Poetry by Mark Young

Key Largo
 
I have a new favorite piece of Bach, the largo from the Piano Concerto #5 in F minor.
 
It is what I call walking music. The pace of it, the expanse. French avenues or neo-Grecian porticos. Last Year at Marienbad. Once again I walk down those ornate baroque corridors… or however it goes.
 
Somewhere I have heard it before, perhaps used in a film, perhaps a version by the Modern Jazz Quartet, one of those strange pieces that John Lewis would mix into their tuxedo-clad repertoire. Seemingly a serious ensemble, then suddenly Milt Jackson would take off all dazzling, & beneath his lines those Lewis blues notes on piano, curving away. & the accompanying small grunts, the smile as Jackson did something that delighted the pianist.
 
A largo is a movement in slow time with a broad dignified treatment. This Bach largo is emotion in a landscape, a wide path that passes between & beneath old trees just after the encroachment of autumn.
 
For once, I am elegant in an environment. It is a part of me I can never hope to otherwise be.
 
 


gastric umbrage
 
Run these experiments in
a test-tube. The true mule
aficionado will take alarm
 
as they stand at their gate
in their dressing-gown. Ex-
pect also a strong reaction
 
from vegetarians. There’s
evidence of classical defense
mechanisms in play here.
 
 


Brahms' Lullaby
 
A loosely structured substance
or a low threshold requirement
such as a grocer or newsagent
is not enough to generate the
derivation of extrinsic inter-
pretations. In Japanese, "my"
or "mine" can be expressed as
watashi no. Such possessives
 
are not strongly distinct in
meaning from a cluster of
properties or winter apparel
like scarves. Elsewhere, the
higher ranks wonder if a basic
grasp of menial skills alone will
be enough to carry them through.
The answer to that is both yes & no.
 
 


Indolent apertures
 
I receive at least one
call per day for the
$1,000,000 Jamaican
Lottery. The creature is
immovable, exerts much
influence, promotes
humiliating racial pro-
filing. Ever since the
days of Galileo, most
teachings of astronomy
are false & pernicious.
 
 


A line from Bernie Sanders
 
The workshops were convened
against a background of concepts
relative to defining seismic
source zones. Thermal & geodetic
 
modeling of the movement to-
ward oligarchy shows that under
high induced stress & high levels
of mine extraction it begins to
 
find voice in violent discourses,
to exhibit brittle behavior, to
break into pieces when subjected
to intense compressional stress.

​

Bio: Mark Young's most recent books are Ley Lines & bricolage, both from gradient books of Finland, The Chorus of the Sphinxes, from Moria Books in Chicago, & some more strange meteorites, from Meritage & i.e. Press, California / New York. 

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