. It's easier for me to speak to out here. I don't have to 353 00:25:04,100 --> 00:25:08,000 slide down between buildings to get your ear. I know you love 354 00:25:08,000 --> 00:25:10,160 Manhattan, but you ought to look up more often." 355 00:25:10,000 --> 00:25:15,430 And then he talks about embracing the world, and I find that really 356 00:25:15,430 --> 00:25:19,300 cinematic as well. And he's he's reacting to Mayakovsky, who was a 357 00:25:19,300 --> 00:25:25,720 very cinematic poet and a filmmaker and it's cartoonish. And I make all 358 00:25:25,720 --> 00:25:28,750 these associations, which I think we all do when we read poems and 359 00:25:28,750 --> 00:25:31,960 when we write poems, and before I finish, I must talk about 360 00:25:31,960 --> 00:25:34,960 listening, because I think that's really important. "I don't have to 361 00:25:34,960 --> 00:25:39,340 slide down between buildings to get to your ear." I think when we're 362 00:25:39,340 --> 00:25:43,600 writing poems, we're listening. Talk about this very thing that 363 00:25:43,600 --> 00:25:48,130 you're actually listening. You're listening for the poem, yeah? Mary 364 00:25:48,190 --> 00:25:50,920 Ruefle talks about it. It's listening to get it right. 365 00:25:50,980 --> 00:25:55,210 Seán Hewitt: Wow, yeah. I loved, you know, the idea of listening. I 366 00:25:55,210 --> 00:26:01,330 was once reading an interview with Alice Oswald, I think, and she said 367 00:26:01,330 --> 00:26:04,300 that the last thing she asks herself before she starts a poem 368 00:26:04,300 --> 00:26:08,440 is, "Am I listening?" And I think that's right, you know, to try and 369 00:26:08,440 --> 00:26:14,860 find the note or the rhythm that you're trying to to get out onto 370 00:26:14,860 --> 00:26:17,350 the page, the thing that you're listening out for. 371 00:26:18,380 --> 00:26:24,110 You just mentioned Mary Ruefle there and with Winnicott, which is 372 00:26:24,110 --> 00:26:26,630 one of my favorite quotes, I was actually going to use it as an 373 00:26:26,630 --> 00:26:32,300 epigraph to something once "it's a joy to be hidden in a disaster not 374 00:26:32,300 --> 00:26:39,530 to be found." Mary Ruefle has a great essay or a lecture in that 375 00:26:39,530 --> 00:26:46,550 book, Madness, Rack and Honey called "On Secrets", and she talks 376 00:26:46,550 --> 00:26:53,030 in that lecture about every poem having a secret, but the trick of a 377 00:26:53,030 --> 00:26:58,940 poem is wanting both to give away and to keep the secret at the same 378 00:26:58,940 --> 00:27:04,490 time. So they're kind of things of revelation and also concealment. 379 00:27:04,550 --> 00:27:11,180 And we want to keep those two things in in tandem, you know, the 380 00:27:11,180 --> 00:27:15,260 same time as you want to express something, to give something away, 381 00:27:15,770 --> 00:27:20,360 you run away and hide it, and you like the idea of the poem as a 382 00:27:20,360 --> 00:27:24,350 place of of safety or being, you know, in which you can kind of 383 00:27:24,350 --> 00:27:26,060 disguise things as well as give them away. 384 00:27:26,000 --> 00:27:30,050 I think one thing that I was thinking about with this poem and 385 00:27:30,050 --> 00:27:35,810 your cat and O'Hara's sun, and this idea of writing about inanimate 386 00:27:36,260 --> 00:27:42,290 things as companionable things or or speaking things, was that all of 387 00:27:42,290 --> 00:27:48,200 these poems seem to me to be poems of friendship in a way, or mutual 388 00:27:48,200 --> 00:27:55,550 concern between the sun and O'Hara or the cat and and the Speaker of 389 00:27:55,550 --> 00:27:59,030 your poem. And I wonder if they're there, in some ways, a sort of 390 00:27:59,030 --> 00:28:04,370 secular version of mystical poems. And, you know, in another time, 391 00:28:04,370 --> 00:28:09,170 would a poet maybe have imagined a saint or God appearing and speaking 392 00:28:09,200 --> 00:28:13,640 to them and offering them advice or correcting their way of life, or, 393 00:28:14,090 --> 00:28:17,720 you know, guiding them. Does it? Does that seem right to you? Do you 394 00:28:17,720 --> 00:28:21,560 think that these poems are kind of filling in as sort of religious? 