You've heard of MRE's, right? The latest twist is SRE's; "indestructible" sandwiches! Of course, after eating those steadily, one would then need an exercise pill! Caution; unless you're a mouse, it ain't ready yet...sigh. Oh, and if you did inhale... Inhaling may have caused one to see visions of lost cities, but those hallucinations may not have been so far wrong. How about using an electronic tongue to test the flood waters over that city for pollution?
Speaking of pollution, in refusing to allow the Director of Homeland Security to testify in open Congressional hearings, the White House said (again) "Mr. Ridge was a member of his staff and so was not subject to such close Congressional oversight." This Administration seems to think it won a landslide victory in 2000, and that its CEO was elected to be King. Arrogance, thy names are Bush/Cheney/Rove.
And now, the promised poem:
I feel like Miguel; if it's National Poetry Month, crib for the next three weeks. They're all better writers than I am.
Conscientious Objector
Edna St. Vincent Millay
I shall die, but that is all I shall do for Death.
I hear him leading his horse out of the stall:
I hear the clatter on the barn-floor.
He is in haste; he has business in Cuba, business in the
Balkans, many calls to make this morning.
But I will not hold the bridle while he cinches the girth.
And he may mount by himself; I will not give him a leg up.
Though he flick my shoulders with his whip, I will not tell
him which way the fox ran.
With his hoof on my breast, I will not tell him where the
black boy hides in the swamp.
I shall die, but that is all I shall do for Death;
I am not on his pay-roll.
I will not tell him the whereabouts of my friends
nor of my enemies either.
Though he promise me much, I will not map him the route
to any man's door.
Am I a spy in the land of living that I should deliver men
to Death?
Brother, the password and the plans of the city are safe with
Me; never through me
Shall you be overcome.
Source: Unitarian Church in Westport
Hey, I have a poem about Millay. Nothing as serious as Conscientious Objector. In fact, it is totally frivolous! I actually have it on a web page, but I took that page down recently.
Miss Millay Says Something Too
by Samuel Hoffenstein
I want to drown in good-salt water,
I want my body to bump the pier;
Neptune is calling his wayward daughter,
Crying "Edna, come over here!"
I hate the town and I hate the people;
I hate the dryness of floor and pave;
The spar of a ship is my tall church-steeple;
My soul is wet as the wettest wave.
I'm seven-eighths salt and I want to roister
Deep in the brine with the submarine;
I speak the speech of the whale and oyster;
I know the ways of the wild sardine.
I'm tired of standing still and staring
Across the sea with my heels in dust:
I want to live like the sober herring,
And die as pickled when die I must.
Taken from The Mimic Muse in the collection Poems in Praise of Practically Nothing by Samuel Hoffenstein, Boni & Liveright, New York, 1928.
What fun! Dueling poems in comments sections! Grins... And quite a well thought-out one, at that. I like it.
Posted by: Linkmeister at April 15, 2002 08:28 AM