I'm Major Jackson and this is the slowdown.

And this is the slowdown. Slow down. In my early 20s, I rocked a gaucho look.

In my early 20s, I rocked a gaucho look,

sibrero Corobes and duster like Zuro.

Then I had this black leather and jeans thing going on.

Then I got a job in the corporate office of urban outfitters, so I eased into sporting

Oxford shirts underneath Blue Blazers. They say clothes make the man.

Frequently though, clothes hide the person,

particularly a person's depth of feeling.

Today's poem explores what states of being we transmit or do not transmit when we step out of our house.

Nature Poem About Flowers by Matthew Rohrer

Looking back at photographs,

Our clothes were enormous, draped across our shoulders, hanging low off our hips, like they were

someone else's, and they were usually someone's old flannel. It is clear we didn't care or that we had different goals for our

clothes. I remember one night at the National Arts Club, B's seemed truly shocked. He said, I always pegged you as kind of a

bohemian, but look at you in that suit. It wasn't unexpected. I drifted through the reading,

nursing some very old wounds, acting like I was paying attention.

There was somewhere else I was dreaming about.

The dappled in shifting light of a forest in a book

where the air was cool and smelled like imaginary flowers.

And then we were applauding.

And outside on the sidewalk, the city trembled and glowed.

...