Beyond Petroleum [Twitter Found Poem, June 3, 2010]

Beyond Petroleum [Twitter Found Poem, June 3, 2010]
Tweets+Edits=#twitterfoundpoem

relaxing at the pool...
The sun is just hot enough...
had A nice time with fried chicken...

A bit windy...The Ocean breeze
upon my face when the wind blows
IS LOVE. The Ocean breeze
and pepper spray upon my face
when the wind blows...
IT BURNS!
Ocean Currents Likely to Carry Oil to the Atlantic??
IT BURNS!
relaxing at the pool The sun BURNS!

and I realize that Pollution IS LOVE.
IT BURNS my fried chicken
IT cools my pool...
IT BURNS my face off

Blatant Pollution
is an acquired taste.
so the next time You are
relaxing at the pool
and everything BURNS your face off
Remember that Beyond the pool of Petroleum
is an Ocean of Petroleum.


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Homing Chicken, Part II [Today's News Poem May 27, 2010]

Homing Chicken, Part II [Today's News Poem May 27, 2010]

Even a chick has to break its own shell.
Hatched in a classroom, the kids call them 'peeps.'
Tending the cages for birdies to dwell,
Students observe that beneath the cute cheep,
Predators lurk. When the black one falls sick,
Siblings both bury the bird in the chips—
Wood for a grave that the yellow ones kick.
Golden like sunlight that's ready to drip
Off of a cloud that evaporates soon
After that instant. The birdlings are burned.
Death by the heater that gave them the boon—
Life and then ashes: the lesson kids learned.

“Powerful governments and political expediency are helping to perpetuate torture, war crimes and other human rights abuses around the world, Amnesty International said Thursday in its annual report.”
– Mark McDonald, The New York Times, May 27, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/28/world/28amnesty.html

“The dire impact of the massive Gulf spill was apparent Sunday on oil-soaked islands where pelicans nest as several of the birds splashed in the water and preened themselves, apparently trying to clean crude from their feet and wings.
Pelican eggs were glazed with rust-colored gunk in the bird colony, with thick globs floating on top of the water. Nests sat precariously close the mess in mangrove trees.”
– GREG BLUESTEIN and MATTHEW BROWN, The Associated Press, Sunday, May 23, 2010
http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5gIXWYBTpLtSayJtg41LKXpxSxVPAD9FSN9GO4

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Homing Chicken [Today's News Poem (Sonnet), May 17, 2010]

Homing Chicken [Today's News Poem (Sonnet), May 17, 2010]

From chips of beaks to clouds in pigeon-flight,
The wings descend from craggy tiles of clay.
The buses pass the birds of gray and white.
The flock descends to peck on trash and play
The street for moments, taking flight at last.
I saw their nests. I heard the peep of chicks.
And later, after dinnertime, I passed
Another rite. Your son was sobbing—sick.
He said his class had hatched and raised from eggs
A flock of orphaned chickens: science-farm.
At dinnertime he saw the drumstick leg
Was once a ball of fluff they held in arms.
And somehow everything must lose its way
Between the time of birth and last decay.

“June live cattle were flat at 93.25 cents a pound; August feeder cattle shed 0.12 cent to $1.1285 a pound; June lean hogs lost 0.65 cent to 82.90 cents a pound; and July pork bellies tumbled 1.30 cents to $1.0010 a pound. ”
– Associated Press, 4 Hours ago as of 1:22pm PST, May 17, 2010
http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5jTFTmnlbuEGk5C6BuJSgEEKeGrvQD9FOM5HO0

“The Calvary Episcopal Church in Danvers launched a new monthly prayer service for dogs on Sunday, called the "Perfect Paws Pet Ministry."”
– WBZ CBS 38,CBS Broadcasting Inc., May 17, 2010 8:15 am US/Eastern
http://wbztv.com/local/pet.mass.danvers.2.1698026.html

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Missionlocal.org Has the Heart of an Out-of-Town Chicken

Missionlocal.org Has the Heart of an Out-of-Town Chicken

I posted Manifesto of a Militant Vegan Bio-Engineer yesterday on http://missionlocal.org after first reading a link on sfgate. I did so because, 1) The article didn't ask the most interesting question. 2) They're 'mission locals' right? So in theory, they should be supportive of truly local activities, like poetry, right? Of course they aren't.

I'm so silly—what was I thinking? Website comments are supposed to be vapid and always supportive. Here is their comment policy/mission-statement: “You are free to make a comment, but do not make a dangerous comment. Do not question why we feel the need to write about people who want to rescue everything. Do not mock eating! It's what we do in the Mission! We moved to town to eat this city up and shit our hipster good-taste all over you yokels! If your verse was truly local, we would have found it!”

This is an anecdote about the power of words. If comments were so meaningless, mission-so-called-local wouldn't have put the option on their site. They wouldn't moderate the comments to permit cloying posts like this: "This is so sweet!!! Thank U and bless those people with love and tender heart to other creatures..." because such comments themselves are essentially meaningless beyond sentiment. Most webmasters censor to manage their 'brand' in the name of 'signal-noise' ratios, but there are no signal-noise ratio issues on their site worth managing. My verse had no profanity, it was relevant to the topic, it was well cited; so I conclude they belong in the coop along with the other chickens in this story. They fear the poem outdoes their story and they are correct. And this fear is a scarlet letter: 'C' and it belongs left of center, on their chests.

ps: It's interesting to note that sfgate, for all its problems (censorship and otherwise), still let me post the poem on their site. Evil Hearst is more local than missionlocals? Noooooooooooo!



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