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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Jackson Mac Low
Jackson Mac Low
Jackson Mac Low was born in Chicago on September 12, 1922. He was a poet and composer, and a writer of performance pieces, essays, plays, and radio works. He was also a...
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Forties 30: Troelstrup Nightmare Flare Competition  
by Jackson Mac Low


Troelstrup nightmare risen quiz motivátion-issue tincture reality
twélve-knit tissue crest nést-modulation excrescence nativity
flý-by-níght trilateral tusk tenser flagrant rag mortal
limp insistence ancilla Detroit tourmaline torque encarceled discography metal
alert turnabout Timorese
liquid equipment Falásha twíce-tóld


Notice emblematic tamper various mérit-badge particulars tango anoint soporific
flicker monastic inéquity-requital fóreigner-enactment
toast nótion-counter ASCII fortune loris lordosis
sole Mon tortilla ferocity laminated klieg Mittwoch deuce dapple nepotism
rábbit-page Nanook alleluia
noûs capíto eastern scholia strobe


Liberá me end of Borrómmlio fair as two trace reply
our room quando coeli movéndi sunt unscheduled saint in progress sticker
laboratory victim metonymic strait safehouse mix
ticket activity fantasy answer encyclical láff-movie Rupert in serigraph rubric telepathy sappy
paper sapience odds
grow sac melography metaphor axial


Sank drift cyclic metaphysics amylation tocks deco_
Nostradamus income tax excerpted fa-lá twist cove
summarized eightfold share appearances dance endure
atom-come-and-góne-again taking different forms passing dream bad tomatoes unfolding
into the light no real self
persist in that union forever



Persia couplets Sufism section merchant parrot sorry
zeal increasingly wary of slogans Dallas reforms television
Cuba's foreign trade excéss ideological álly sugar oil
rationing purity earlier petrol fumes cue now-it's-wórse hurt everything'll come
despised difficulties doubt
not in social prop áptitude-depict


Political pester to click yeárs-execution held for nonviolent
sentence conditions abuses admit basically fearfully
armed economist distant enthusiasm dense impossible town
improve eclectic witness latest fuse hula radio map pole they hold sanctions imposed on
violator loch installations
optimistic place resolve shéd-jewel beat


Neither the wherewithal nor the subdominant topical speculate
involved interlocutor confident rich wínter-par stucco
virtually key decision slake discovery repudiate a long way off
influx of likely condemn hostile application ripening justice labor remainder integral Münster
reminder provisional
meaningful change largely invited observers


Court sforzando journalist Irawaddy délta-area separatist
flagpole valiant local Midol pressure immer-adorátion pasture
selfish figures cancel leísure-potential méssed-up plants
how well government harvest Albania probe across the Balkan state chunnel critiques support
foreseeable sea
foreseeable Hague flare competition

 


 


Caesural spaces = durations of silence and/or prolongations of 

final phonemes or syllables:

4 letter spaces [ ] = 1 unstressed syllable;
8 letter spaces [ ] = 1 stressed syllable or beat; 16 letter
spaces [ ] = 2 beats;
none occurs between typographical lines; breath pauses at verse-line
endings ad lib.

 


Nonorthographic acute accents indicate stresses, not vowel qualities. 

Each hyphenated compound is read as one extended word: somewhat more
rapidly than other words but not hurried. [ - ] indicates a
slowed-down compound (each member, one beat). Indented typographical
lines continue verse lines begun above them.



From the series "154 Forties," published in 20 Forties by Zasterle Press, 1999. Copyright © 1999 by Jackson Mac Low. Reprinted with permission.
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