Program Note:

Based on a poem of the same name by Li-Young Lee, This Room and Everything in It explores human memory and its connection to imagination. Every movement derives its title from a line in Lee’s poem. Before a reading of this poem, Lee described a mnemonic device in which a person “stores” various ideas and facts they may want to remember in a room, and they can recall these memories by using the associated location of the room. This poem is essentially an attempt to use this device and mapping the failure to retrieve these memories in text: “I am letting this room / and everything in it / stand for my ideas about love / and its difficulties.” Imagination and memory become intertwined and the memory itself begins to deteriorate, which is reflected in the structure of the poem: “my idea / has evaporated … your hair is time, your thighs are song … / it had something to do / with death … it had something / to do with love.” In addition to the poem itself, This Room and Everything in It is informed by my own fears and failures in memory.