Lip-Syncing A Vast Terrain

Barack Obama Rewrites History

2008-11-05T15:09:00.000-08:00

Some princes are born in palaces. Some are born in mangers. But a few are born in the imagination, out of scraps of history and hope. Barack Obama never talks about how people see him: I'm not the one making history, he said every chance he got. You are. Yet as he looked out Tuesday night through the bulletproof glass, in a park named for a Civil War general, he had to see the truth on people's faces. We are the ones we've been waiting for, he liked to say, but people were waiting for him, waiting for someone to finish what a King began.

Barack Hussein Obama did not win because of the color of his skin. Nor did he win in spite of it. He won because at a very dangerous moment in the life of a still young country, more people than have ever spoken before came together to try to save it. And that was a victory all its own.

An election in one of the world's oldest democracies looked like the kind they hold in brand-new ones, when citizens finally come out and dance, a purple-thumb day, a velvet revolution. A hundred thousand people came out in red states to hear Obama; a hundred fifty thousand turned out in purple ones, even after all this time, when they should have been sick to death of Hope and Change. In Michigan, people put an electric fence around their yard sign to protect it. NASA astronauts on board the International Space Station sent a video message encouraging people to vote; they did, from 200 miles up. A judge in Ohio ruled that homeless people could use a park bench as their address in order to register. A couple flew home from India just to cast their ballots. Obama's Ohio volunteers knocked on a million doors on Monday alone. That night, a Florida official locked himself in the Seminole County election headquarters and slept overnight with the ballots to make sure nothing went wrong with the vote. Early-voting lines in Atlanta were 10 hours long, and still people waited, as though their vote was their most precious and personal possession at a moment when everything else seemed to be losing its value. You heard the same phrases everywhere. First time ever. In my lifetime. Whatever it takes.

When it was over, more than 120 million pulled a lever or mailed a ballot, and the system could barely accommodate the demands of Extreme Democracy. Obama won more votes than anyone else in U.S. history, the biggest Democratic victory since Lyndon Johnson crushed another Arizona Senator 44 years ago. Obama won men, which no Democrat had managed since Bill Clinton. He won 54% of Catholics, 66% of Latinos, 68% of new voters — a multicultural, multigenerational movement that shatters the old political ice pack. He let loose a deep blue wave that washed well past the coasts and the college towns, into the South through Virginia and Florida, the Mountain West with Colorado and New Mexico, into the Ohio Valley and the Midwestern battlegrounds: you could almost walk from Maine to Minnesota without getting your feet wet in a red state. After months of mapmaking all the roads to 270, Obama tore right past with ease.

A nation doesn't much need a big President in small times; it needs one when the future is spitting out monsters. We've heard so much about Obama's brand-new voters that we easily forget the others he found, the ones who hadn't voted since Vietnam or who had never dreamed they'd vote for a black man or a liberal or a Democrat, much less all three. But many Americans are living through the worst decade of their lives, and they have anger-management issues. They saw a war mismanaged, a city swallowed, now an economy held together with foreign loans and thumbtacks. It took a perfect storm of bad news to create this moment, but even the big men rarely win in a walk. Ronald Reagan didn't. John Kennedy didn't. Those with the clearest vision often have to fight the hardest for others to see things as they do. Find out more about America's President-elect in a video biography at: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=3545343528928314588

Research info gathered at: http://www.time.com/

Now, here's one of my poems still stuck in the ballot box:

Enclosee Please Find

An umbrella hanging in the hallway.

A noisy vending machine with a quick temper.

Circles drawn in a mirror with red lipstick.

Tar melting on a hot tin roof.One innocent knife.

Some shy bullets.

The moat of a former castle.

Ordinary white underwear.

A persistent fire alarm.

Toy trains emitting real puffs of smoke.

War right after it declares a truce.

A copper skillet with it own cleaning instructions.

Brightly colored canisters of embalming fluid.

8x10 pictures of a single apple ripening.

A meadow thick in a woman of flowers.

Poem first published at: http://kenagainfreesavers.com/

Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/

tutoring blog: http://www.miceintheclassroom.blogspot.com/

and music blog: http://www.medleyamkersant.blogspot.com/

The International Code of Signals

2008-11-01T14:34:00.000-07:00

The International Code of Signals (INTERCO) is a signal code used by merchant and naval vessels to communicate important messages about the condition of a vessel or the wish of the ship’s captain when there are language barriers. INTERCO signals can be sent by signal flag, blinker light, Morse code, or by radio.

The First International Code was drafted in 1855 by the British Board of Trade and was published by the Board in 1857 in two parts. One part was universal and international signals and the other was British signals only. 18 separate signal flags were used to make over 70,000 possible messages. In 1889 the code was once again updated at the International Conference in Washington, D.C.

In 1927 The International Radiotelegraph Conference in Washington D. C. created a code in seven languages: English, French, Italian, German, Japanese, Spanish and in Norwegian. This new edition was completed in 1930 and was adopted by the International Radiotelegraph Conference held in Madrid in 1932 where a standing committee was also set-up to continue revising the Code.

By 1961 the Code was supervised by the Inter-Governmental Maritime Consultative Organization (IMCO). By then too, a new version included vocabulary for aviation communication and an international medical code as well as updated signals for communications between vessels and shipowners, agents, repair yards, and others in the maritime business. The Code was updated again in 1965.

Today, every signal in the INTERCO has a complete meaning and usually does not need any more than two or three signals to complete a message. Here are some examples: AC: I am abandoning my vessel. AN: I need a doctor. GM: I cannot save my vessel. IT: I am on fire. MAA: I request urgent medical advice. MAC: I request you to arrange hospital admission. MAD: I am . . . (tell how many) hours from the nearest port. You can find out more about this subject at: http://flagspot.net/flags/xf-ics.html

Research info gathered at: http://www.wikipedia.org/

Now, here's one of my poems that never uses a signal:

An Asylum, Brandishing A Flashlight

My life isn’t always this dull.

Sometimes I gawk at unblocked stars and
scrap the cobalt blue map until there’s
no color left to see. I read the river
in my palm and spend quality
time feeling toasted wind.
I take my heart apart
plank by plank and
examine each
one for termites. I
darn my socks then hang
my bathrobes from a tree or
maybe set the scarecrow on fire
and never write it in my diary. I stuff
my pockets with pet rocks or burrow a home
in the hollows. And when I really want to
have fun I try my luck at telling the
difference between a weather
vane and a tuning fork,
both of which I
eventually
eat at my leisure,
completely convinced
that there is no better way to fly.

This poem was previously published at: www.puzzleddragon.com/Bent_Pin_Contents/Bent_Pin_Contents.html

Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/

tutoring blog: http://www.miceintheclassroom.blogspot.com/

and music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/

Classic Euro Economy Cars: Fiat 500

2008-10-29T13:33:00.000-07:00

The Fiat 500 (the "cinquecento", /tin.kwe.ten.to/, or "chin-kwe-chen-to", from the Italian word for "500") is a car produced by Fiat company of Italy between 1957 and 1975 (the Fiat 500 K alone was produced until 1977). It was designed by Dante Giacosa.

Launched as the Nuova 500, it was marketed as a cheap and practical town car. Measuring only 2.97 m (9 ft 9 in) long, and originally powered by a tiny 479 cc two-cylinder, air-cooled engine, the 500 redefined the term "small car" and is considered one of the first city cars. In 2007 Fiat launched a similar looking, retro-styled car, the Fiat Nuova 500, basing it on the Fiat Panda.

To meet the demands of the post-war market which called for economy cars, the Fiat 500 was rear-engined on the pattern of the Volkswagen Beetle, just like its bigger brother, the 1955 Fiat 600. Several car makers followed this now nearly vanished design at the time and were quite successful, but only the Fiat 500 was used as the template for other car makers in Europe. The firms Neckar of Germany and Steyr-Puch in Austria each made cars that were legally based on the Fiat 500. There were six main models of Fiat 500 produced by Fiat themselves. The original model was called the Nuova (1957-1960).

The Nuova had a smaller engine than all newer models, at 479 cc and producing just 13 bhp. The original model also features a roof folding all the way back to the rear of the vehicle, like that of a Citroen 2CV rather than the later roof design which only folds half way back along the roof. The Nuova is one of three models featuring "suicide doors”. There is also a stylish Sport version of the Nuova, which features a distinctive red stripe and a more powerful engine, bored out to 499.5 cc from the original 479 cc engine and with a longer stroke, thus producing an impressive 21 bhp from the same original block.

The other five models were the “D” (1960-65), the “K” or Giadiniera (1960-77), the “F” or Belina (1965-72), the “L” or Lusso (1968-72), and the “R” or Rinnovata (1972-75). Fiat previewed the all new 500 in March 2007 exactly 50 years after the first Fiat 500 was presented. The design of the new 2007 Fiat 500 is based on the 2004 Fiat Trepiuno concept. The car features a distinctive retro-look just like the Volkswagen New Beetle and BMW MINI but may well be substantially cheaper than those cars, with a starting price of €10,500. The car is 3.55 meters long and 1.65 meters wide. Top speed is 180 km/h (112 mph). The basic price is €10,500 in Italy; with options €15,000. Find out more at: http://www.retro500.com/

Research info gathered at: www.wikipedia.org

Now, here’s one of my poems that speaks Italian:

12 Stanzas In A Taxi

In her opinion, a metaphor should be categorized

by size & amount of choices on the menu. By speed

& wind velocity. Whether they are punctual on habitually

tardy. If they've ever been arrested for driving under

the influence. Missed a child-support payment. Filed

for bankruptcy. She feels it should be noted if they have

ever had a bad case of heartburn. Wet in the bed as a

child. Can read music. Chinese characters. Morse code.

Has a preference for frog legs or snails. Can speak at

least 3 different languages. Likes panoramic views. And

perhaps more important, has dived into the deep blue

sea with its headlights still on.

Poem first published at: http://kenagain.freeserver.com/
Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/
And music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/
Poem Copyright 2008 by Maurice Oliver. All Rights Reserved.