395 00:28:22,170 --> 00:28:25,890 Martina Evans: I think it's very true. And Ireland was originally 396 00:28:25,920 --> 00:28:31,140 the cult of St. Brigid —was sun worshippers. It's hard to remember 397 00:28:31,140 --> 00:28:34,920 what I was thinking on that day, but I'm sure I would have just 398 00:28:34,920 --> 00:28:38,820 dismissed God because I just can't believe him anymore. But I think 399 00:28:38,820 --> 00:28:42,270 it's very true. And actually, the sun is the source of all life. If 400 00:28:42,270 --> 00:28:46,440 we were supposed to adore anything, that would be the right place to 401 00:28:46,440 --> 00:28:50,430 put our adoration, not some strange man in a white beard. You know? 402 00:28:50,460 --> 00:28:52,800 Seán Hewitt: Yeah, it always seems to me a strange dismissal, you 403 00:28:52,800 --> 00:28:58,740 know, when you see those stupid kind of colonial cartoons or 404 00:28:58,740 --> 00:29:01,500 something. You know, "before we came, you were worshiping the sun." 405 00:29:02,070 --> 00:29:06,390 And I'm like, "well, yes, this makes much more sense to worship 406 00:29:06,390 --> 00:29:09,270 the sun," if anything. 407 00:29:09,630 --> 00:29:12,360 Martina Evans: And Apollo is the god of poetry as well, isn't he? 408 00:29:12,660 --> 00:29:16,890 Seán Hewitt: Yeah, yeah. I mean, sometimes poetry is just to give 409 00:29:16,890 --> 00:29:21,030 you that, that sense of wonder in something that otherwise seems 410 00:29:21,030 --> 00:29:27,180 normal. And there's nothing normal about a cat or the sun. You know, 411 00:29:27,180 --> 00:29:34,080 they're incredible and strange. And the stuff of poems, Martina, you 412 00:29:34,080 --> 00:29:38,250 know, were you thinking here about lineages? In a way, your poem 413 00:29:38,370 --> 00:29:44,190 echoing back to O'Hara. O'Hara's poem echoing back to Mayakovsky and 414 00:29:44,190 --> 00:29:49,080 I wonder if you think about yourself as a poet with a lineage, 415 00:29:49,080 --> 00:29:52,530 or if you're conscious of these other voices in the background, and 416 00:29:53,220 --> 00:29:56,850 who would be there at the family gathering of a Martina Evans poem? 417 00:29:57,170 --> 00:29:59,960 Martina Evans: Oh, God, I don't know. I find it really hard. I read 418 00:29:59,960 --> 00:30:01,400 an awful lot and widely, and, I mean, Frank O'Hara would be really 419 00:30:01,400 --> 00:30:09,410 important. And when you mentioned secrets, Stanley Kunitz is a huge 420 00:30:09,410 --> 00:30:13,040 figure, and he spoke about "a poem should never give up all its 421 00:30:13,040 --> 00:30:17,810 secrets." Yeah e's got a wonderful, wonderful, wondrous poem called 422 00:30:18,440 --> 00:30:23,210 "The Abduction," where he had just been reading a book on UFOs and 423 00:30:23,210 --> 00:30:27,650 things like that, and he merges it with some other more mystical kind 424 00:30:27,650 --> 00:30:33,290 of experience, and it's terrific and haunting. So I love him, but 425 00:30:33,290 --> 00:30:36,290 sometimes I think the poets that I love are nothing like me. 426 00:30:36,630 --> 00:30:40,110 Seán Hewitt: I think that's often the case. I think I find myself 427 00:30:40,110 --> 00:30:45,240 drawn to to poets completely different to me. Perhaps, if you 428 00:30:45,240 --> 00:30:49,980 read poets who are very similar to you, you kind of, I don't know if 429 00:30:49,980 --> 00:30:53,850 you get this experience of the cringe. You know that you recognize 430 00:30:53,850 --> 00:30:57,480 yourself too much, and you can kind of see something of what you're 431 00:30:57,480 --> 00:31:01,890 doing in someone else. So if you read someone very far away from 432 00:31:01,890 --> 00:31:06,300 you. I think you know you've more to learn from them, perhaps. 