2011-02-27

bought

Right-wing noise machine 
 demonizes the unions 
 to enrich the Kochs

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snowblind

Blinded by his spew 
 overtaking the snowplow 
 doubly hazardous

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coherent

Paradoxically 
 synchrotron radiation 
 lets you tune quanta

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squeak!

Every step I take 
 squeaks like silver amalgam 
 cold snow storm last night

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raccoon face

Blue sky at 10k 
 everyone knows where you've been 
 skier's leprosy

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microcosm

Wrought in wool and gold 
 tabernacle aped cosmos 
 in miniature

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free at last

Pried out of ski boots 
feet compose sweet hymns of praise 
 for liberation

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go big

Hucking the cornice 
 the grand homes of Malibu 
 frolic in the storm

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deep

Spring in Rochester 
 excavates the fossil cars 
 missing since the storm

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legacy

George, George, Jeb and Neil 
 four horsemen of destruction 
 Bush-league governance

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epidemiology

A foot of wet snow 
 welds parked cars to the asphalt 
 heartattack weather

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gravity

Better ski chalets 
 sit high on their properties 
 driveway drains to street

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security

Skiing in mittens 
 the same thought recurs each time: 
 cellphones need lanyards

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design tradeoffs

Gibbons and humans 
 share glenohumeral joints 
 suited to baseball

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bounded in a nutshell

Colonel Qaddafi 
 remains president for life 
 of his shrinking cell

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evil smells, evil times

Scent of burning brakes 
 descending the Sierra 
amateur drivers

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Scott Walker

The Kochs' Trojan horse 
 wants to sell Wisconsin short 
 to pay his masters

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the joint

Knees load and unload 
 pounding through the mogul field 
 youngsters' suspension

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Prison 'suicides' 
 often mask a darker truth
 dead men tell no tales

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cloudsuck

the Ideal Gas Law
 PV=nRT
fails at the dewpoint

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2011-02-25

the cost of Liberty

vigilance slumbers
"not the 'droids you're looking for"
 Jedi NSL

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hero

a new SuperMan
 guards his adoptive planet
 "I am Number Four"

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what the market will bear

the market's like that:
 when you want a deal real bad
 you'll get a bad deal

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thank you sir!

Outrageous hazings 
 to become an officer 
 taint Sudan's police

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2011-02-24

perks

Chinese wine buyers 
 dominate Bourdeau's market 
 empires swig claret

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sovereignty

Julian Assange
empowers electorates
 to vote real issues

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it's personal

personal haiku
 failing to communicate
 to anyone else

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pessimist

the blood of tyrants
nourishes our liberties
 in Jefferson's mind

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blame

Colonel Qaddafi 
blames the strife on  bin Laden...
 . . .or maybe the Jews

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temporary insanity

to catch a girl's eye
 testosterone poisoning
reckless behavior

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spontaneity

Feral daffodils 
 defy the landscaper's plan 
 botany snubs art

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political theater

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

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upstart

Rahm Emanuel 
 shocked the Chicago public 
 he's not named Daley

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dark frame

For reasons obscure 
 my cell phone takes photographs 
 of pocket linings

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rabid

Colonel Qaddafi 
"mad dog of the Middle East"
 kills his own puppies

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2011-02-23

Ozymandias

colonel Quaddafi
loves the Libyan people
they're soft to walk on

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disruptive

Vast reserves of oil 
 don't make Saudis feel secure 
 when their world's in flames