Classic Euro Economy Cars: Austin Mini

2008-10-21T13:04:00.000-07:00

The Mini is a small car that was produced by the British Motor Corporation (BMC) and its successors from 1959 until 2000. The most popular British-made car ever, it was superseded by the New MINI, which was launched in April 2001. The original is considered an icon of the 1960s, and its space-saving front-wheel-drive layout (that allowed 80% of the area of the car's floor span to be used for passengers and luggage) influenced a generation of car-makers. The vehicle is in some ways considered the British equivalent to its German contemporary, the Volkswagen Beetle, which enjoyed similar popularity in North America.

This distinctive two-door car was designed for BMC by Sir Alec Issigonis. It was manufactured at the Longbridge and Cowley plants in the United Kingdom, the Victoria Park / Zetland British Motor Corporation (Australia) factory in Sydney, Australia, and later also in Spain (Authi), Belgium, Chile, Italy, Portugal, South Africa, Uruguay, Venezuela and Yugoslavia. The Mini Mark I had three major UK updates: the Mark II, the Clubman and the Mark III. Within these was a series of variations including an estate car, a pick-up truck, a van, and the Mini Moke— a jeep-like buggy. The Mini Cooper and Cooper "S" were sportier versions that were successful as rally cars, winning the Monte Carlo Rally three times. Minis were marketed under the Austin and Morris names until Mini became a marquee in its own right in 1969.

Designed as project ADO15 (Austin Drawing Office project number 15), the Mini came about because of a fuel shortage. In 1956, as a result of the Suez Crisis which reduced oil supplies, the United Kingdom saw the re-introduction of petrol (gasoline) rationing. Sales of large cars slumped, and there was a boom in the market for so called Bubble cars, which were mainly German in origin.

The production version of the Mini was demonstrated to the press in April 1959, and by August several thousand cars had been produced ready for the first sales. The name Mini was first used domestically by BMC for Austin's version in 1961, when the Austin Seven was remaketed as the Austin Mini, somewhat to the surprise of the Sharps Commercials car company (later known as Bond Cars Ltd) who had been using the name Minicar for their three-wheeled vehicles since 1949. Slow at the outset, Mark I sales strengthened across most of the model lines in the 1960s, and production totaled 1,190,000.

The Austin Mini Cooper and Morris Mini Cooper debuted in 1961. The original 848 cc engine from the Morris Mini-Minor was increased to 997 cc, boosting power from 34 bhp to 55 bhp (25 to 41 kW). The car featured a racing-tuned engine, twin SU carburetors, a closer-ratio gearbox and front disc brakes, uncommon at the time in a small car. One thousand units of this version were commissioned by management, intended for and designed to meet the homologation rules of Group 2 rally racing. The 997 cc engine was replaced by a shorter stroke 998 cc unit in 1964. The Mini would become the only car in history to be placed in the top three on the Monte Carlo Rally for six consecutive years. Find out more at: http://www.austinmemories.com/

Research info gathered at: www.wikipedia.org

Now, here’s one of my poems that speaks Olde English:

Ignoring The Super-Crazy-Ultra-Wide

OK. OK.

If I had my rathers I'd prefer a steamy attic

with a razor's edge view. The wooden beams
would have nothing left to say & the winter

isolation would be pilfered in the prettier way.
There would be no mirrors & the stylize fuzz

might be mistaken for dust bunnies. O yeah,
& the old trunk in the corner would become

extremely talkative after a few drinks but most
of all would be well-known for its slick handling

of a deck of cards.

Poem first published at: http://www.kenagain.freeserver.com/
Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/

tutoring blog: http://www.miceintheclassroom.blogspot.com/
And music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/

Classic Euro Economy Cars: Saab 92

2008-10-16T13:45:00.000-07:00

In 1945, at the end of WW II, Saab, a firm that until then had made planes for the Swedish air force, had to branch out. The designers thought of a Swedish car for Swedes in much the same sense as Citroën thought of the Deux Chevaux for the French peasant, and with more luck and intuition than money for development, devised a vehicle that slotted neatly below Volvo's smallest car. In the code numbers for their planes they had reached 91; the code number for their first car was, therefore, 92.

Designer Sixten Sason's "Project Small Car" - how unromantic Swedes can be - was to have front-wheel drive, leaving an uncluttered cabin with a flat floor for five passengers and luggage. Construction was to be chassis-less, monocoque, and on aerodynamic aircraft principles, the parts tough, reliable and cheap.

Full-scale production began on 12 December 1949, the model year 1950 car - 700 of which were made. The 1951 model year Saab 92 was identical in every respect except that German VDO instruments now replaced the American Stewart-Warner components. Philipsons, Sweden's largest automotive distributor, reportedly had a waiting list of between 15,000 and 35,000 people for the Saab 92. They also had the exclusive distribution rights as they had guaranteed to take 8,000 units in the first four years. More importantly to Saab, Philipsons had given a large advance that made it possible for Saab to start production of the 92. Saab manufactured 1,246 cars in 1950 - all of them green - and production increased by more than 2,000 units a year. The target of 8,000 cars in the first four years was exceeded by 1,000.

The cost of production was critical to Saab at the time and only 17% of the cost of the 92 was from imported materials. Hence the Henry Ford principle of any colour you like as long as it's… green in Saab's case! It has been said that the reason that the first Saabs were available in this colour only was that they had a surplus of green paint left over from their wartime aircraft production. Substantiated or not, it's an interesting story.

A two-cylinder, two-stroke 764cc 25hp thermo siphon water-cooled engine powered the Saab 92. The maximum speed was around 105km/h. The 92 had three gears, the first being unsynchronised. In 1953 the Saab 92 was replaced by the 92B, although that designation was never used in any advertising in its first year of its production. Find out more about this classic car at: www.independent.co.uk/life-style/motoring/classic-cars/saab-92-414631.html

Research info gathered at: www.wikipedia.org

Now, here’s one of my poems that can speak Swedish:

“Skip #73” Sonnet

I have my reasons. For instance, the ability

to iron creases out of a fan for one. To find

a chaos theory appealing for another. To be

a vehicle on the road to salvation. Untied

shoelaces. Overturned chairs. The buoy left

out in a frigid ocean. An obdurate spider. A

redeemed sheep. The quack of a ravenous

duck. "X" that does not mark the spot. Pastry

already stale. No shortage of hummingbirds.

Lead feathers. Tarred toast. Clouds that have

not yet learned how to clot. Defiant caterpillars.

Edible snails. The sun & moon oblivious to

indifference. No pet rocks. Beauty when it's

accidental. Fruit that purposely lacks seeds.

And of course, a steadfast belief in the notion

of "why".

Poem first published at: http://kenagain.freeserver.com/
Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/

tutoring blog: http://www.miceintheclassroom.blogspot.com/
And music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/
Poem Copyright 2008 by Maurice Oliver. All Rights Reserved.

Classic Euro Economy Cars: VW Beetle

2008-10-10T13:58:00.000-07:00

The Volkswagen Beetle,officially known as the type 1, is an economy car produced by the German auto maker Volkswagen (VW) from 1938 until 2003. Although the names "Beetle" and "Bug" were quickly adopted by the public, it was not until August 1967 that VW itself began using the name Beetle in marketing materials in the US.

In Britain, VW never used the name Beetle officially. It had only been known only as either the "Type I" or as the 1100, 1200, 1300 or 1500, which had been the names under which the vehicle was marketed in Europe; the numbers denoted the vehicle's engine size in cubic centimeters. In 1998, many years after the original model had been dropped from the lineup in most of the world (production continued in Mexico until 2003), VW introduced the "New Beetle” (built on a Volkswagen Golf Mk4 platform) which bore a cosmetic resemblance to the original.

Its peculiar styling, underpowered motor, rough ride, and high noise levels compared to modern vehicles might have made it a market failure. In its day, though, it was more comfortable and powerful than most European small cars, and ultimately the longest-running and most-produced automobile of a single design (a record that will not take long to be beaten by its younger "cousin" the Type-2 Bus or Kombi, which is still in production in Brazil, with the same basic characteristics of the first series).

It remained a top seller in the US, even as rear-wheel drive conventional subcompacts were refined, and eventually replaced by front-wheel drive models. The Beetle car was the benchmark for both generations of American compact cars such as the Chevrolet Corvair, and subcompact cars such as the Ford pinto and Chevrolet Vega. In the international poll for the award of the world's most influential car of the twentieth century the Beetle came fourth after the Ford Model T, the Mini, and the Citroen DS.

Starting in 1931, Ferdinand Porsche and Zundapp developed the "Auto für Jedermann" (car for the everyman). This was the first time the name "Volkswagen” was used. Porsche already preferred the flat-4 cylinder engine, but Zündapp used a watercooled 5-cylinder radial engine. In 1932, three prototypes were running. All of those cars were lost during the war, the last in a bombing raid over Stuttgart in 1945. Much of the Beetle's design was inspired by the advanced Tatra cars of Hans Ledwinka, particularly the T97, which also had a streamlined body and a rear-mounted 4 cylinder horizontally-opposed air-cooled engine.

In occupied Germany, the Allies followed the Morgenthau plan and the industries Germany was to be allowed to retain were set up. German car production was set at a maximum of 10% of the 1936 car production numbers. The Volkswagen factory at Wolfsburg was handed over by the Americans to British control in 1945; it was to be dismantled and shipped to Britain. Thankfully for Volkswagen, no British car manufacturer was interested in the factory.

The factory's re-opening was largely accredited to British Army officer Major Ivan Hirst (1916–2000). The first 1,785 Beetles were made in a factory near Wolfsburg in 1945. By 1973, total production was over 16 million, and by 1992, there had been over 21 million produced. By 2003 Beetle annual production had fallen to 30,000 from a peak of 1.3 million in 1971. On July 30, 2003, the final original VW Beetle (No. 21,529,464) was produced at Puebla, Mexico, some 65 years after its original launch, and an unprecedented 58-year production run since 1945, the year VW recognizes as the first year of non-Nazi funded production. Find out more at: http://www.vvwca.com/

Research info gathered at: http://www.wikipedia.org/

Now, here’s one of my poems that speaks German:

A Bobby Pin & An Electric Socket

Sometimes pleasure rises up like a brand-new sun. But more often,

things pan out in the abridged version. The search-boat never

comes close to spotting the pearl necklace. The stitches

that hold together our lives unravel due to shoddy

workmanship. Whatever was once in the kitty

has now been doled-out to an over-paid

maid who only dusts the mantle

every second Friday. The

peace plan is crumpled

beyond any reasonable

recognition. The absurd

attaches itself in the air

like Spanish moss while

the marks a prisoner makes

counts the days. Or, a storm rocks

the ship out of the beam of the lighthouse.

