Red Queen's Race

Why do trees grow tall? 
 if they could grasp game-theory 
 they'd cooperate

back seat

Don't tease your sister! 
 if I have to stop this car. . . 
 Summer vacation

crass

New amusement park 
 on the theme of Burning Man 
 can't you just see it?

stuck

Coddled through childhood 
 wearisome narcissism 
 warps them forever

fire arts

In the crucible 
 between each parent and child 
 the Self is crafted

in the rough

Sweet young Keith Richards 
 sang soprano in school choir 
 he found art later

personal motives

Likud's policies 
 non-war, non-peace and nonsense 
 are good for Bibi

three-faced liar

For his own reasons 
 Kayani takes our dollars 
 but he's no one's friend

discord

horned owl and peacock
 sing their dissonant duet
melodic as Glass

shocking

So indecorous!! 
 Richard Strauss' Elektra 
 shocked Victorians

make the grade

Treat them like pylons 
 tiny European cars 
 can't climb the grapevine

herring

Tip your chin sky-ward 
 herring doesn't require teeth 
 Gravity's enough

sold!

Ronald McDonald 
 keeps shilling unhealthy food 
 'he's a force for good'

open field

No stars are rising 
 in the silence of the Right 
 Santorum could win

appearance of impropriety II

Criminal conduct 
 warrants hiring a big gun 
 Benjamin Brafman

hopeless

Netanyahu knows 
 fear keeps the voters in line 
 hope makes them restless

but he's our son of a bitch

For many allies 
 political repression 
 'made in USA'

fig-leaf

'Til Mugabe's dead 
 'power-sharing agreement' 
 means he holds the reins

maybe it's me

Gravity's constant? 
 Newton can't explain it all 
 some days, I'm just dense

still here

One more messiah 
 didn't read the calendar 
 morning-after ache

be here now

The End of the World 
didn't come--again--today 
 plant one more fruit tree

fungible

In the cytosol 
 ATP is currency 
 glucose for export 

bite your own chic

Lengua fills tacos 
 but sweetbreads need a showcase
 offal's on waffles?

guardian angels

Better than gargoyles 
 lizards adorn my deck-chair 
 guarding me from bugs

masters of the Universe

For big-shot bankers 
 the lives of little people 
 are of no interest 

comic relief

We'll miss you, Donald! 
 great theatre needs a clown 
 to provide contrast

enraptured

You keep warning me 
 'the world will end Saturday!' 
 can I have your bike? 

not our problem

Marketing replied 
 'TB's a third-world problem 
 there's no profit there'

hit list

For Papilloma 
 is there a wild reservoir? 
 can we wipe it out? 

crass

Rod Blagojevich 
 tried to sell a senate seat 
 it's fucking priceless!

stalled

The way the game's played 
 the threat of filibuster 
 keeps us paralyzed

carpe diem

Declare victory! 
 this chance to bring our boys home 
 can't be repeated

appearance of impropriety

DSK's worried!
 hiring Benjamin Brafman
 means it's serious

instrumentality II

Man, horse and monster 
 for Aphrodite's revenge 
 killed Hippolytus

instrumentality

Aphrodite, spurned
 used gods and men for revenge
Hippolytus died

busted

Dominique Strauss-Kahn 
 asserted droit du seigneur 
 the judge spoke no French

less than equal

Germans grant women 
 Kinder Küche und Kirche
 men own the boardroom

mortality

we, who are dying
dance our season in the sun
 but, in the long run...

Xanadu

lost in the knocking
Coleridge's dream vision
 sketches Xanadu

doubt

hire a teenager
while he still knows everything
 doubt comes with wisdom

Phaedre

Aphrodite, spurned
used gods and men for revenge
 Hippolytus died

dangers of celibacy

Man, horse and monster 
 for Aphrodite's revenge 
 killed Hippolytus

terrified

what Benazir guessed
about where Osama was
scared the ISI

martyred

Benazir Bhutto
challenged the military
she had to be crushed

goes around comes around

prison guards' unions
lobby for harsh sentences
job security

sensitive

how would his schoolmates
have teased a lad named "Ashfaq"?
maybe he's still sore

selected

the most inane ploys
to get a girl's phone number
works, often enough

oldest profession

bartering carrots
male macaques get what they want
Darwin finds a way

what's in a name?

Eomer's tribute:
"Strider is too poor a name:
Wingfoot I name you"

what utility?

Dead philosopher
mummified in a glass case
rather odd bequest

poor sod

Kayani's schoolmates 
 mangled his name to taunt him 
 he's still bloody sore

gamesman

For Netanyahu 
 Peace isn't the highest good 
 fear rallies voters

two-faced

Ashfaq Kayani 
 a perfidious ally 
 plays a double game

brat

Chutzpah's poster-child 
 wants rewards for his failures 
 Ashfaq Kayani

Skinless, boneless

 The Castro's culture 
 sacrifices food for sex 
 false dichotomy

instead of food

In most recipes 
 skinless boneless chickenbreast 
 tastes just like tofu

foresight

Plan for one lifetime 
 'in the long run, we're all dead': 
 John Kenneth Galbraith

retarded weather

Funny May weather 
 maybe I'll carry tire chains 
 a few weeks longer

narrow minded

Fundamentalists 
 claim to own the only Truth 
 science has no place

teen spirit

Soaring the storm clouds
 never mind that it's not fun 
 hell-bent on heaven

block by block

at every stop-sign
 regenerative braking
makes cities greener

justice

Ashfaq Kayani 
 could die of embarrassment 
 if he's not hanged first

prophet III

For the true prophet 
 deep social maladjustment 
 is prerequisite

prophet II

For A. J. Heschel 
 maladjustment was the key 
 to prophetic truth

utilitarianism

Jeremy Bentham 
 exalted utility 
 as the greatest good

out-standing

Prophets must be strange 
 unbearable extremists 
 uncompromising

what is it good for?