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class war

Colonel Qaddafi 
 finds protesters outrageous 
 they gum up tanks' treads

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stubborn as an ass

Colonel Qaddafi 
 vows 'no negotiations' 
 Everything will burn

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egoist

Colonel Qaddafi 
 vows a vast conflagration 
 reigning drama queen

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the new country

Motley assembly 
 everything west of Auburn 
 came from somewhere else

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deluded

This will be easy 
 Iraq will fund its own war 
 Rumsfeld's fantasy

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on the rebound

Like Richard III 
 the full moon woos land bereft 
 of the setting sun

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quo bono

Globalization 
 sends Mexican food to us 
 their kids in hungry

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memento mori

stark black butterfly
 sucks the pluot's white blossoms
Death attends the dance

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dehumanizing

colonel Quadhafi
calls protesters "cockroaches"
they clog his tanks' treads

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2011-02-22

fitting

Petite Cordelia 
 sought for Dustin Hoffman's Lear 
 'there are no small roles'

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no time wasted

Dog-hearted full moon 
 woos the land newly bereft 
 of the setting sun

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triumphant

Sweet cheery jonquils 
 flourish where nothing else will 
 they're toxic to deer

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two Americas

Rushing to rescue 
 financial sector fat cats 
 they trample the poor

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fixed nitrogen

For the war effort 
 crystals of saltpeter grew 
 under the outhouse

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suckers

Wisconsin's voters 
 bought the Koch brothers' platform 
 hook, line and sinker

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tinderbox

Tiny Tunisia 
 sparked a vast conflagration 
 in the Arab world

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rampant

Lighting the hillside 
 trumping the gardener's plans 
feral daffodils

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lunar eclipse

heaven-faring warg
vomits it's sky-candle meal
balance is restored

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they'll find you next Spring

drowning in the snow
lungs full of frozen pleasure
chilly way to go

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2011-02-20

snow eater

eight-foot-tall steel knives
carve the berm into the screw
impellers launch it

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2011-02-19

Canon

Despite it's late date
the Rabbis went to great lengths
to include "Daniel"

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powder

powder fills my tracks
snow-waves curl around my knees
bust out the fat-boys

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wistful

post-holing back out
lots of time to contemplate
the piste not taken

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iambic pentameter

monosyllables
appended to the lines' starts
shoehorn trochees in 

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Christmas Carol

the first ghost beckoned
"bear but a touch of my hand"
fly into your past

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ski culture

wind-driven powder
psyched the Sugarbowl crowd up
Squaw shut the lifts down

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light-struck

hailing in Auburn
as sun struggles through the clouds
breathtaking, really

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Tantalized

the lift-lines get old
holiday weekend skiing
way too "Disneyland"

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the tomb was empty

serene in their faith
Chilean miners hang tough
no grave can hold them

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ugly mob

shutting the chairs down
while skiers queue sixty-deep
lifties get black looks

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Lear X

Gloucester's bastard son 
 duped his noble-born brother 
 to seem the villain

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instability

Sporadic hail storms 
 augur well for hang gliding 
 chaos in heaven

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priority

Europe's first burghers 
 left ceramic doll-houses 
 under the Black Sea

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the Cure

Whatcha want from me? 
 unhappy psychiatrist 
 doctor, heal thyself

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yeti

Snow-crusted whiskers 
guard my face from Winter's blast
  I am the Walrus

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buddy system

Off piste powder stash
 If you biff it in these trees
Theyll find you next spring

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Lear IX

Lear's youngest daughter 
 proved the best man of the bunch 
 Elizabeth Rex

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O brave new world!


Abundant iron 
 over-turned the Bronze Age world 
disruptive technology

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disruptive technology

Abundant iron 
 over-turned the Bronze Age world 
 weapons became cheap

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Lear VIII

For want of a son 
 Lear left Britain to his girls 
 see: Henry VIII

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Lear VII

Lear, in his folly 
 left Britain to his daughters 
 Tudors took it ill

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In the Beginning...

Primordial life 
 may have used just RNA 
 proteins came later

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awesome

 He came back awestruck 
 bumps the size of volkswagons! 
 Vail's not like Vermont

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ravening

Primitive tire chains 
 grant traction when all else fails 
 tearing up the road

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vision

To glimpse the future 
 strive to understand the past 
 the motifs repeat

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garment of days

Jacob Marley's ghost 
 wore the chains he'd forged in life 
 a ponderous weight!