Most only listen to music that can move. And

while all this is happening, Dracula's two pointed

teeth write sentimental inscriptions on some sleeping neck.

Poem first published at: http://www.kenagain.freeserver.com/
Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/

tutoring blog: http://www.miceintheclassroom.blogspot.com/
And music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/

Classic Euro Economy Cars: Citroen-2cv

2008-10-05T18:20:00.000-07:00

The Citroën 2CV (French: deux chevaux vapeur, literally "two steam horses", from the tax horsepower rating) was an economy car produced by the French automaker Citroen from 1949 to 1990. It is considered one of their most iconic cars. It was described in the book Drive On!: A Social History of the Motor Car by longtime CAR magazine columnist the late LJK Setright as"the most intelligent application of minimalism ever to succeed as a car." The 2CV belongs to a very short list of vehicles introduced right after WWII that remained relevant and competitive for many decades — in the case of the 2CV, 42 years.

It was designed for low cost, simplicity, versatility, reliability, and off-road driving. For this it had a light, easily serviceable engine, extremely soft long travel suspension (with adjustable ride height), high clearance, and for oversized loads a car-wide canvas sunroof (which until 1960 also covered the boot). Between 1948 and 1990 3,872,583 2CVs were produced, plus 1,246,306 camionettes (small 2CV trucks), as well as spawning mechanically identical vehicles like the Ami, Dyane, Acadiane, and Mehari.

From 1988 onwards production took place in Portugal rather than in France. This arrangement lasted for two years until 2CV production halted. The level of technology in the 1948 2CV was remarkable for a car of any price in that era, let alone one of the cheapest cars on the planet. While colors and detail specifications were modified in the ensuing 42 years, the biggest mechanical change was the addition of front disc brakes in 1981 (from the discontinued Citroen Dyane), for the 1982 model year. The body was constructed of a dual H-frame chassis, an aircraft-style tube framework, and a very thin steel shell.

The car featured an air-cooled, flat-twin, four-stroke, 375 cc engine, with the notoriously underpowered earliest model developing only 9 bhp DIN (6.5 kW). A 425 cc engine was introduced in 1955, followed by a 602 cc (giving 28 bhp (20.5 kW) at 7000 rpm) in 1968.

The 2CV has also been used for travel around the world. In 1958–1959 two young Frenchmen, Jean-Claude Baudot and Jacques Seguela started at the Paris Motor Show on Oct. 9, 1958, headed south and crossed the Mediterranean by boat from Port Vendres to Algeria; traversed the African continent and crossed the South Atlantic from Cape Town to Rio de Janerio; cris-crossed South America and the U.S. and boated from San Francisco to Yokohama. They returned to Paris on Nov. 11, 1959. During the 13 months, they drove 100 000 kilometers, and consumed 5 000 liters of petrol and 36 tires. Find out more at: http://www.cats-citroen.net/

Research info gathered at: www.wikipedia.org

Now, here’s one of my poems with a French accent:

And Nothing.Or Not.

As surely as one foot falls
in front of the other
we all share the experience of
joy and sorrow over years:
lying on his back
an angle facing the table
with lids shut down
dressed in a work shirt
and blue dungarees
a few empty bottles of beer
chicken wings on the table
the skins of some strange fruit
hair matted & damp
those early hints of gray
less two cigarettes from a pack
the dog's dish bone dry
as a face lined in wilderness
there was no blood
on permanently sealed lips
in a calm before the wake
as if an ordinary immobile body
could upright the over-turned chair.

Poem first published at: http://nzpoetsonline.homestead.com/
Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/

tutoring blog: http://www.miceintheclassroom.blogspot.com/
And music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/
Poem Copyright 2008 by Maurice Oliver. All Rights Reserved.

Native American Warriors: Manuelito

2008-09-30T21:56:00.000-07:00

Manuelito was one of the war chiefs of the Navajo people before, during and after what is now known as the Long Walk Period. He was born to the Bit'ahni Clan, near the Bear's Ears in southeastern Utah in about 1818. His name means “Little Manuel,” in Spanish but he had many other Navajo names too. The Navajo once lived in much of Arizona, New Mexico, Utah, and Colorado. They had clan leaders instead of "head chiefs".

By the 1850s, leaders including Manuelito, had become wealthy through livestock, agriculture, and raids on Mexican and neighboring Indian tribes. But as the western territories became part of the U. S. after the Mexican War, this all changed. Mexicans automatically became American citizens while Navajos did not. When the Mexican-Americans raided Navajo homes, kidnapping women and children to be sold as slaves, the U.S. Army usually did nothing. When Navajos fought back, the government punished them. Manuelito’s own home, crops and livestock were destroyed by soldiers in a “punishment raid” in 1859.

In 1860, he attacked Fort Defiance, Arizona, a military outpost commanded by Colonel Edward R.S. Canby. By then, the Civil War had started, and the Army needed soldiers to fight east of the Mississippi River. So Canby and Manuelito made peace, but with no Army to keep peace, fighting continued.

By 1863, the situation was so bad General James Carleton was sent from California with orders to remove all the Indians to a new reservation called Bosque Redondo, at Fort Sumner, New Mexico, a dry wasteland. Navajos were given a short time to surrender. When they did not, Carleton sent Kit Carson and his troops to destroy crops, livestock, and homes. By October 1863, the first Navajos began making the “Long Walk” from their homelands 350 miles southeast to Fort Sumner. They were given plenty of food and good treatment so others would follow, and when they did not, Carson raided the Canyon de Chelly, a Navajo heartland.

Navajo began to surrender by the thousands in March 1864 and Manuelito and his warriors became the last hold-outs. In February 1865 Carleton sent six Navajo headmen to plead with him to surrender for the sake of his starving people. He still refused. Finally, in September, Manuelito and 23 of his warriors surrendered, their emaciated bodies clad only in rags.

In 1868, after hundreds died of disease and starvation, a new treaty was signed granting the Navajo a reservation back in their original land, along with livestock and food supplies. Manuelito served as head chief from 1870 to 1884. In 1876 he traveled to Washington where he met with President U.S. Grant. He died from measles complicated by pneumonia in 1894 at the age of 76, one of the most respected figures in Navajo history. More about this hero at: www.accessgenealogy.com/native/indianchiefs/manuelito_navajo_war_chief.htm

Research info gathered at: http://www.wikipedia.org/

Now, here's one of my poems that can ride bareback:

The Secret To A Great Lip-Sync...

or in anticipation ofa treat home hurries
the steel-toe shoes to potlick a ride
on your tongue I beg. Or truth
be told, the delights of being
safely tucked in the roof
of your mouth and
topple up the
stairs to
our bedroom.
A candle flickers
and the gull plays
voyeur on the window
ledge as the moon slips in &
out of clouds once it's stripped down
to its underwear.

Poem first published at: http://venerealkittens.blogspot.com/
Visit my ezine at: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/
music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/
and tutoring blog: http://www.miceintheclassroom.blogspot.com/
Poem Copyright 2008 by Maurice Oliver. All Rights Reserved.

Native American Warriors: Crazy Horse

2008-09-25T12:34:00.000-07:00

Crazy Horse, or Thašuŋka Witko, was born on the southern part of the Cheyenne River in around 1842. Crazy Horse's father, a Lakota who was also named Crazy Horse (born 1810), passed the name to his son, taking the new name of Worm for himself thereafter. The mother of the younger Crazy Horse was Rattling Blanket Woman (born 1814), a Lakota as well. Rattling Blanket Woman was the daughter of Black Buffalo, the chief who met Lewis and Clark on the Bad River.

Crazy Horse was a brave and skilled warrior who showed his fighting skills at a young age. In 1864, after the Sand Creek Massacre of the Cheyenne in Colorado, the Lakota tribe joined forces with the Cheyenne against the U.S. Army. Crazy Horse was present at the Battle of Red Buttes and the Platte River Bridge Station in 1865 and was made a war leader. He then fought with Red Cloud in the 1865-68 war, playing a key role in destroying William J. Fetterman's brigade at Fort Phil Kearny in 1867. However, that victory did not stop the settlers from coming and the Fort Laramie Treaty of 1868 opened the door of Lakota land to all that Crazy Horse fought to prevent.

Still, he continued to fight, leading a party of warriors in attacking a survey party sent into the Black Hills by General George Armstrong Custer in 1873. When the U.S. War Department ordered all Lakota onto reservations in 1876, Crazy Horse decided to lead a resistance, fighting in the War for the Black Hills of 1876-77. On June 17, 1876, he fought at the Battle of the Rosebud and a week later, joined forces with Sitting Bull and Chief Gall in the attack that destroyed Custer’s Seventh Cavalry at the Battle of the Little Bighorn. General Nelson Miles chased Crazy Horse and his men throughout the winter of 1876-77. On Jan. 8, 1877, his warriors fought their last major battle against the U.S. Cavalry at Wolf Mountain in the Montana Territory. On May 6 of that year, knowing that his people were weakened by cold and hunger, Crazy Horse surrendered to U.S. troops at Camp Robinson in Nebraska.

In reaction to a rumor that Crazy Horse was planning an escape from his reservation, the Red Cloud Agency (Indian soldiers working for the U.S. government), Army troops and Indian police arrested the famous chief. When he discovered he was being taken to the post jail, Crazy Horse began pulling away from his guards and was either accidentally stabbed with a knife or was bayoneted by an army sentry, Private William Gentles. He died that night on September 5, 1877. After his death, his body was given to his elderly parents, who secretly buried the Sioux chief somewhere in the wilds near Nebraska’s Red Cloud Agency. Find out more about this Native American legend at: http://www.crazyhorse.org/

Research info gathered at: www.wikipedia.org

Now, here's one of my previously published poems rain dancing:

Eventually, A Horse

Or hailstorms to build split-level houses.

When both bells & birds stop. The big mouth

of a refrigerator. Or irony sitting on the

back porch. Girls with flowers to push broom.

The skinny sequoia in a newspaper. Lousy wig.

Lazy lock. A giant running backwards...

fistfuls of handy-wipes

doodles on a napkin

Trying to figure out the best way to

disguise a wish-bone.

