Ersatz Ignatz

Ersatz Ignatz

By Monica Youn Monica Youn
The clockwork saguaros sprout extra faces like planaria stroked by
               a razor. Chug

say the sparrows, emitting fluffs of steam. Chug chug say the piston-powered
               ground squirrels.

The tumbleweeds circle on retrofitted tracks, but the blue pasteboard welkin
               is much dented by little winds.

The yuccas pulse softly under the grow-light sconces.

Here is the door he will paint on the rock.

Here is the glass floor of the cliff.

He’ll enter from the west, backlit in orange isinglass, pyrite
            pendants glinting from the fringes of his voice.

Monica Youn, “Ersatz Ignatz” from Ignatz. Copyright © 2010 by Monica Youn. Reprinted by permission of Four Ways Books.

Source: Ignatz (Four Way Books, 2010)

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Poet Monica Youn

POET’S REGION U.S., Mid-Atlantic

Subjects Nature, Landscapes & Pastorals, Animals, Arts & Sciences, Reading & Books, Social Commentaries, Popular Culture

Poetic Terms Free Verse

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Biography

Monica Youn’s poems have appeared in numerous journals and anthologies, including Tin House and in Cue: A Journal of Prose Poetry. Her awards include the Stegner Fellowship at Stanford University and residencies at Yaddo and MacDowell. Her books of poetry include Barter (2003) and Ignatz (2010), a series of poems loosely based on the mouse character from George Herriman’s Krazy Kat comic strip of the 1920s-30s, was a finalist . . .

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Poems by Monica Youn

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Poem Categorization

SUBJECT Nature, Landscapes & Pastorals, Animals, Arts & Sciences, Reading & Books, Social Commentaries, Popular Culture

POET’S REGION U.S., Mid-Atlantic

Poetic Terms Free Verse

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Originally appeared in Poetry magazine.

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