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nivenauts

Helmet video 
pans from white to blue to black 
 full-twisting faceplant

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stark

Monochrome ski-scene 
 evokes Vermont or New York 
 not California

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ungulates?

Orcas and hippos 
 share a common ancestor 
 their teeth betray them

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2011-02-16

Anathem II

Stephenson's novels 
 masquerade as adventures 
 but ideas drive them

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Lear VI

Poor Dustin Hoffman! 
 too old to play Romeo 
 too short to play Lear

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Lear V


Dog-hearted daughters 
 vied to love their father less 
 and the bastard more

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Lear IV

Dog-hearted daughters 
 vied to love their father less 
 than bastard Edmund

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Lear III

A light Cordelia 
 is the critical asset 
 when you're casting Lear

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immanence

The numinous lurks 
 any spark might cleanse the doors 
 wired into your brain

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Lear II


Lear's bitchy daughters 
 fight to share the bastard's bed 
 ignoble dogpack

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Lear

Lear's bitchy daughters 
 squabble over the bastard 
 ignoble dogpack

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globalization

The U.S. Market 
 drives the planet-wide drug trade 
 out-sourcing vices

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2011-02-15

demographics

Arab autocrats
wait for the next shoe to drop
the kids are restive

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press, freed

Arab journalists
revel in new-found riches
so many scandals!

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al Jazeera

The whole Arab world
watches the news from Egypt
autocrats tremble

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lovely, dark and deep

Robert Frost's forest
invited contemplation
were there only time

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focused

Paul A. M. Dirac
loved his maths more than his mates
Aspberger's syndrome

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smug

Party-of-Hoover
keeps pitching austerity
except for the rich

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golden age

hunter-gatherers
before farmers forced them out
lived lives of leisure

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Ramadan

Hassan al-Banna's
grandson joined the Swiss elite
so far from his roots

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confusion II

a badly cooked steak
goes by the code name "well done"
English is cryptic

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confusion

pity the tourist
asking for a steak cooked right
instead gets "well done"

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vocation

alas, the image
came unbidden in a dream
I just transcribed it

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Xanadu

Coleridge insists
"Xanadu" came in a dream
he transcribed fragments

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Sapir-Warf

the liminal state
swimming Day-wards out of Dream
casts image in prose

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professionalism

the Bard of Avon
banished trochees from his verse
iambs paid the bills

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the Redactor

Who Wrote the Bible?
Richard Elliott Friedman
nominates Ezra

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Deep Time

James Hutton perceived
no vestige of Beginning
no prospect of End

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Winter sport

seven crows, soaring
twirling, diving and jousting
above Disney ridge

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2011-02-13

tricky

Hosni Mubarak 
 tossed the reins to the army 
 full-twisting dismount

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looking backwards, not forwards

Banking on despots 
 keeps our foreign policy 
 in debt to the past

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instability in heaven

Egypt's Armed Forces 
 guarantee the transition 
 no one knows what's next

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change

Mubarak peers out 
 like Sisera's old mother 
 at a whole new world

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boundless

One world's not enough 
 to encompass the ideas 
 of Freeman Dyson

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cynic

Not content with faith 
 Elisha ben Abuyah 
 forsook happiness

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Anathem

Raz promised Ala 
 were he granted a fourth life 
 he'd spend it with her

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snipped

Upstart Macabees 
 can't be traced to David's line 
 so we'll skip that book

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vapid

Expertly packaged 
 Justin Bieber's concert film 
 doesn't need content

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going cheap!