Ironic coda 
 Jeremy Bentham's mummy 
 no utility

false charges

Watch Iran this month 
 arrests for 'demon worship' 
 mean strife is brewing 

prophet

Abraham Heschel 
 writing in his fourth language 
 made the mountains ring

dissent

It is our duty 
 as citizens to say no 
 when our nation sins

slant

All books are biased 
 victors write the histories 
 the losers be damned

sacrificial lamb

Offer up Pasha 
 to distract the journalists 
 from Kayani's sins 

inherit the wind

Philip's son Alex 
 built a vast inheritance 
 to leave to no sons

not that way

Seek peace through justice 
 the sword is the pride of man 
 bringing only death

O brave new world!

MicroSoft bought Skype 
 trying to stay relevant 
 in a changing world

assassin

David Margolis 
 gutted OPR's report 
 he deserves as much

lashon harah

Once tweets go viral 
 the object of ridicule 
 has no real redress

me! me!

Frantic young women 
 vie to catch prince Harry's eye 
 he's their destiny

ridiculous

Some politicians 
 invite public ridicule 
like Rick Santorum

arrogance

Less than two percent 
 of your genome codes proteins 
 don't sneer at the 'junk'

pathetic

Playing the victim 
Kayani's angry puppet 
 blames the CIA

back-end

Under the surface 
 sexual innuendo 
 makes most humor work

irresponsible

playing the victim
 Netanyahu thanks Mitchell
and accepts no blame

xenia II

Hector's kid brother
took Menelaus' wife
this cannot end well

aged to perfection

the older he gets
the better he used to be
in the fireside tales

blind ambition

Pride and vanity 
 mired us in Afghanistan 
 with no clear way out

goose that laid the golden egg

Ashfaq Kayani 
 nurtured the terrorist threat 
 to bilk us for aid

crybaby

Ashfaq Kayani 
 swears that he's the real victim 
 of CIA schemes 

Mickleburg

 Barbary pirates 
 watched the straits of Gibraltar 
 Norse rowed the east route

responsibility

Ashfaq Kayani 
 could die of embarrassment 
 if he's not hanged first

thou shall not follow a majority II

For the true prophet 
 deep social maladjustment 
 is prerequisite

thou shall not follow a majority

For A. J. Heschel 
 maladjustment was the key 
 to prophetic truth

malleable

In Scalia's hands 
 foundational documents 
 crumble like wet pulp

paradise

Abandon all hope 
 ye who would write of heaven 
 hell gets the best lines

sussurus

Dreams of roaring brooks 
 fade to grey reality 
 wind pummels the trees

de gustibus

Is that voice lovely 
 just because it's so high- pitched? 
 not my aesthetic

creepy

Trump's going nowhere 
 his appetite for young girls 
 turns off the voters

the official story

Bin Laden's coda 
 'killed while resisting arrest' 
 inevitable

be afraid

Bin Laden's terror 
amplifiied by John Ashcroft 
diminishes us

chickenhawks

No one remembers 
 war on American soil 
 talk has become cheap

dance club

Five big tom turkeys 
 tails splayed up and wings stretched down 
 pay court to one hen

into that good night

Aldous Huxley's death 
 like the prophet Elijah's 
 flaming chariots

bad client

Ashfaq Kayani
 incompetent? complicit?
 we don't need this clown

values

Lombardi's credo: 
 'winning isn't everything 
 it's the only thing'

blinded

Pakistan's leaders'
 egos trumped Intelligence
 they all look foolish

changes

aesthetics adapt
 hair migrates from scalp to chin
as the years scroll past

`connected

Ashcroft's new day-job
 Blackwater's head of Ethics
grants him strange powers

personhood

Corporate profits 
came unmoored from real persons' 
 nothing in common

California dreamin'

Nine billion people 
 can't live like Californians 
broadcast smaller dreams!

ya know?

I know what I'd mean 
 if I had spoken those words 
 with you, I'm guessing

appearance of impropriety

Abbottobad's police 
 incompetent? Complicit? 
 looks bad either 

puppetmaster

Ashfaq Kayani 
formerly of ISI 
 still runs key assets

power grab

the "War on Terror"
 tips the Balance of Power
 towards autocracy

...and when did he know it?

Kayani's silence 
 about bin Laden's hideout 
 appears complicit

priceless

Ashfaq Kayani
 still insists he knew nothing
 and that's what he's worth

chief of ISI

Ashfaq Kayani
 still insists he knew nothing
 such intelligence!

turn about

Vengeance is served cold 
 nine-banded armadilloes 
 give leprosy back

agenda

Ashfaq Kayani
and his Haqqani assets
 don't play for our team

acceptance

Kayani's guard-dogs  
never barked at bin Laden 
 he's like family

appearance of impropriety

Abbottobad's police 
 incompetent? Complicit? 
 looks bad either 

higher bidder

Osama's rent checks 
 kept the ISI at bay 
 until we paid more

eviction notice

Bin Laden's rent check 
 to his ISI minders 
 bounced for the last time

Im tirtzu

Peace isn't abstract
pursuing social justice
puts flesh on the dream

fear monger

Helen Caldicott
sincere and charismatic
cultivates our fears

unbalanced

the "War on Terror"
 tips the Balance of Power
 towards autocracy