One large alarm clock ticking

down the hole...

more sentimental rain

a self-indulgent cloud

I could donate my front door to science,

she teases, with her hand on the knob.

And you're about as natural as a freeway, I

reply, because I think the words hit & run.

You see how difficult gift-giving is?

Poem first published at: http://www.myfavoritebullet.com/

Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/

tutoring blog: http://www.miceintheclassroom.blogspot.com/

and eclectic blog: http://www.copyat5.blogspot.com/

Native American Warriors: Dull Knife

2008-09-21T11:24:00.000-07:00

Dull Knife, who was also known by his Lakota Sioux name of Morning Star (Tamílapéšni), was a chief to the Northern Cheyenne people. He (on right in photo) was born in Montana in about 1810 and gained a reputation as a successful warrior at an early age. He was only nine years old when his family was separated from the rest of the tribe while on a buffalo hunt. His father was away and his mother busy, and he was playing with his little sister on the banks of a stream, when a large herd of buffalo swept down upon them on a stampede for water. His mother climbed a tree, but the little boy led his sister into an old beaver den whose entrance was above water, and remained in shelter until the buffalo passed and they were found by their distracted parents.

Dull Knife was described by many of the 19th century writers as "an admirable outlaw". In 1868, he represented his tribe at the signing of the Treaty of Fort Laramie. As the U.S. government broke one promise after another he soon came to regret it. Following "Custer's Last Stand" at the Battle of Little Bighorn in 1876, Dull Knife became an ally with the Dakota and other tribes against army troops. However, after a disastrous raid by American soldiers (the Dull Knife Fight) in which 153 tepees were destroyed and 500 war ponies captured, most of the Cheyenne were eventually forced to surrender and move to the Indian Territory in Oklahoma. But because they were unable to hunt on the trip and were given very little rations by the government, many suffered from starvation and disease.

Dull Knife saw what was happening, and in September 1878 he decided to lead the tribe on a 400 mile trek north again toward their ancient homelands. Fighting 1,000 soldiers the Cheyenne were unable to win a battle against U.S. soldiers in the Nebraska Sand Hills. On Oct. 23, 1878, Dull Knife and his people surrendered peaceably to the Army and were imprisoned in nearby Fort Robinson (Nebraska). When they refused to return to Oklahoma, an attempt was made to starve them into going, and the Indians were not given heat, food, or water.

They broke out of prison on January 9, 1879 and, in their dash for freedom, 64 were killed and 78 were recaptured, but six people, including Dull Knife and surviving members of his family, escaped and made it to the relative safety of the Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota. By this time public opinion was on the side of the Indians, and the Bureau of Indian Affairs were forced to a establish a reservation for the northern Cheyenne on the Tongue and Rosebud rivers, where Dull Knife and his people (fewer than 80 remaining) were finally allowed to settle. Because of his courage, the Northern Cheyenne today still possess a homeland in their traditional country (present-day Montana). Dull Knife lived out his days on a reservation assigned to the surviving Cheyenne in the Rosebud Valley. He died in 1883 and was buried on high ground near his home. Find out more about him at: www.legendsofamerica.com/NA-Dullknife.html

Research info gathered at: www.wikipeida.org

Now, here's one of my poems that can cut you too:

Do You Read Me, Copy?

His chair can purr.

He takes it everywhere he goes.

Some say he feels this unusual

closeness because the chair

reminds him of the basic

animal instinct in all of

us. Others insist the

chair is simply his

“security blanket”

he’ll never have

to wash. Whatever

the reason, year after

year he carries it over a

shoulder. He once even had

it upholstered in a flame-stitch

pattern using colors taken from the

rainbow. But the chair remained

non-committal with sturdy

legs. It prides itself in

being a perfect

dance

partner and

never eats meat.

It can be positioned in

an endless variety of angles

and has a built-in microphone.

Best of all, when he finishes this

life he can just fold it up and ship it

by parcel post to that place, rumored

to be somewhere beyond the white light.

Poem first published at: http://www.sundress.net/21stars

Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/

tutoring blog: http://www.miceintheclassroom.blogspot.com

and music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/

Native American Warriors: Chief Joseph

2008-09-16T22:36:00.000-07:00

Hinmaton Yalatkit, “Thunder Rolling in the Heights,” a Nez Percé chief, was a peaceful man who came to be known as one of the greatest Indian military commanders of the 19th century. He was born at the mouth of Joseph Creek, in Wallowa Valley, Washington, in 1832, the third child of Khapkhaponimi, a Nez Percé woman, and her husband, Tuekakas, a Cayuse man also known as Old Joseph. The younger got his name after being baptized by Christian missionaries. He would use the name for the rest of his life.

Joseph became chief at 30 when his father died. The 6’ 2’’ tall younger Joseph was brave but not a warrior chief. He relied instead on passive resistance in his relations with Whites. By 1835 (especially after gold was discovered) white settlers began to move onto the Nez Percé’s beautiful fertile land. Indians were forced to live on reservations. By 1863, a new treaty had reduced the reservation to about 550 square miles and no longer included the land of many of the tribal leaders land, including Joseph’s father, so some refused to sign it and continued to occupy their homeland in the Wallowa Valley in relative peace with their white neighbors.

Finally, in 1877, the government took action against Joseph and the rest of the non-treaty Nez Percé. General O. O. Howard met with them to try to reach a peaceful agreement, but fighting broke out between young warriors and white settlers and both sides were forced into a state of war. In the first major battle, at White Bird Canyon, the U.S. Army was almost annihilated. The Nez Percé won 18 more battles, but Joseph knew he had only three ways to end the war: annihilation, surrender, or retreat. He chose to retreat. His original plan was to join the Crow people in Montana, but they refused to help him, so he decided to go to Canada to join Sitting Bull and the Sioux who had fled there in 1876.

The retreat of Joseph’s people turned out to be one of the most brilliant in United States military history. They were able to escape U.S. troops because a few sharpshooters were able to hold off large numbers of soldiers. Their speed amazed the Army and they even managed to maintain good relations with the Whites they met along the way. Joseph led about 750 of his people twice over the Rocky Mountains, through Yellowstone Park (which became a park in 1872), and across the Missouri River. The journey covered four states and over 1,500 miles. But while resting on the way to Canada, General Nelson Miles caught-up with him and attacked on September 30th. Joseph and his men fought bravely but were to few in number to win. On October 5, 1877 he surrendered. He and his people were sent to reservations far from their homeland. Joseph went to Washington D.C. twice to ask President McKinley for help but nothing was done. He died on September 21, 1904. Find out more at: www.pbs.org/weta/thewest/people_c/chiefjoseph.htm

Research info gathered at: www.wikipedia.org

Now, here's one of my poems wearing buckskins:

Items Needed For 'Data Mining'

The list is relatively short. You'll need

the wealth of a shipping tycoon like

China. A signature that retains its

maiden name. The general idea

that history repeats itself. A

reliable 401K which is by

most accounts considered

"cautiously optimistic". Art

for art's sake. An obituary written

well in ad-vance. A couple of seersucker

summer suits. An old-fashioned rotary phone

and a phone book from '56. The uncanny ability

to mind-read. A religion that doesn't cause

heart burn. Pictures of the floating

gardens of Babylon. One lime

colored hula hoop. A pair

of genuine Mickey

Mouse ears. A

guidebook to the

first stop in your itinerary.

A room with a view of utopia.

And at least twenty-four hours to make your decision.

Poem first published at: http://www.whyvandalism.com/

Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/

and music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/

Native American Warriors: Red Cloud

2008-09-12T13:47:00.000-07:00

Red Cloud was born around 1822, close to the forks of the Platte River near the modern-day city of North Platte, Nebraska. His mother was an Oglala and his father was a Brule Indian. Red Cloud was partly raised by his maternal uncle, Chief Smoke. At a young age, he fought against neighboring Pawnee and Crow, learning valuable military experience.

He became the Chief of the Oglala Sioux Indian Tribe. One of the fiercest enemies the U.S. Army ever fought, he led the successful Indian Campaign known as Red Cloud's War between 1866 and 1868. He fought the army for control of parts of Montana and Wyoming.

He started Red Cloud's war in 1866, which was the most successful war an Indian nation ever waged against the US Army. The military was building forts along the Bozeman Trail straight through the Lakota Territory of Wyoming and Montana. As miners and pioneers started encroaching on Lakota Land, Red Cloud feared the end of the Indian way of life there.

Red Cloud's military success forced the U. S. to make treaties with the Indians. The army abandoned its forts on the Bozeman Trail, and gave the Lakota possession of much of what is now South Dakota. In particular, the Lakotas were given the Black Hills of Montana and Wyoming. Peace was short-lived. In 1874, General Custer attacked Red Cloud. Red Cloud did not take part in the Lakota war of 1876–77 with Crazy Horse, Sitting Bull, and other war leaders.

Throughout the 1880's Red Cloud struggled with the Indian Agent who had been assigned to the Pine Ridge Reservation on the White River in South Dakota where he was forced to live. He complained to the government about the awful way food was given to the people that lived there and about who should control the reservation’s police force. He was eventually successful in getting the agent fired from his job. Red Cloud also worked with whites back East who wanted to see a better life for Native Americans on reservations and he even with to Washington D.C. to meet the President.

Red Cloud became an important leader of the Lakota as they transitioned from the freedom of the plains to the confinement of the reservation system. He outlived the other major Sioux leaders of the Indian wars and died in 1909 at the age of 87 on the Pine Ridge Reservation, where he is buried. An Indian school on the reservation was later named in his honor. Find out more about his life at: www.en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Cloud

Research info gathered at: http://www.wikipedia.org/

Now, here's one of my poems riding side-saddle:

The Correct Way To Drive An Abu Ghrib

In this scenario I marry the blue dress and

end-up smiling with an ice pick in my skull.

Every dusty highway is lined with blinking

neon signs that declare "No Vacancy" or the

motel is a version of heaven for the affluent.

There's fire in the winter stars. The murky

water in roadside ditches hum Motown tunes.

A guardrail that likes to hug. A dim railroad

crossing that prefers bow ties. Miles and miles

of Route 66 with someones fingers tightening

around its throat. A dirty windshield with

telepathic eyes. Either way, it all depends on

the price of gas and whether we can move the

furniture around enough to have the room

we need to dance to The Supremes...

and the flicker of the candle grows imperceptibly
taller as it burns.

