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AS DAY ENDS
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Clark Terry’s horn unleashes
a silvery note
……………….that ascends
………………………ever higher
………………………………to join a golden full moon
………………………………………rising into early evening orbit.
When the note ends, listeners
discover they have forgotten
……………….to breathe,
………………………and slowly rejoin
………………………………………their quiet neighborhood
and prepare for sleep
………where they will drift
down a midnight river filled
………with remembrance of music
and the unspooling of life.
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by
Michael L. Newell
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THEY SAY, ON NEW YEAR’S EVE
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they say, on new year’s eve
……. you should make some new resolutions
……. ……. for the new year.
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they say, especially in your seventies
……. you should be doing something
……. ……. in everyday, that you want to do, so much.
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I say, I have
……. been lucky enough
……. ……. to have heard the music for this.
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in the last five years
……. it is more than enough to have written
…………………… more poetry every day.
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and to have all those thoughts
…………. . come to me … again & again
………….. ……. like I know, for sure, they will never end.
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by
Alan Yount
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Michael L. Newell is a retired English/Theatre teacher who has spent one-third of his life abroad. He now lives on the Oregon coast. In addition to the recent publication of his new book, Meditation of an Old Man Standing on a Bridge, he hasrecently had poems published in Verse-Virtual and Current.
Click here to access all of Michael L. Newell’s poetry published on Jerry Jazz Musician
To order a copy of the book, contact BELLOWING ARK PRESS 18040 7th Avenue NE Shoreline, WA 98155
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Alan Yount, 71, has written and published poetry for over 50 years. His many poems have appeared over the years in publications such as WestWard Quarterly (where he was invited to be the Featured Writer and Poet for the summer, 2018 issue), Big Scream, Green’s Magazine (Canada), Spring: the Journal of the E.E. Cummings Society (academic journal), Wind, Legend, Roanoke Review, Tidepool, Art Centering Magazine (Zen Center of Hawaii), Wormwood Review, Palo Alto Review, Barefoot Grass Journal, Frontier: Custom & Archetype, Modern Haiku and The Pegasus Review. He has been in two anthologies: Passionate Hearts (New World Library), and The Chrysalis Reader. Alan also plays jazz trumpet, and has led his own dance band. He is a direct descendant of the famous frontiersman, Daniel Boone.
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I enjoyed both of these poems very much. Newell’s poem reminds us of music’s transcendent qualities and how listening to music can carry us into another world. Yount’s reminder that we should be doing something every day in our 70’s that we want very much to do, such as listening to poetry’s music every day, trusting the lines that come to you will never end. What a beautiful way to live.
Thank you for these poems, Michael and Alan. What a good start to the New Year!
Both poems explore the value of the music that inspires and evokes a poetic response. Mr. Newell’s reminds me that the impact of music begins in the body before it moves to the transcendent. For Mr. Yount the music leads him back to his life-long involvement, make that enmeshment,
in poetry.
I have always enjoyed reading poetry by Alan Yount. I never turn the page of his writings without feeling as if I had been present in the moments he describes. His poetry often allows me the liberty to explore an experience, unknown to me, that I only am aware of through his words. “I have been lucky enough to have heard the music for this”.
I found the same to be true in the poem offered by Mr. Newell. The lines “discovered they had forgotten to breathe” and “with remembrance of music and the unspooling of life” both evoked that tremendous feeling of knowing. Looking forward to reading more of Mr. Newell.
Very grateful to have had the pleasure and opportunity to enjoy both of these poems.