Antique autocrat 
 must sell to make room for change. 
 will negotiate

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behind

Still behind the curve 
 Obama backed Mubarak 
 history rolled past

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unsavory friends

Beneath the cheap words 
 Washington loves a strongman 
 it's so convenient

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about face

Muddled messages 
 when the lone dissenting voice 
 is the president's

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tidy

Six by two by two 
 ludicrously small coffin 
 to contain a life

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creationist bunk

No scripture designed 
 mammalian clotting cascades 
 it just took Deep Time

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precarious

Hosni Mubarak 
 perched atop the pyramid 
 of his spy network

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accessory after the fact

Barack Obama's 
 conspiracy of silence 
 guards Bush's war-crimes

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old hand

In the new Egypt 
 who'll write the constitution?
 Send Noah Feldman

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famine

my Winter garden
languishes for want of rain
I blame Dick Cheney

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salad days


soar on a thermal
bask in a star-lit hotspring
life just ain't that bad

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2011-02-10

knowns and unknowns

Given two people 
 who agree on everything 
 one isn't thinking

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inventive

Like everything else 
 L. Ron Hubbard's war record 
 is mostly fiction

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politicized

Hassan al-Banna
 waved the banner of Islam
 in Great Britain's face

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Jeb?

Campaigning towards '12 
 inevitable as death 
 there's another Bush

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uncompromising

Belgium's government 
 gropes for a way past deadlock 
 see 'Lyssistrata'

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still

Crushing high pressure 
 oppresses California 
 convection seems dead

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selection bias

If you only write 
 from the depths of suffering 
 you write a dark tale

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half-portrait

Manic depressives 
 only paint in their up moods 
 the rest is darkness

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deferred maintenance

One broken window 
 invites more vandalism 
 upkeep cannot wait







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beyond "why"

Moshe ben Maimon
 sought to see the face of God
 in Natural Law

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combat-ready

Senator Jim Webb 
clears the decks for twenty-twelve 
 prepare to engage

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2011-02-08

pump it

Karman vortex streets 
 break the contrail's simple lines 
 entropy evolves

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listless

Fair weather sailors 
 bolt upright in the water 
 going nowhere fast

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touring display

Philadelphia 
 photographs of artifacts 
 meta-Dadaists

fresh

Rosy-cheeked students 
 flirting in the climbing gym 
 make me look ancient

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new again

The moon's first crescent 
 chases the sun down the sky 
 plunging towards the sea

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same old

Hollywood cliches 
 long ago ceased to amuse 
 I crave novelty

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spartan breakfast

Lenticular clouds 
 piled up on mt. Shasta's peak 
 tall stack, no whipped cream

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values for others

Persian paradox 
 back freedoms in Tunisia 
 but crush them at home

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values

honor law, not men!
 charismatic leadership
 leaves no succession

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2011-02-05

an Ideas whose time has come III

Hungry Egyptians 
 crave more than subsidized bread 
 they want human rights

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the state

Thirty years later 
the State of Emergency 
 has become Egypt

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timetables

September won't do 
 Mubarak's day is over 
 Egypt wants change now

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arrogance

Mubarak's regime 
 treats voters as a nuisance 
 there's no room to talk

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lord of the dance

Sex and destruction 
 entwine in one deity 
 Sri Natarajah

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now you see the violence inherent in the system!

Mubarak's hired thugs 
make sure things get violent 
 it's their metier

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oppression II

Mubarak's kill-switch 
 alarmed internet users 
 all around the world

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oppression

Deafening silence 
 all Egypt just went off-line 
 Mubarak's kill-switch

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swept away

Like Pharaohs of yore 
 the Mubarak dynasty 
 went down in the mud

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social safetynet

The crisis wears on 
 dandelions grow scarce in Greece 
 the poor live on them

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2011-02-02

inside joke

Not for everyone 
 Rothko and his admirers 
 share synaesthesia

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an Ideas whose time has come III

Hungry Egyptians 
 crave more than subsidized bread 
 they want human rights

brilliant

Vivid orange newt 
 set on a verdant moss throne 
 biologic gem

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what a State

Thirty years later 
 the State of Emergency 
 has become Egypt

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