Poem first publised at: www.main.nc.us/wiresandwich

Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/

and music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/

Native American Warriors: Sitting Bull

2008-09-08T12:53:00.000-07:00

Sitting Bull (whose real name was Tatanka Iyotaka) was born about 1831 near the Grand River in South Dakota. He was the main chief and medicine man of the Dakota Sioux, who were driven from their reservation in the Black Hills by miners in 1876, and took up arms against the whites and friendly Indians, refusing to be transported to the Indian lands.

In June, 1876, they defeated and massacred Gen. George A. Custer's advance party of Gen. Alfred H. Terry's column, which was sent against them, on Little Big Horn River. Because of their victory, they were pursued northward by General Terry.

In the months after the battle, Sitting Bull fled the United States to Wood Mountain, Saskatchewan, Canada, where he remained, and, through the mediation of Dominion officials, surrendered to the American military police on a promise of pardon in 1881.

After his return to the United States, he briefly toured as a performer in Buffalo Bill’s Wild West show and traveled to the major cities in America and even with the show when it went to Europe. He was not impressed by white society and their version of civilization. He was shocked and saddened to see the number of homeless people living on the streets of American cities. He warned other Indians to be wary of what they accept from white culture.

After working as a performer, Sitting Bull returned to the Standing Rock Agency in South Dakota. Because of fears that he would use his influence to support the Ghost Dance movement, Indian Affairs authorities (who were Indians themselves) ordered his arrest. During a fight between Sitting Bull's followers and the reservation agents, Sitting Bull was shot in the side and head on December 15, 1890 by American police after they were fired upon by his supporters.

His body was taken to nearby Fort Yates for burial, but in 1953, his remains possibly were exhumed and reburied near Mobridge, South Dakota by Sioux who wanted his body to be nearer to his birthplace. However, some Sioux and historians dispute this claim and believe that any remains that were moved were not those of Sitting Bull.

After his death, his cabin on the Grand River was taken to Chicago to become part of the 1893 Columbian Exhibition (the exhibition where the first Ferris wheel appeared). It was exhibited along with Native American dances and a sign that said "War Dance Given Daily." He became the subject of several Hollywood movies. Even today, Sitting Bull is still remembered as an archetype of Native American resistance movements. Find out more about him at: http://www.sittingbull.org/

Research info gathered at: http://www.wikipedia.org/

Now, here's one of my feathered with a feathered headdress:

Ignition Or Perdition

She reads my leaves.

First, she tells me that very shortly my life will become smooth

as a blister and that good fortune will allow me to drink from

Cinderella's slipper. There will be two omens to serve as

forewarnings; a groundhog will emerge from my

mouth looking for its shadow and an elaborate

grid-work of spider webs will appear

between my toes, several days

before the revelation. But

she also cautions me

to pick the

right Monk tune next time

I play a jazz album or I might face

the possibility of becoming an eternal

extra in a Fellini movie. Once success comes,

I should stash the loot under my mattress and schedule

the next bank hoist on a day when someone I trust can drive

the get-away car. After all, both humor and horror can be depicted

from the back of a dirt bike, competing for shiny awards in a

timeless paradox. When she's done, I pay the minimal

fee and step back out into the night, where the

cosmos waits to deal with me from its

simmering lobster pot.

Poem first published at: http://www.wildviolet.net/

Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/

and music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/

Native American Warriors: Geronimo

2008-09-04T17:11:00.000-07:00

Geronimo (far right in photo) was born in 1829 in what is today western New Mexico, but was then still Mexican territory. He was a Bedonkohe Apache by birth. His wife Juh, was a Chiricahua Apache. He was the leader of the last American Indian fighting force to surrender to the U. S. government. Because he fought so bravely and held out the longest, he became the most famous Apache of all. To the pioneers and settlers of the region he was a bloody-handed killer. To the Apaches, he was a courageous hero.

The Chiricahuas were mostly nomads, hunting and farming according to the seasons. At the time American settlers arrived, the Spanish controlled the area. The Spanish wanted Indian slaves and Christian converts. In 1858 when Geronimo returned home from a trip to Mexico he found his wife, his mother and his three young children murdered by Spanish troops. From that day on he hated whites and vowed to terrorize Mexican settlements using the power which came to him in visions. Geronimo was a medicine man.

In 1876 the Chiricahua were forced into an Indian reservation in eastern Arizona. Geronimo escaped with warriors to Mexico but was arrested and returned to the reservation. For much of the 1870s he and his second wife Juh would live peacefully there. Then 1876 the U.S. Army tried to move the Chiricahuas into another reservation. Geronimo fled to Mexico where he would return to fight U.S. troops for a decade. The U.S. government would use over 5,000 soldiers, one-quarter of the entire Army, and 500 scouts, and perhaps up to 3,000 Mexican soldiers to track down Geronimo and his band.

Then in May 1882, Apache scouts working for the U.S. army surprised Geronimo in his mountain sanctuary, and he agreed to return with his people to the reservation, but after a year of farming, the sudden arrest and imprisonment of an Apache warrior caused Geronimo to flee on May 17, 1885, with 35 warriors and 109 women, children and youths. In January 1886, Apache scouts found Juh's hideout and threatened to kill her if he did not surrender. So on Sept. 4, 1886 he surrendered to Gen. Nelson Miles. The government breached its agreement and transported Geronimo and nearly 450 Apache men, women, and children to confinement in Forts Marion, Florida.

In 1894 they were moved to Fort Sill in Oklahoma. One year later many of them were relocated to the Mt. Vernon barracks in Alabama, where about one quarter died from tuberculosis and other diseases. Geronimo remained in Oklahoma where he became a rancher, appeared in 1904 at the Louisiana Purchase Exposition in St. Louis, sold Geronimo souvenirs, and rode in President Theodore Roosevelt's 1905 inaugural parade. He died on Feb. 17, 1909, a prisoner of war, unable to return to his homeland. He was buried in an Apache cemetery in Fort Sill in Oklahoma.Find out more about this Native America and others at: http://www.indians.org/

Research info gathered at: http://www.wikipeida.org/

Now, here's one of my poems that knows how to pow-wow:

Unpredictable Velocity

Expect a rough ride & plan on landing hard:

or it might be cross-eyed stairs you

can't climb or an amp that goes up to

fifteen. You may have to muscle pass

aimless grease or sneak-in the snaking

line round the block. Then, perhaps

it'll appear as a fingernail clipping of

some spinster or a fine feather floating

in chicken broth. In its shaky claim to

the future it might put on a bathrobe

with saggy sleeves or a nurse's uniform

with scuffed white shoes. In any case,

the story line's the same. The restraining

order is still issued to the stockbroker

while he dines at a buffet. The glint you

see is still a mirror or a glass eye. And the

figurative line in the sand's just a coil of

razor wire. So don't count on a cozy

retirement-plan. Just try to enjoy your

bit-part while your helmet still rattles &

fogs away in a craggy mischance.

Poem first published at: http://www.myfavoritebullet.com/
Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/
and music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/
Poem Copyright 2008 by Maurice Oliver. All Rights Reserved.

The Six "Black U.S. Presidents"

2008-08-31T18:24:00.000-07:00

Would Barack Obama be the first black president of the United States? In the 19th and 20th centuries, the standard for determining one’s race was, one drop of black blood, made you black, socially and in the eyes of the law. So if we use this measuring stick, it would appear that there are other U.S. presidents who would have been considered black, mulatto (the Spanish word) or Creole (the French term). Were there other "black" presidents? Some historians have reason to believe people don't really understand the genealogy of past U.S. Presidents. Recent research shows that at least six other former U.S. presidents had black ancestors and that Thomas Jefferson, the nation's third president, was considered the first black president, according to historian Leroy Vaughn, author of Black People and Their Place in World History. Here’s what his research found:

1. Thomas Jefferson the third elected president, who served two terms between 1801 and 1809 was described as the “son of a half-breed Indian squaw and a Virginia mulatto father,” as stated in Vaughn’s findings. Jefferson also was said to have destroyed all documentation attached to his mother, even going to extremes to seize letters written by his mother to other people. Only in recent years did the family of Thomas Jefferson acknowledged he was the father of the (5 or 6) children born to a slave on his plantation, Sally Hemmings.

2. President Andrew Jackson, the nation’s seventh president, was in office between 1829 and 1837. A renowned African-American historian J. A. Rogers, author of the “Five Black Presidents” wrote that Andrew Jackson Sr. died before his son, President Andrew Jackson Jr., was born. The president’s mother then went to live on the Crawford farm, where there were Negro slaves and one of these men was Andrew Jr.’s father, Rogers wrote. Vaughn cites an article written in The Virginia Magazine of History that Jackson was the son of an Irish woman who married a black man. The magazine also stated that Jackson’s oldest brother had been sold as a slave.

3. Abraham Lincoln, the nation’s 16th president, served between 1861 and 1865. Author Vaughn, states Lincoln had very dark skin and coarse hair and his mother allegedly came from an Ethiopian tribe. His heritage fueled so much controversy that Lincoln was nicknamed “Abraham Africanus the First” by his presidential opponents and cartoons were drawn depicting him as a Negro. In a book, titled “The Hidden Lincoln” written by William Herndon, Lincoln’s law-office partner, said that Lincoln’s father of record, Thomas Lincoln, could not have been Lincoln’s father because he was sterile from childhood mumps and later was castrated.

4. President Warren Harding, the 29th president, in office between 1921 and 1923, apparently never denied his ancestry. According to Vaughn, William Chancellor, a professor of economics and politics at Wooster College in Ohio, wrote a book on the Harding family genealogy. Evidently, Harding had black ancestors between both sets of parents. Chancellor also said that Harding attended Iberia College, a school founded to educate fugitive slaves. Professor Chancellor says the Justice Department agents allegedly bought and destroyed all copies of this book. Harding suffered nervous breakdowns at the age of 24 and had to spend some time in a sanitarium. Between 1889 and 1901, Harding paid five “protracted” visits to the J. P. Kellogg sanitarium in Battle Creek, Michigan “to recover from fatigue, overstrain, and nervous illnesses.” Some speculate his illness was due to the pressure of not fully disclosing his black heritage and living as “white”.

