Mark Young

From 100 Titles From Tom Beckett

#15: I Don’t Feel Centered

Breathe deeply. Count to

three. Leave your cellphone

out of the bedroom at night.

The list goes on. & on. & over-

balances me even more. A

contemporary clone of KC

& The Sunshine Band is doing

their disco version of Shake

Your Chakras, not Your Booty

out on the patio; & I would

if I could, but I know that if

I shook either I am certain

to fall over. Would come a-

round to find the world has

surrounded me, & treating

me to a mashup of Humpty

Dumpty & London Bridge

is Falling Down. Nothing

nuanced. & though I may be

the center of their current

attention, I know my center

will drift away when they do.

Four from the Workshop

1. a sudden prosthesis

dans les termes de la

Loy de J^^1'** Nature 3

ou qui les ayant violez

described the reduction

in cor- Te distribution of the

slurry during aprosion

solutiopes cold sores,     you

are on the righlast thing you

want is a decent steering lock

2. Miss Emoji: a found poem

Are driving F1 Chevy pickup truck.

I love paying high fuel prices at the

petrol pump because it's good for

fuel companies. They keep electric

vehicles in their place & that's worth

paying $5 a liter at the pump. People

who drive electric vehicles love to

smell their own farts. Fossil fuels for

the win; & clean coal is a thing, We

should have more coal power plants.

3. The making of a

molehill

molecule

molarize

polarize

placate

lacerate

medicate

mediate

fountain

mountain

4. In the foundry

I need to weld a wordling wid-

get that can construct application

bars to spell out such cautions

as: "Potential Prose Risk Ahead"

or: "Beware of Rancid Jigsaws."

Depending on the circumstances,

such text messages must be able

to be covered up to survive any

chance exposure to acid rain.

 A line from The Venerable Bede

Always put your own mental health first.

Take a break from your phone. Too much

cell-addiction will impinge upon your daily

activities. The effect is higher among girls.

When your own photos receive likes, the

brain’s reward center is activated. But young

women are easily harmed by appearance-

focused social media which can often cause

body image & eating concerns. Think about

what drives your followers to Like posts. To find

who likes me I click on the three horizontal lines in

the upper-right corner. I am my own secretary.

Support your local Vampire

Something must die if meat

appears on the table. Satanic

Panic is back, examining the

rheology & tribology in mole-

cular models of how the media

sausage is made. Conservative

fervor about brands being too

“woke” is again on the rise, &

boycotts are increasing all a-

round the globe. In Nigeria

there is panic as northerners

get set to boycott Igbo busi-

nesses in response to IPOB's

ban on Fulani cows. In the US

Target giving in to conserva-

tive pressure on Pride is not

a great sign. I'm not a big fan

of real-life culture wars &

panic-stoking in the media,

so though I have no time for

the man, I don't see myself

bothering to boycott the visit

of Donald Trump Jr. to Aus-

tralia — I have no interest in

going to see him dance or

whatever it is he does. After

all, Vampire Freaks has been

around far longer than both

manic Panic & the son of the

orange man. &, unlike that

latter pair, what VampF are off-

ering is a memorable blend of

art, science, & teenage angst.

Mark Young was born in Aotearoa / New Zealand but now lives in a small town in North Queensland in Australia. He has been publishing poetry for almost sixty-five years, & is the author of more than sixty books, primarily text poetry but also including speculative fiction, vispo, memoir, & art history. His most recent books are a free downloadable chapbook of visuals & poems, Mercator Projected, published by Half Day Moon Press in August 2023 &  Ley Lines II,  recently published by Sandy Press & available through Amazon.