Rat-A-Tat Tah-Tahs [Today's News Poem, March 26, 2011]

Rat-A-Tat Tah-Tahs [Today's News Poem, March 26, 2011]

The sexy empowered with fuck imagination
Powered the office, and powered the celibate marriages.
The daughter of catsuits and hooker boots boxed after college,
Discovered her mother's vagina; her daddy's revolver.
Her Lexus swerves, ricochets off of the panels of cars, off lanes.
And if credit cards bounce, then just launch off a penis
A pogo; then dress in a suit. Go sell houses, insurance;
Your body's a weapon to copy by internet; to copy and
Touch with our eyes. While we handle our organs
You handle a pistol and load it and fire—it's cute so it's safe—
It is pink, therefore gentle. Oh you siren, you call us by testes,
We call back by phone then we enter your lair where you crash us on bullets.
You'll get on a show, you'll be famous and author some books
And appear at the rallies, the NRA rallies, to vanquish the losers of Onan
You fine fucking thing, with your tatas, dentatas,
A rat-a-tat-tah-tah; don't give me sons, give me daughters!

"Meghan Brown, a former Florida pageant queen, shot and killed 42-year-old Albert Franklin Hill during a home invasion March 12 at the 2,732-square-foot house she shares with her fiance in Tierra Verde, Fla."
—Cristina Corbin, FoxNews.com, Published March 22, 2011
http://www.foxnews.com/us/2011/03/22/armed-beauty-queen-fatally-shoots-intruder-florida-home-invasion/



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Banana Slug Nazar [Today's News Poem, March 10, 2011]

Banana Slug Nazar [Today's News Poem, March 10, 2011]

At first it was God's Eye: a charm of protection
We made with two sticks and a colorful yarn.
Crafts of our youth went to trash, yet the talisman

Survived with its crudeness—its innocence, crudeness—
And stupidly watched from its perch near the stove
Warding off something far worse than our bickering.

I'll miss it and throw it in trash while I'm cleaning
My mother's possessions and sorting her will;
Stunned at my ignorance—mother my mystery.

And somewhere between, back in college, a woman—
A schoolmate who kissed and forgot me—had kissed
Someone who tore off his pants and excitedly

Began to undress her. She gazed at the nazar
And pushed him away. There were eyes all around,
Spitting their blessings or semen on comforters.

I batter my shoulders in doorways and rarely
Avert when I gaze. I have missed all the cues,
Broken the spell that coordinates offices—

The pace on the sidewalk—deflected the daggers
They've launched from their eyes, so the eye of the slug—
Pattern of spot it may be—might examine me

And stay me from clumsiness, grant me her rhythm
Amidst all the traffic just meters away,
Grant me her slime and remove my revulsion.

"McDonald's (NYSE:MCD) announced a far-reaching sourcing policy that could significantly reduce the fast-food giant's impact on the environment, including global forests. Yesterday McDonald's unveiled its Sustainable Land Management Commitment (SLMC), a policy that requires its suppliers to use "agricultural raw materials for the company's food and packaging that originate from sustainably-managed land". The commitment will be monitored via an independent evaluation process, according to the company. "
—Rhett A. Butler, mongabay.com, March 11, 2011
http://news.mongabay.com/2011/0310-mcdonalds.html

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Ready For The Next Nerve [Today's News Poem, February 18, 2011]

Ready For The Next Nerve [Today's News Poem, February 18, 2011]

Press conversation; the world is for you.
Sell your opinion, say 'sharing,' it's sales.
Levitate over the subject as lord,
Clouding the view with hot air and the smog.

Press the advantage, the keyboard awaits—
Trading the options, for ownership, fiefs.
Pressing oppression demands full alert,
Iron your shirt for the camera's teeth.

Trigger—the world's on a trigger I fear—
Nerves—if I feel it's the nerve of the world
Causing my nervousness—show me the mind
Hiding behind every keystroke—I'm ready.

"Hundreds of thousands of Egyptians rallied Friday to celebrate former President Hosni Mubarak's ouster a week earlier and remind the ruling generals that protest organizers can still muster daunting crowds if the military stalls on democratic reforms. "
—CHARLES LEVINSON And MATT BRADLEY The Wall Street Journal, FEBRUARY 19, 2011
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704900004576152013556019684.html

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Counterpoint Epiphany [Today's News Poem, November 12, 2010]

Counterpoint Epiphany [Today's News Poem, November 12, 2010]

I open my eyes, and by seeing, am seen;
Leverage circuitry, witness the outbreaks
Of rekindled relationships: cholera.

The names of diseases appear on my screen
Lacking a meaning beyond definition.
I am watched as I voyeur the monitor

Considering menace. Computers are dry,
Likewise myself: we both share dispositions.
We are pulling the themes from polyphonies

Of history, memory. Everything old,
New, in-between is an echo, a counter
To the trend and all lead to epiphanies.

"Medical workers in Haiti on Friday called the upward trend in deaths and illnesses in the cholera outbreak "alarming" as the earthquake-devastated nation's already strained health system overflowed with the sick. "
— Moni Basu, CNN, November 12, 2010 3:34 p.m. EST
http://www.cnn.com/2010/WORLD/americas/11/12/haiti.cholera/

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Altar for Piranhas [Today's News Poem (Sonnet), May 16, 2010]

Altar for Piranhas [Today's News Poem (Sonnet), May 16, 2010]

Today was canceled. Pack your bags and walk
Away from vending boxes selling bags
Of neon hue—against the beige—and talk.
The chatter's constant. Televisions nag
On altars propped above the greasy seats.
A woman drops her phone; a moment's pause
In conversation. Crowds of people bleat...
I'm deaf. My ears were snapped to bits by jaws
With orange caps and sparkle ankle boots.
Processional piranhas dressed in red
Observe the ceremony. Each salutes
The mouth for eye and ear—from color lead,
For hungry masses: inspiration's screen.
It gobbles up their cud, then beams a scene.

“Flights were cancelled across large parts of Britain today as the continuing disruption from the volcanic ash cloud reignited tensions between airlines and the aviation safety watchdog.”
– Dan Milmo & Martin Wainwright, The Guardian, Sunday 16 May 2010 22.10 BST
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/may/16/volcanic-ash-uk-flight-disruption

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Global Village [Today's News Poem]

Global Village

By Khakjaan Wessington

The television is haunted
With saints and demons.
We worship personalities
And then networks
And then simply brands.

They say television is insidious,
That it destroys minds,
Families and so forth.
What nonsense!
Who has time to drive to church anymore?
Pizza is delivered.
So is religion.

Who says television kills?
Who calls it the idiot machine?
I say it saves. Jay Leno saved
NBC millions and millions are saved
By his monologues. I don't know how
But they still tune-in.

The North Star was once a brand.
Just because sailors used it in metaphor
Doesn't mean it didn't guide a ship northward.

Conan O'Brien has all the fun I want to have,
So I don't watch his show.
Jay Leno should have fun,
But loves comedy as accountants love.
They laugh at our sins.
They are our sins.
They've made sin irrelevant.

--

The edit to this poem, in full metered verse, can only be read in the print edition, on sale here:




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