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Friday, February 11, 2011

Devolved Phoenix [Today's News Poem, February 11, 2011]

Devolved Phoenix [Today's News Poem, February 11, 2011]

By match or lighter, someone burned alive
To death in a street: one of the many lives
Squirming for rescue, for the end of nerves.

The ears that lean upon the walls have heard,
They've typed up a eulogy, phoneward bound:
Littlest birds that have delivered sound.

Baskets are flowing and the honey blooms
From jar to the tummy. The birdie croons
And twitters nightly, under office moon.

Rumor transforms what was once flame to spark,
And spark to an image; the whispered dark
Above the keyboard, screenshot bird: a lark.

Bird of pain, bird, my brain,
Phoenix lord—Lord, I'm bored—
Embers flick, trick and fade;
Monitors: glitter blades.

"President Hosni Mubarak told the Egyptian people on Thursday that he would delegate authority to Vice President Omar Suleiman but that he would not resign, enraging hundreds of thousands gathered to hail his departure and setting in motion a volatile new stage in the three-week uprising. "
—ANTHONY SHADID and DAVID D. KIRKPATRICK, The New York Times, Published: February 11, 2011
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/12/world/middleeast/12egypt.html




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1 comment:

Mark Kerstetter said...

The language really sings, I can read this aloud over and over. The message seems to have a double edge though: the contrast between the very real life and death energy in the world and the chattering of twitter. Some have likened twitter to a sort of weapon though, a social phenomenon that can help shape perception of events.