I'm Major Jackson, and this is the slowdown.

Many nights I let music take me away.

Away here meaning both transport and submission.

I listen mostly in my home office.

Bonafide audio files like my friend Garrett would probably look on with pity at my rag-tag system.

A pair of both speakers, an aging Sony receiver, and a retro JVC turntable.

His vacuum tube amps, Italian-made tower speakers, and carefully curated music collection is the epitome of

sophisticated listening. In his extraordinary memoir, the perfect sound, he speaks of, quote,

sound staging, air, and bloom. My audio system might not bloom, but it does emit a crisp sound,

big enough that if I close my eyes, I'm suddenly in the recording studio, staring straight-faced

into the seductive phrasing of a tenor saxophonist. The phrase, take me away, sounds passive.

But music requires work, requires paying attention to changes, knowing a passage is an improvisational

homage to some legendary artists. I love keeping up with the fast

thinking behind the notes like little sunbursts. The nuances say of a Thelonious monk

off-cord is an intentional discordant act which announces presence.

Today's poem knows music is light that travels places.

If we are lucky, we know not where we're going,

but are sure to arrive by way of intricate progressions of sound to ourselves.

Listening to monks Mysterioso, I remember braiding my sister's hair by Christopher Gilbert.

What it's all about is being just beyond a man's grasp, which is a kind of consciousness

you can own, to get to be at a moment's center and let it keep on happening, knowing

you don't own it, which is moving yourself close to, being particular to that place.

...