swifts  &  s l o w s · a quarterly of crisscrossings

beneath the ice
Mark Young

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The / divergent direction / of subsequent revolutions

Cultivo una rosa blanca
En julio como en enero
—José Martí, Versos sencillos: XXXIX

There is an arrow on the
reverse side of the blank
medallion. When I turn
it back over, there is
now a question mark in-
scribed. I take it to mean:
where are you traveling
to? I take it to mean that
there will be a white rose
waiting for me no matter

where I go, no matter what
time I might get there. I
take it to mean that I have
reached there — or here —
already. I take it to mean
that I really have no idea
now of what it means. But
then I also can no longer
say: yo soy un hombre sin-
cero de donde crece la palma.

a / controversy rages / in Piano, Texas

Nothing exposes the feldspar found
in monarchs & princes & merchant
bankers unless you shape the nozzle of
the cartridge to suit the thread before
the surrounding foliage loses too
much light. You might also need a gable

infilled with weatherboards, like those
found at the south-east corner of Stanley
Street East, to provide the right vertical
hold, brightness, contrast. Otherwise
only bluetooth plus a bank of spotlights
& a stadium-sized screen will garner

sufficient focus to enable proper exam-
ination of the subjects. Overkill, perhaps,
for one of the most ubiquitous minerals
in the upper echelons of Wall Street, but
it’s nice to know what makes money talk,
& when it does, in what elemental way.

A line from Behrouz Boochani

Beneath the ice there is often
running water. Still flows be-
neath, still floes above. It all
depends on how we see the

world of words. Some bridges
burnt can never be rebuilt. We
burn within, but look inside &
I uncover nothing but myself.

Ice below the running water.
Bridges built in preparation for
the thaw that never comes. No
heat. So, ice burns, water never.

trackwork

I’ve been doing some
debugging on my
Portable Runtime
Library using a piece
of homebrew software
I bought a build of a
few weeks back. Am
searching for packages
that contain certain
architectures allowed
under the rules for
describing original
items & historical
collections. Have
found two matches,
both involving
systems with infinite
entanglements of
molecular units—a
range of motor-driven
mechanical diaphragm
pumps, & the best quality
generic Viagra with 100%
satisfaction guaranteed.

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Mark Young’s first published poetry appeared over sixty-two years ago. Much more recent work has appeared in The Sparrow’s Trombone, Scud, Ygdrasil, Mobius, SurVision, NAUSEATED DRIVE, Unlikely Stories, Don’t Submit, & Word For/Word.