433 00:31:06,780 --> 00:31:10,650 Martina Evans: Yeah, and it's such a cliche, maybe not, maybe not, but 434 00:31:10,680 --> 00:31:16,500 I just love Shakespeare, and he's timeless. I've often enjoyed 435 00:31:16,710 --> 00:31:21,270 Shakespeare as a book of poems or a play of Shakespeare's, to me, is 436 00:31:21,270 --> 00:31:25,770 just a long narrative poem. I think he may have influenced me in that 437 00:31:25,770 --> 00:31:31,170 way. Yeah, so he's somebody I really, really love, which I 438 00:31:31,170 --> 00:31:34,230 suppose you wouldn't associate with me. I think Frank O'Hara is 439 00:31:34,260 --> 00:31:37,920 obvious. I think James Joyce is a huge influence,. 440 00:31:37,000 --> 00:31:38,980 Seán Hewitt: in some ways, Shakespeare should be so many 441 00:31:38,980 --> 00:31:46,480 people's answers, but I don't think many people are brave enough to 442 00:31:46,480 --> 00:31:51,640 give the answer of Shakespeare, not because, you know, we're comparing 443 00:31:51,640 --> 00:31:57,760 ourselves to him, but sometimes it seems that we take it for granted 444 00:31:58,060 --> 00:32:06,310 just how renewable and strange and powerful those plays are. And 445 00:32:06,310 --> 00:32:10,120 I think having a constant text, you know, if you take all of 446 00:32:10,120 --> 00:32:15,340 Shakespeare as as a life's work, you could spend your life inside it 447 00:32:16,090 --> 00:32:17,440 and, and happily. 448 00:32:17,710 --> 00:32:21,010 Martina Evans: One poet I listen to all the time is Yusef Komunyakaa, 449 00:32:21,850 --> 00:32:27,130 and I think June Jordan, yes, and Lucille Clifton would be huge 450 00:32:27,130 --> 00:32:31,450 influences as well. Yeah, as you think about the demotic and, you 451 00:32:31,450 --> 00:32:35,230 know, having that courage just, you know, "Homage to My Hips," 452 00:32:35,260 --> 00:32:38,050 Seán Hewitt: Yeah, I can hear June Jordan in the back of your poems. I 453 00:32:38,050 --> 00:32:42,010 think I can hear them in the speaking voice. She's such a 454 00:32:42,000 --> 00:32:46,020 Martina Evans: Yeah, so, and June Jordan's "A Poem about Intelligence 455 00:32:42,010 --> 00:32:42,760 brilliant poet. 456 00:32:46,020 --> 00:32:48,780 for My Brothers and Sisters." That's a poem I really love. 457 00:32:49,380 --> 00:32:53,460 Seán Hewitt: Martina Evans, it has been such a pleasure to speak to 458 00:32:53,460 --> 00:32:55,860 you. Thank you for coming on The Glimpse. 459 00:32:56,350 --> 00:32:57,730 Thank you so much. Seán. 460 00:33:04,540 --> 00:33:08,830 Thanks for joining us today. I'm your host. Seán Hewitt. Martina's 461 00:33:08,830 --> 00:33:12,760 poem, The Day My Cat Spoke to Me" comes from her collection of poems 462 00:33:12,760 --> 00:33:18,520 titled Can Dentists Be Trusted. It was published in 2004 and aired 463 00:33:18,520 --> 00:33:22,870 with permission from Carcanet Frank O'Hara's poem, "A True Account of 464 00:33:22,870 --> 00:33:26,320 Talking to the Sun at Fire Island," is from The Collected Poems of 465 00:33:26,320 --> 00:33:30,700 Frank O'Hara published in 1971 and was aired with permission from 466 00:33:30,790 --> 00:33:31,120 Knopf. 467 00:33:33,190 --> 00:33:37,030 Coming up next week. Poet Stephen Sexton muses about the afterlife 468 00:33:37,060 --> 00:33:41,530 through a capitalist lens, his love of American poetry and a lonely yak 469 00:33:41,590 --> 00:33:46,810 in Batesville, Virginia. Make sure to subscribe to The Glimpse 470 00:33:46,840 --> 00:33:50,200 wherever you get your podcasts. You can also find episodes on our 471 00:33:50,200 --> 00:33:54,490 website, Brinkerhoff poetry.org/podcast. We'd also love 472 00:33:54,490 --> 00:33:57,190 to hear from you. Drop us an email at the glimpse poetry 473 00:33:57,220 --> 00:33:58,270 podcast@gmail.com 474 00:34:01,480 --> 00:34:05,186 The Glimpse is a production of the Adrian Brinkerhoff Poetry 475 00:34:05,247 --> 00:34:09,077 Foundation. I'm your host, Seán Hewitt. Our senior producer is 476 00:34:09,139 --> 00:34:12,907 Jennifer Wolfe. Kat Yore is our technical director and mixing 477 00:34:12,968 --> 00:34:16,860 engineer. Editorial Director Amanda Glassman is our curator and 478 00:34:16,921 --> 00:34:20,875 production coordinator. Amy Holmes is the foundation's Executive 479 00:34:20,936 --> 00:34:25,013 Director, and our co founders are Cathy and Peter Halstead. Thanks 480 00:34:25,075 --> 00:34:25,940 for listening.