5. Calvin Coolidge, the nation’s 30th president, served between 1923 and 1929 and supposedly was proud of his heritage. He claimed his mother was dark because of mixed Indian ancestry. This notion was disputed by Auset Bakhufu, author of “The Six Black Presidents” who said in her book that by the 1800s, the New England Indians hardly were pure Indian, because they had mixed so often with blacks. Coolidge’s mother’s maiden name was “Moor” and in Europe the name “Moor” was given to all blacks just as “Negro” was used in America. It later was concluded that Coolidge was part black.

6. The last elected “black” president was Dwight David Eisenhower who served from 1953 to 1961, the 34th president. Eisenhower’s mother, Ida Elizabeth Stover was a mullato woman making Eisenhower part black. Eisenhower as president moved military integration from a law to reality. He battered Arkansas Gov. Orval Faubus with federal force to desegregate Little Rock’s Central High School. He was the first President to elevate an African- American to an executive position in the White House. He established the first regulations to prohibit racial discrimination in the federal workforce. He was the first President since Reconstruction to meet with Civil Rights leaders in the White House. After turning the U.S. Armed Forces into an integrated military where blacks and whites could fight in the same baton then live in barracks side by side, he helped turn Washington D.C. which had once been as segregated as any place in the South, into an integrated nation‘s capital. To find out more visit: http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/08036/854713-51.stm

Research info gathered at: http://www.wikipedia.org/

Now, here's one of my poems that's black and white:

Real Life, Transcending The Rule Book

She insists Adam & Eve must have had a dog.

She never had any pets of her own as a child. She would

often become violently ill at merely the sight of anything

as hairless as a Chihuahua. We both wanted to sleep

with Lassie when we were ten. I longed to grow-up to be

as strong and robust as Rin-Tin-Tin. Instead, by the time

I reached twenty-one I had become a ninety-five pound

weakling. I could vote, but no dogs were allowed on the

ballot. That was about the time I learned how to point my

tail in a straight line and raised one paw at the same time.

I suppose it was one way of compensating for not having

a he-man’s body. She has never cared much for my skillful

tail-pointing and thinks my strange laugh resembles the

present-day Hyena. I tell her I’m more wolf than anything

and she just frowns. And when we get tired of pounding

nails in the dog house we put on our leashes, bring out the

sheet music of mistranslated text, and dig-up the bone of

our falsetto voices. Then, we proceed to carefully sniff our

way through an entire cantata by Scarlatti.

Poem first published at: http://thepotomacjournal.com/

Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/

and music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/

Walt Disney World

2008-08-26T23:21:00.000-07:00

Sadly, Walt Disney died on December 15, 1966, before Disneyworld was finished. His brother Roy put off his own retirement to oversee the rest of the construction. At the dedication of the property, Roy gave a speech, where he said the property would officially be known as WALT Disney World, to honor his brother. And so even though Walt Disney did not live to see his dream realized, his dream would become true thanks to his brother Roy.

Roy Disney died just two short months after Walt Disney World opened, in December of 1971. EPCOT was completed in 1981 at a cost of 1.4 billion, the Disney/MGM Studios Theme Park in 1989, The Twilight Zone Tower of Terror in 1994, and Disney’s Animal Kingdom in 1998. Today, Disneyworld also has a 10,000 person amphitheater, Discovery Island, Pleasure Island, and Village Market, the theme park’s shopping center. Today, Disney World ranks the 6th most visited theme park in the world and employees about 52,000 people during the peak season. It sits on 25,000 acres of land or 45 sq. miles, almost twice the size of Manhattan. Find out more at: http://www.disneyworld.disney.go.com/

Research info gathered at: http://www.wikipedia.org/

Now, here's a poem that walks like Mickey Mouse:

A Reoccurring Dream, Swallowing Trees

In this scenario

the audience is encouraged to believe

there's a cold war raging in the pitcher

of milk, performed by a secret

agent disguised as the lit interior of a late-model

car. Life is a

bed wetter that likes a constant temperature of 88 degrees.

Hand shakes are the accepted gesture when first meeting.

The demilitarize-zone wears a name-tag and is

set-up between

the wrist and collarbone.

If anything aches it's OK to rub it.

Foot soldiers do. Some even open the window when they

dream. And if they get lost,

they subtract the remaining body

fluids then multiply their mother's age by two. What's left equals

religion or a canary in a coal mine. Either way, most people

don't mind

eating off paper plates and have

no problem writing a letter now

and then to a convicted felon.

They find comfort in knowing the getaway car has a full tank and

say they keep the extra voice in

a jewellery box, simply because it's the

last place anybody would look.

Poem first published at: http://www.laurahird.com/
Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/
and music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blgospot.com/
Poem Copyright 2008 by Maurice Oliver. All Rights Reserved.

Grand Central Station

2008-08-21T19:20:00.000-07:00

Grand Central Terminal (GCT, often called Grand Central Station) is located at 42nd Street and Park Avenue in Midtown Manhattan in New York City. It is the last of three train stations that have stood on this site. The present-day building was built by New York Central Railroad as a way to outdo the arch-rival Pennsylvania Railroad and smaller railroad lines. It is still the largest train station in the world by number of platforms, 44, with 67 tracks along them. The station has two levels, both below ground, with 41 tracks on the upper level and 26 on the lower. It is used by almost half a million passengers each day on over 550 trains.

The station was opened in October 1871. The original design had the main terminal for passenger services and offices on an "L" shape with a short leg running east-west on 42nd Street and a long leg running north-south on Vanderbilt Avenue. A glass ceiling (called a train shed) covered platforms and tracks. But between 1899 and 1900, the main terminal was torn down and an entirely new facade put on it. The tracks and the train yard was redesigned to make turn around time quicker and the reconstructed building was then renamed Grand Central Station.

In 1914 French sculptor Jules-Alexis Coutan created a 48 feet (15 m) high clock in the center off the terminal with a dial that was 13 feet (4.0 m) wide. It depicted the God Mercury with Hercules and Minerva on both sides and was carved by the John Donnelly Company. It is the station’s symbol today.

The construction of Grand Central created a mini-city within New York, including the Commodore Hotel and office buildings inside the station and was one reason the Chrysler Building was built in the neighborhood. In 1928, the New York Central Railroad built its headquarters in a 34-story building (now the Helmsley Bldg) on the north side of Park Ave. From 1939 to 1964 CBS television had studios above the station’s main waiting room. In 1947, over 65 million people, 40% of the population of the U. S., traveled through Grand Central. But by the mid-50’s railroad travel was becoming a thing of the past, due to government subsidized highways and intercity plane traffic.

Grand Central and the neighborhood around it fell on hard times during the financial collapse of railroads and the near bankruptcy of New York City itself in the 70‘s. Amtrak ended its contract with the station in 1991 and moved to Penn Station. MTA came to the station’s rescue in 1994. It signed a long term lease on the building and began renovations that finally finished in 2000. The station serves commuters traveling to counties in New York and Connecticut. Grand Central Terminal was declared a National Historical Landmark in 1976. Find out more about the station at: http://www.grandcentralterminal.com/

Research info gathered at: http://www.wikipedia.org/

Now, here's one of my poems that can blow its own horn:

Nine Ounces, Said The Strange Dream

Then later, the lakeshore laps in & out of a coma until

all the love & combat in the world is required to

wear a raincoat over itslips. In an attempt to

help, a hand draws clouds on a blank sheet

of white paper over the real face. But

a splash disrupts the stillness,

causing muse to become a

sponge-bath. And that

fistful of air you

thought washer

blouse turns out

to be a rainy night

in Georgia trying to pass

itself off as a mud puddle. The

swarm of flu you thought was a snot

rag or maybe trapped in the refrigerator

of your pocket, settles as fog thick enough to

shut down the sea, or even worst, the loose jaw of

a sunroof, drunk & passed-out beside the reek of a drainage ditch.

Poem first published at: http://www.megaera.com/

Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/

and music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/

The White House

2008-08-17T19:11:00.000-07:00

Summertime means travel time. I'm lucky when it comes to travel. I've seen many of the world's landmarks up close and personal. Places like the Eiffel Tower, The Acropolis, Vatican City, Ayres Rock, Franz Josep Glacier, Norte Dame and Big Ben. For the next few postings I want to share some lesson plans I use for my students as I present some of America's outstanding landmarks and places of interest. So get your luggage packed and gas-up your mental car because we're off. Today, let's go to The White House:

The White House is the official home and main workplace of President of the United States. It was built between 1792 and 1800 of white-painted sandstone in the late Georgian style, it has been the executive residence of every U.S. President since John Adams. When Thomas Jefferson moved into it in 1801, he, with architect Benjamin Henry Latrobe made it larger by making two colonnades which was built to hide stables for horses and a storage area.

In 1814, during the War of 1812, the mansion was set on fire by the British Army in the Burning of Washington, destroying the interior and charring much of the exterior walls. Reconstruction began almost immediately and President James Monroe moved into it before the work was completed in October 1817.

Construction continued with the addition of the South Portico in 1824 and the North Portico in 1829. By 1901 the White House had become too small so President Theodore Roosevelt had nearly all work offices moved to the newly-constructed West Wing. Eight years later, President William Howard Taft made the West Wing larger by adding the Oval Office which was moved too as the building expanded. The third-floor attic was converted to living quarters in 1927.

A newly constructed East Wing was used as a reception area for social events and both new wings were connected by Jefferson's colonnades. East Wing alterations were completed in 1946 creating additional office space. By 1948, the house's load-bearing exterior walls and internal wood beams were found to be close to failure. Under President Harry S. Truman, the interior rooms were completely taken apart and a new steel framework was created.

Today, the White House includes the area where the President and his family lives, The West Wing, and the East Wing as well as the Old Executive Office Building which houses the offices of the President and Vice President. The White house is six stories high and has a two story basement. It is located at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW in Washington D. C. Find out more: http://www.whitehouse.gov/

Research info gathered at: www.wikipedia.org

Now, one of my poems that would fit right into the Executive Branch:

Instructions To S/He Who Waits

Then finally, I make a list of the things we won’t need:

-Hula honey in the airplane propeller.

-A stand-in knot of arsenal bondage.

