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Thursday, March 11, 2010

Gold to Ash [Bonus News Poem March 11, 2010]

Gold to Ash [Bonus News Poem March 11, 2010]

“India, which has tripled its defense spending in a race against China’s military buildup, is having trouble converting the funding into weapons and equipment its military says are urgently needed.”
-James Rupert, Bloomberg, March 11, 2010, 2:46 PM EST
http://www.businessweek.com/news/2010-03-11/india-s-stalled-arms-buying-leaves-its-army-outgunned-by-china.html

“However, the report said the overall human rights picture in Somalia has deteriorated because of continued conflict, the availability of small arms, and the absence of the rule of law.”
--VOA News, 11 March 2010
http://www1.voanews.com/english/news/africa/US-Report-Paints-Grim-Picture-of-Human-Rights-in-Africa-87386672.html


The AK Forty Seven's sure
As iron blades from long ago.
And likewise RPGs secure
The job of catapults—to mow

The armor, spiting tongues of smoke.
It's easier to make these arms
Than medicines. A gun will choke
All other trades. A raider farms

The peasants, much like ancient times.
It's not a way of life, instead
Consider it a chain of crimes
With unclear origins. We tread

Upon the brink of middle-age,
With swords enough, but lacking sage
Advice to stay the spreading time afoot:
A darker age. This golden age? Kaput.
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A Game of Chess [Today's News Poem March 11, 2010]

A Game of Chess [Today's News Poem March 11, 2010]

“What was the spark that lit her interest in radical Islam? Born in Michigan, raised in Texas, living in Pennsylvania, LaRose may have had no contact with actual Muslims prior to professing a willingness to die for their cause in electronic messages.
In June 2008, LaRose posted a comment on YouTube saying she was “desperate to do something somehow to help” suffering Muslims. According to the timeline in the US indictment, it appears that only after that was she connected with a loose band of international extremists who suggested she help plot the murder of Swedish cartoonist Lars Vilks.”
--Peter Grier, Christian Science Monitor, March 11, 2010
http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Justice/2010/0311/Three-crucial-questions-in-the-Jihad-Jane-case

The age of loyalty's not dead,
Not exorcised: the trait evolved.
We neither live behind, ahead,
Nor inbetween the times—we've solved

Some riddles; nothing war can't fix.
A bit of zero sum uplifts
The winner's soul. War's waged by cliques
And just because allegiance shifts

That doesn't mean that faith's gone dry.
A piety combined with rage
Explodes with zealotry. The spry
Will fight those others fear engage.

In conflict, righteousness is won.
The status quo must face or fail
The challenge it would rather shun.
But martyrs tip perception's scale

Until the entity of state,
Of church, or other cause is lost
For want of worship; sealing fate
As newer faiths take tithing's cost.

Salute a flag, or amity,
Or anime... astrology—
We serve to shape calamity
In service of idolatry.

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Okay, gonna start the news poem

And I'm going to write a bonus poem or two, to make up for the last few days.

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