MORE CATCHING UP WITH ALAN YOUNT

These posts are a bit out of order, but I'm not enough of an expert with Blogger to know how to adjust that, so just keep reading down for more of Alan's work as I'm posting several things he's sent me over the past few months, my very bad for not keeping current!  Alan is a true renaissance man - trumpet player par excellence, amazing poet, husband, father, and retired university librarian...so many talents!  Enjoy these poems!  Thank you Alan for continuing to share your work with us - please keep it up!   Keep reading below - there is more after this first one!

 

ON  ONE  DAY  AT  A  TIME

 in these troubled times

 and false spring

 after seventy

 but also before

 those older years

 try and find

 on one day at a time

 find something in each day

 you will enjoy doing

 something good and interesting

 you absolutely love to do

 on every single day

         Postscript:  written on June 6, 2020 seventy third birthday,

                   with hope of strength and peace in these times.

 Published by:  JerryJazzMusician (a national online jazz journal),June 18, 2020.

 Published by:  Birdsong Journal (a Sandy Benitez publication), June 23, 2020.

 

AFTERWARDS:  FOR  THE  SPRING  OF  2020

           “The World Breaks Everyone, And Afterwards,

          Many Are Stronger At The Broken Places.”--- Ernest Hemingway.

 many, many, years ago

          I was in need

                   of some extra money.

 I had decided

          to sell my upright 1940’s

                   kay bass violin.

 however

          this april

                   I still have it:

 and I always know …

                   how much

                             it still means to me.

             it is beyond compare

with the comfort

                             it gives.

 just feeling the design

          of the birds eye

                             maple neck …

 and then again …

          just lightly touching

                             the string

      there’s the deep strength of sound:

          reassuring and resounding

                   from the perfectly placed bass notes.

 this bass

          has been

                   a lifelong friend:

 I need this old bass

          in these trying times

                   now more … than ever.

           Published by www.JerryJazzMusician.com (a national online jazz journal): 

“Afterwards: For The Spring, Of 2020.”  May 23^rd, 2020.

 

 

ALAN YOUNT MEMORIALIZES OUR CLASSMATES JOHN EMERLINE & JIM BURTON IN VERSE

My apologies to Alan for being so late in posting his work.  This one is also published on jerryjazzmusician.com and the editor of that blog was very complimentary of this one.  A shame we have to memorialize our classmates due to deaths way too early, but at least we can remember them with dignity and enjoy Alan's poetry.

 

ACCIDENTLY  PULLED  UNDER,

                             BY  THE  UNDERTOW

                              “For Jim Burton And John Emerline.”

 just today, I read

          in my high school newsletter,

 that two 1965 classmates

          and friends from kirkwood high:

 jim burton

          and john emerline

 were pulled under

          by the undertow.

 it was off of the beach

          near emerald isle, north carolina.

 the day was sunday

          july 12, 2020.

 it seems enough, in this year

          and in these times

 to worry about dying

          from the virus.

 then there is also the constant

          and continuing … undercurrent of worry

 about accidently contracting, and then

          succumbing to the virus.

 at the extreme very least

          for my two

 high school friends

          could thus be said:

 “he who

          dies today

 does not

          have to worry

 about tomorrow.”

          william shakespeare.

Published by: www.JerryJazzMusician.com  (a national online jazz journal).Sept. 25, 2020.  In “Vol. 3, A Collection of Poetry Reflecting the Era of COVID, Black Lives Matter, and a Heated Political Season.”  (27^th Yount poem published by JJM and his150^th poem published).