-Any spittish trail that pours out of chance.

-Straw bales from your marooned pelvic purse.

-Any trifle act of a same-sex drought.

-Every go-go boot germ in a robot’s heartbeat.

-Four synonyms for male perversity worry beads.

-All ink fountains of mastectomy cheeks.

-The rejection slip of a steel-toed jodhpurs.

-Chest wax designed for a cruise missile.

-Fragrant stirrups encased in a falsetto toll box.

-And of course, the rubber pulley of gesture implants.

Poem previoulsy published at: http://www.coupremine.com/
Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/
and music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/
Poem Copyright 2008 by Maurice Oliver. All Rights Reserved.

Harvard University

2008-08-13T13:34:00.000-07:00

Summertime means travel time. I'm lucky when it comes to travel. I've seen many of the world's landmarks up close and personal. Places like the Eiffel Tower, The Acropolis, Vatican City, Ayres Rock, Franz Josep Glacier, Norte Dame and Big Ben. For the next few postings I want to share some lesson plans I use for my students as I present some of America's outstanding landmarks and places of interest. So get your luggage packed and gas-up your mental car because we're off. Today, let's go to Harvard University:

Harvard University is a private university in Cambridge, Massachusetts and is a member of the Ivy League (8 private institutions of higher education in New England). It was founded in 1636 while Massachusetts was still a colony of England (16 years after the arrival of the Pilgrims at Plymouth). Harvard is the oldest institution of higher learning in the U. S. It is also the first and oldest corporation in North America.

Initially called "New College" or "the college at New Towne", the name was changed to Harvard College on March 13, 1639. It was named in honor of a young pastor John Harvard who gave the new college his library of four hundred books and half his personal wealth, $1,500 (or £750). The earliest known official reference to Harvard as a "university" occurs in the new Massachusetts Constitution of 1780.

The 1708 John Leverett became the first president who was not a Puritan pastor. In the 17th century, Harvard University started the Indian College to educate Native Americans but was discontinued by 1693. Between 1830 and 1870 Harvard became a private university ran by Boston's upper-class business and professional community and funded by private endowment. In 1870, Richard T. Greener became the first African-American to graduate from Harvard College. Seven years later, Louis Brandeis, the first Jewish justice on the Supreme Court, graduated from Harvard Law School.

During his forty years as Harvard president (1869-1909), Charles William Eliot changed the university into one of America’s most important research centers. Eliot's changes included elective courses, small classes, and entrance examinations and his ideas influenced higher education all over American. Eliot wrote university books and traveled making speeches and became so widely known that by the time of his death in 1926 his name (and Harvard’s) had become synonymous with the universal aspirations of American higher education.

Harvard's library collection contains more than 15 million volumes, making it the largest academic library in the world. Harvard has the largest financial endowment of any non-profit organization (except for the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation), standing at $34.9 billion as of 2007. The university has 6,715 undergraduates and 12,424 postgraduates. It sits on 380 acres of land. The Harvard Advocate (founded 1866) is the nation's oldest college literary magazine. Famous people who have attended Harvard include Presidents Roosevelt, Kennedy, Nixon, and Bush and Vice President Al Gore and Sen. Barack Obama. Harvard’s nickname is Crimson and its color is red. Find out more about this center of higher education at: http://www.harvard.edu/

Research info gathered at: www.wikipedia.org

Now, here's one of my poems that is crimson too:

Do You Read Me, Copy?

His chair can purr.

He takes it everywhere he goes.

Some say he feels this unusual

closeness because the chair

reminds him of the basic animal

instinct in all of us. Others insist

the chair is simply his “security

blanket” he’ll never have to wash.

Whatever the reason, year after

year he carries it over a shoulder.

He once even had it upholstered in

a flame-stitch pattern using colors

taken from the rainbow. But the

chair remained non-committal with

sturdy legs. It prides itself in being

a perfect dance partner and never

eats meat. It can be positioned in

an endless variety of angles and

has a built-in microphone. Best of

all, when he finishes this life he can

just fold it up and ship it by parcel

post to that place, rumored to be

somewhere beyond the white light.

Poem first published at: http://www.sundress.net/21stars
Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/
and music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/
Poem copyright 2008 by Maurice Oliver. All Rights Reserved.

Puerto Rico

2008-08-08T23:57:00.000-07:00

Puerto Rico (officially called the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico) is a self-governing territory of the U. S. located in the northeastern Caribbean. The territory includes the main island of Puerto Rico and a number of smaller islands and keys, the largest of which are Vieques, Culebra, and Mona.

The history of Puerto Rico (which means "Rich Port" in Spanish) before Christopher Columbus arrived is not well known. What we do know comes from archaeological findings and early Spanish stories. We know that the first settlers were the Ortoiroid people, an Archaic Period culture of hunters and fishermen. An archaeological dig on Vieques in 1990 found the remains of an Archaic man from around 2000 BC. Between AD 120 and 400, the Igneri, a tribe from South America arrived. Between the 4th and 10th centuries, the Arcaicos and Igneri lived together on the island. Between the 7th and 11th centuries Arawak Indians known as Tainos inhibited the island and were there when Christopher Columbus arrived during his second voyage to the New World on November 19, 1493.

The Tainos called the island "Borikén". Columbus re-named the island San Juan Bautista, in honor of Saint John the Baptist. Later the island took the name of Puerto Rico and the capital was named San Juan. In 1508, Spanish explorer Juan Ponce de Leon became the island’s first governor.

The Spanish soon colonized the island. Taínos were forced into slavery and died off due to harsh conditions of work and diseases brought by the Spaniards. Others committed suicide and within a few decades most of the native population had vanished. African slaves were captured and then shipped across the Atlantic Ocean to work the sugar cane and tobacco fields. Puerto Rico soon became an important stronghold and port for the Spanish Empire. Walls and forts were built around San Juan to protect the city from Spain’s enemies like France, England and The Netherlands.

In the late 19th century, the people of Puerto Rico were very poor and began to rebel against Spain. On July 25, 1898, during the Spanish-American War, Puerto Rico was invaded by the United States. As an outcome of the war, Spain ceded Puerto Rico, along with Cuba, the Philippines, and Guam to the U.S. under the Treaty of Paris. The Foraker Act gave Puerto Rico a certain amount of self-government and the Jones-Shafroth Act of 1917 gave Puerto Ricans U.S. citizenship. In 1947, the U.S. granted Puerto Ricans the right to democratically elect their own governor. Many Puerto Ricans migrated to America in the 1950s. Today, Puerto Rico is a major tourist destination and a leading pharmaceutical and manufacturing center. Find out more about at: http://welcome.topuertorico.org/

Research gathered at: www.wikipedia.org

Now here's one of my poems with swaying palm trees:

Or Low-Life A Ceiling

A man jumps from the twentieth floor but floats down.

Escapism hanging on a coat rack. A banquet honoring

vinegar. Falling leaves. A crowd waiting for the

arrival. Or on a park bench with a grassy knoll to

fondle. Shopping at a best friend's house. A telephone

with two mouthpieces. A cookbook story of our lives.

Busy crosswalks. Phony street signs. To have a

pre-conceived notion of downtown Phoenix. "I see you've

learned to travel light", she says, noticing the

flight bags under my eyes. "Yeah, and you must be on

your way to palm reading class", I reply, searching

for the tube of hand lotion. Hot bath. Fragrance-free

shampoo. Pickpockets working the market stalls. Then

later, I dream that weapons are the witnesses...

naked with sunlight entering our forest...
or we could test drive an Italian hair dryer.

A full stomach or sky adrift in a lifeboat.

Until everything around us looks like shoelaces or

maybe just a bit rambunctious in a rash, wearing a

dark catacomb and paste-on mustaches as disguises.

Poem first published at: http://www.unlikelystories.org/

Visit my ezine at: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/

and music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/

Death Valley

2008-08-02T14:38:00.000-07:00

Death Valley is the lowest, driest and hottest valley in the U.S. but is not the lowest point in the Western Hemisphere. It is the location of the lowest elevation in North America at 281 ft. (85.5 m) below sea level. It holds the record highest temperature in the Western Hemisphere and the world’s second highest. It is located on the border of California and Nevada.

Death Valley is located southeast of the Sierra Nevada mountain range in the Great Basin and the Mojave Desert in death Valley National Park. It runs north-south between the Amargosa Range to the east and the Panamint Range to the west, the Sylvania Mountains and the Owlshead Mountains form its northern and southern boundaries. It has an area of about 3,000 square miles.

The Valley is an excellent example of the Basin and Range configuration. It lies at the southern end of a geological trough known as the Walker Lane which runs north into Oregon and is bisected by three fault lines which makes the chances of an earthquake high. Death Valley has sand dunes and salt pans. Millions of years ago, there was an inland sea over the valley, but the water evaporated as the land turned to a desert, leaving behind the salt.

Temperatures in Death Valley can range from up to 130 °F (54 °C) in the day in the summer, to below freezing at night in the winter. The lowest temperature on record at Furnace Creek Inn is 15 °F (-9 °C). The National Climatic Center reports that temperatures at Furnace Creek reach 90 °F (32 °C) on an average of 189.3 days annually and 100 °F (38 °C) on an average of 138.0 days annually. Freezing temperatures occur on an average of 11.7 days each year. Usually, the lower the altitude of a place, the higher the temperatures tend to be, and this is especially true in Death Valley. Because of the mountains that encircle it, the valley radiates extreme amounts of heat. The hottest temperature ever recorded in the U. S. was 134 °F (56.7 °C) at Furnace Creek during a sandstorm on July 10, 1913.

While Death Valley gets very little rain, there can be flooding during heavy rains because the soil is unable to absorb the bulk of the water. The runoff can produce dangerous flash floods. In August 2004, such flooding caused two deaths and shut down the national park. The Valley is home to the Timbisha Indians, a tribe that has lived in the valley for over 1000 years. Some families still live in the valley at Furnace Creek. The name of the valley, tümpisa, means 'rock paint' because the valley as a source of red ochre paint. Find out more at this website: www.nps.gov/deva/

Research info gathered at: http://www.wikipedia.org/

Now, here's one of my "hot" poems:

Expectant Look. Deliberate Attempt.

Can I be very candid?

OK, first off I favor the reinstatement of the cast system.

