False Etymology of Western Modernity [Today's News Poem, March 1, 2011]

False Etymology of Western Modernity [Today's News Poem, March 1, 2011]

Pass through the root of a word:
It resembles enchanters of blaze,
Medicine wands made of paw
And the pelt of a Nemean Lion.

Passion: an animal zeal.
The religion of sunrise and rays
Sniffs for and snuffs out the source
In the soil, in the catgrass—the cornstalks.

Compassion: the dream of a mouse
Covered in paws; and compassion—the taste
Of blood is the flavor of rain,
Pity and love: the communion of famished.

Romance: desire is a sword
Or wound, or the wounded—the wounding
Passing unbreakable flesh
To memories, hopes, expectations.

Roman: the letters and laws.
Imperial characters slaying
Wilderness, making the peace
With weaponry, ownership, commerce.

Roma: a cairn made of bones
For saints and salvation. Religion
Vanquishes beast and its praise,
Compassion and conscience—the wilderness.

"They are not God, yet they act as though they have all power and authority to determine the day and hour of a baby's death and also the manner in which he dies."
—Jennifer Hartline, Catholic Online, 3/1/2011
http://www.catholic.org/national/national_story.php?id=40526

"Animal control officials are concerned that they have had to put down too many dogs and have developed a plan to curb the euthanasia rate."
—Kevin Valine, The Modesto Bee, Feb. 28, 2011
http://www.modbee.com/2011/02/27/1576232/oakdale-tryingto-reduce-rate-of.html

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The Slave Meme [Today's News Poem, February 23, 2011]

The Slave Meme [Today's News Poem, February 23, 2011]

Calculate value with margins of error:
Rome had its slaves who rebelled and destroyed it;
We have computers to operate, process
Assets, authority; ever our servant.

Rome was the peak of the body as weapon,
Masters of iron and bronze for the export
Of edges to fringes to chip off the forests,
And skewer the lion and lamb in their turn.

Enslavement as industry; slaving the farmer,
Enslaving a continent's people who feuded
And built a machine with no center for labor;
To slave and be slain in their turn as the master.

Heirs to the empire of crumbling marble,
Sacrifice blood in arenas of numbers.

"The political turmoil sweeping the Arab world drove oil prices sharply higher and stocks much lower on Tuesday despite efforts by Saudi Arabia to calm turbulent markets."
—CLIFFORD KRAUSS and CHRISTINE HAUSER, The New York Times, Published: February 22, 2011
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/23/business/global/23oil.html

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