Four Poems by Mark Young

Cyborg sidewalks

 

Doors open at 7:30, show starts at 8pm.

It's always polite to be there earlier.

 

Travel is a mirror for who we are.

How would you define your travel style?

 

Should you be polite to artificial intelligence?

Straight answers that are slightly polite are always good.

 

Conversation-starting pieces of clothing will easily draw attention.

Social pleasantries in questions & answers should be strongly discouraged.

 

There are three-month-old dumplings on the ceiling fan.

That's a style, not a confession.

 

 

Threshold

 

Liminal space beckons. Is filled

with fresh-cooked bagels that I

know can't be real because they

smell too good. I am standing at

the top of a stairway that leads

down to the local rail station. All

I can see are steps & a sign on

the wall that says This way to the

 

Led Zeppelin concert & looks out of

date. The smell of bagels comes up

from the bottom of the stairs: there

are no signs of trains or travelers;

posts an emptiness that is both im-

minent & has fragrant disconcerts.

 

 

A line from Leopold von Sacher-Masoch

 

Is there a border we will never cross,

or are there only plateaux that

follow on from one another, each at

a different height? Some things I

 

can never know for sure; but I remind

myself that every day is a new begin-

ning, that from now on I no longer exist

as I am, or was, or ever will be again.

 

 

A rarely explored tonal pathway

 

He tore pages out of An

Open Doorway to the Almighty

& ate them. They repeated on

him, percussive, but still melo-

dic, much like a glockenspiel.

The Tin, by Pravasan Pillay

I place the flat tin of sardines, which was bought from Lidl at a cost of 19 kronor, on the kitchen countertop. The rectangular tin is packed inside a sealed cardboard box with the dimensions 11cmx6.5cmx3cm. The information on the box is in Swedish and Finnish: The skin-and-bone free sardines are packed in sunflower oil and a lemon slice, weighs 125g net and 90g drained. The fish (sardina pilchardus) were caught with purse seine nets and trawlers in the Eastern Central Atlantic – FAO Area 34.

The box also has barcodes on three sides, nutrition listings, and a best before date of 31.12.2028 – listed below the date is the following text: “L043T Morocco 1156”. The box is predominantly blue in colour and, on the front, has a picture of sardine fillets placed on a white plate, and garnished with lemon slices as well as leaves of some sort – which is presented as a serving suggestion.  

I start to remove the cardboard around the tin. The box flaps are glued shut and require using a fingernail to pick an edge loose and to then peel open. I try to not tear the glued flap, but even so, some tearing happens. The tin, which measures 10.5cmx6.3cmx2.8cm, fits snugly in the box, but also slides out without much effort. It’s silverish in colour, with a slight bronze tinge, and a dull shine.

The longer sides of the tin are lined with about ten protruding ridges each, while the shorter sides are lined with three ridges each. The bottom has two shallow oblong depressions, one nesting inside the other. (The number 32 is faintly stamped in the innermost oblong.) There is also a small dent on the underside, about two centimeters in length.

The tin’s lid is imprinted with the same info found on the side of the box – “31.12.2028” and “L043T Morocco 1156.” – but they are askew. This is the only text on the tin. The lid also has nested oblong depressions, though these are larger in dimension. On one end of the lid is the ring tab with which to open the tin. The ring tab looks much like those on soda cans but broader. It’s pear-shaped with a large hole at the bottom through which one can grasp the tab.

The bottom of the tab – the part to be lifted – rests on two bumps, which results in the tab being raised slightly above the surface of the lid. Between these bumps, and underneath the tab, is small indentation. The combined effect of the bumps and the indentation allows the tab to be easily held and lifted from the surface – without using anything, such as a butter knife for example, to pry it up.  

Using one hand to hold down the tin, I grasp and lift the tab more than 90 degrees with my other hand, which causes the tab to push down into the lid, and for the lid to cave in somewhat, revealing a sliver of oil as the seal is broken. I insert a finger into the tab, and using my thumb as leverage, I pull it slowly towards me, allowing the thin lid to be incrementally peeled away from the tin. The lid, which is oily underneath, and which now has a curved shape, requires a bit of jiggling to completely detach.

Three Poems by Alex Rainey Ward

Muezzins

 

Trying to tame my wildness

my hair’s askew

my hair’s on fire

my wildness is up to no good.

In the Zoo Shop there are

10,000 parakeets,

each one of them happy

as fuck.

I knocked on Death’s door and

Death ran away,

I thumped on Death’s door like

thumping a melon to see if

it was ripe yet.

My wildness is on fire

my mind is the muezzins’.

 

Waystations

 

I feel so candid in my naked body

sitting here on the couch with a

towel under my ass

with the man tits I fought so

hard against

just like my mother trying to

rid herself of her little

potbelly,

using bogus products she bought

for $9.99.

Finally she gave up,

she’d rest her hands on her

little potbelly and eat buttered

Pop-Tarts, slumped down

on the couch.

A couch, a TV, waystations.

Demurely, I’ve drawn the

curtains

but the naked light bulb’s

blazing

I want to throw open the curtains

and appall the night.

It’s 2 am, the city’s timid.

Railyard

 

The night’s a railroad track, the moon’s a train, and all the rest is ash.

The dark matter of the universe is just ash and cinders,

something enormous was burnt, maybe the body of God,

sacrificing himself in the act of creation.

And everything’s still unfinished, in disarray,

the Kuiper belt, for example, which is maybe hiding the

real solar system with a better Earth in it,

this one’s only a rough draft.

The night’s slivers, spars, spurs of a railroad,

the rails look like silver hissing serpents’ tongues.

Ore cars parked on a siding, a cashiered old

passenger car, an old dining car still coupled,

going fusty and musty, like a man and wife rotting in the grave together. 

Maybe from the chaos of the railyard a train will

gather into one long thing and start

rolling through the night, thrumming rhythmically,

rocking gently side to side, carrying everybody home. 

Alex Rainey Ward