I strongly believe that ditches belong between thighs and
that organic food talks with a lisp.

A good splash though a rain puddle is the only way to find
the ultimate truth.

Grapefruits should come with their own spoons and burnt
toast ought to have its own national holiday. Train whistles
should be banned worldwide. On the other hand, warm milk
at bedtime should be mandatory and mattresses ought to
know at least one lullaby.

There never has been a need for pen caps or things dyed
green. I prefer to have my life’s road map tattooed on my
lower eyelid and detest alarm clocks.

What else. O yeah, I feel it would be better if the government
discontinued minting pennies, so long as they replaced them
with Velcro. Zippers are just so “prehistoric“.

Poem first published at: http://litchaos.com/2008/vol13/issue33
Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/
and music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/
Poem Copyright 2008 by Maurice Oliver. All Rights Reserved.

Salt Lake City

2008-07-29T18:55:00.000-07:00

Salt Lake City is the capital and largest city in Utah. It was originally known as Great Salt Lake City. The population is 178,858 but if the suburbs are included the population increases to 1,018,826. The total area is 110.4 square miles (285.9 km²) and has an average elevation of 4,327 feet (1,320 m) above sea level.

The city is located in the northeast corner of the Salt Lake Valley surrounded by the Great Salt Lake to the northwest and the steep Wasatch and Oquirrh mountain ranges on the eastern and western borders. The city has four distinct seasons. Summer is hot and dry and winter is cold and snowy. Both are long with spring and fall serving as brief but comfortable transition periods. The city receives 16.50 in (419 mm) of precipitation annually. Spring is the wettest season, and another "rainy season" occurs in fall.

The city was founded in 1847 by a group of Mormon pioneers led by their prophet, Brigham Young, who fled religious intolerance and violence in the Midwest. The headquarters of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (or Mormon Church) is located in the city, and the church and the city is considered to be the center of the Mormon Religion.

Mining for gold and silver and the construction of the first transcontinental railroad brought people to the city and helped it grow until it was nicknamed the Crossroads of the West. Today, the city has become a tourist center (skiing and biking), become the industrial banking center of the U.S. and served as the host of the 2002 Winter Olympics.

Before the city became a Mormon settlement it was the home of the Shoshone, Ute, and Paiute Indians for thousands of years. The first European explorer in the Salt Lake area is believed to be Jim Bridger in 1825. U.S. Army officer John C. Fremont surveyed the Great Salt Lake and the Salt Lake Valley in 1843 and 1845. The first Europeans to settle in the valley were the Latter-day Saints on July 24, 1847, traveling beyond the boundaries of the U.S. so they could practice their religion in peace.

The First Transcontinental Railroad was finished in 1869 at Promontory Summit on the north side of the Great Salt Lake and the railroad was connected to the city in 1870. The first city streetcar began to run in 1872 and was electrified in 1889. The last trolley ran in 1945 but a light rail (TRAX) was built once again in 1999. The majority of its citizens are still Mormons but Hispanics account for 19% of the population and there is also a large Pacific Islander population (about 1%), mainly of Samoans and Tongans. The city is also home to non-governmental think-tanks and advocacy groups. Find out more at: http://www.visitsaltlakecity.com/

Research info gathered at: http://www.wikipedia.org/

Now here's one of my poems surrounded by snow-capped mountains:

The Important Words Are Underlined

Did I ever tell you about the time oil from
a leaky canister seeped into my thoughts
then expressed its dissatisfaction with my
sexual life. Or what about the time a
wispbroom popped-up out of my shoulder
and then preceded to brush the dandruff
away. Then there was the time I drew a
circle in my bathroom mirror with shaving
creamand Beethoven’s Fifth came pouring
out through it. See what always happens
when you unfurl the celestial flag of pure
astralphysiognomy from vast dripping
muzzles. Automatically a one-horned
unicorn willappear, and you can bet your
lift it’s been dry cleaned and disinfected
first. Now, sit back and feet up like a sunrise.

Kentucky Derby - Churchill Downs

2008-07-17T23:28:00.000-07:00

The Kentucky Derby is a world-famous horse race that takes place each year on the first Saturday in May. Only three-year-old thoroughbred horses can enter the race which is held in Louisville, Kentucky. The race is the last event of the two-week-long Kentucky Derby Festival. It is also the first of an annual racing event called the Triple Crown, the three main horse races in America, the other two being the Preakness Stakes and Belmont Stakes.

The Kentucky Derby takes place at Churchill Downs, a race track that is one and a quarter miles (2 km) long. Colts are allowed to carry no more than 126 pounds (57.2 kg) jockeys and fillies no more than 121 pounds (54.9 kg).

The race is known as "The Most Exciting Two Minutes in Sports" for its approximate duration, and is also called "The Run for the Roses" for the blanket of roses draped around the neck of the winning horse. Last year 150,000 people were admitted to the race track. General admission tickets are $40, with private viewing boxes going for up to $2,250.Kentucky has been the main center of horse breeding and racing in America since the late 18th century. From the time the region was settled, the fields of the Bluegrass region were known for producing superior race horses. The idea of the racetrack was thought up by Col. Meriwether Lewis Clark, Jr. (grandson of William Clark of Lewis and Clark expedition) got the idea to start a fine race track after visiting England and France in 1872. The first race took place on May 17, 1875.

On May 3, 1952, the first national television coverage of the Kentucky derby took place. In 1954, the price money was more than $100,000 for the first time. The fastest time ever run in the Derby (at its present distance) was set in 1973 at 1 minute 59 2/5 seconds by a horse named Secretariat, a record that no other horse has ever broken.

Over the years the race has started its own traditions, including the Mint Julep, an iced drink made of bourbon, mint and a sugar syrup sipped from a souvenir glass. Women who come to the race are also famous for wearing big fancy straw hats. Find out more about the annual race and the famous racetrack at: http://www.kentuckyderby.com/

Research gathered at: http://www.wikipedia.org/

Now, here's a poem that knows how to gallop:

Trance Mission

The sigh of gas pumps in an empty station. Newspapers

that line the desert, flagstones leading to the porch.
Some folks don't know the difference between a
missile and a match. An easy mistake when
you think about it, seeing as though they
both emit flames. Quickly we realize
there's not even enough room to
bury the cat, at least not in
this postal-stamp size
backyard. So much
concrete. And my
brother-in-law
likes to
play with handcuffs.
Not the best role model for
his boy. Industry? Is the music
business considered an industry. I like

it when electric guitars cry the blues. Come

to think of it, I don't remember there ever being
atoll on this bridge. Driving for miles and not an RV
park in sight.The father comes along and we regret every
minute. The son never removes his cap the whole trip.
But by morning, the bottle of iodine fully escapes
anyway, creeping up the length of the toll
booths like masses of famished kudzu.

Poem first published at: http://www.buzzword.ndo.co.uk/

Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/

and personal blog: http://www.copyat5.blogspot.com/

Las Vegas

2008-07-13T16:57:00.000-07:00

Las Vegas is the largest city in Nevada and is an internationally renowned resort city for gaming, shopping, and live entertainment. The city is called The Entertainment Capital of the World. It is famous for its lavish casinos, and adult entertainment. Once officially called Sin City, Las Vegas is also a popular setting for films and TV programs.

Las Vegas (English: "The Meadows") was named by the Spanish who used the water in the area while heading north and west along the Old Spanish Trail from Texas. In the 1800s, areas of the Las Vegas Valley contained artesian wells that created green areas or meadows (vegas in Spanish) and so the name Las Vegas.

John C. Fremont traveled into the Las Vegas Valley in 1884 while it was still part of Mexico. He was a leader of a group of scientists, scouts and observers for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. In 1855, after the Nevada became America territory, and Brigham Young sent 30 missionaries for the Mormon Church there to convert the Paiute Indians to Mormonism. A fort was built near the current downtown area, serving as a stopover for Mormon travelers between Salt Lake and San Bernardino, California. Las Vegas became a railroad town in 1905, the same year the first city charter was written-up. It was also a staging point for all the mines in the surrounding area, especially those around the town of Bullfrog, that shipped their goods out to the rest of the country. Las Vegas became a city in 1911.

It is the American mafia, especially mob figures like Bugsy Siegel and Meyer Lansky that found a way to use the money they were making in bootleg liquor, racketeering, and brothels to finance the first casinos built in the city after gambling was legalized in 1931. The Hoover Dam, which was finished in 1935, helped the city to grow too by providing a source of fresh water to the desert town. Bugsy Seigel’s Flamingo Hotel was built on what would become The Strip in 1946, and the future of the city was sealed.

Today Las Vegas has become the most populous American city founded in the 20th century just as Chicago was in the 19th century. The city includes much of Clark County that surrounds the city, especially the resort areas on or near the Las Vegas Strip. This 4.5-mile (7.2-km) stretch of Las Vegas Boulevard is mostly outside the city limits, in the unincorporated towns of Paradise and Winchester. It is the 28th most populous city in the U.S. and one of the fastest growing cities in America. Tourism. Gambling and conventions drive the economy. Last year 8 million people visited Las Vegas and analysts estimate that revenue on the Las Vegas Strip in 2006 was about $6.5 billion. Find out more at: http://www.visitlasvegas.com/

Research info gathered at: http://www.wikipedia.org/

Now, here's one of my poems you can bet on:

Ten Frames Later

Dear Samantha,

Want to experience a Kodak moment? Listen to this.
My chair no longer purs and for the first time ever
I realize that the sky never really was blue on cloudy
days. It's rained a month now and the chair just sits
at the living room window staring out all day. Last
week I had it re-upholstered in a flame-stitch pattern
using colors taken from the rainbow but it still remains
non-committal with wobbly legs. I suppose there is no
way of ignoring the fact that we miss you. You had a
way with dental floss and you made a perfect dance
partner. A wind almost out of breath. Moss without the
ability to grow lips. Grasshoppers trying to out run the
lawnmower. Everything is topsy-turby. Please come
back and polish my silverware. Spend a trial weekend in
the life of my undergarments. You can stay longer if you
like. The chair won't mind and that sky passing for blue
may turn out to really be grape-flavored. If it is, we can
drink some on the patio using the cups of martyred saints
and then when we've finished, sell their bones like pretzels
from a makeshift stand out in front of the house near the
curb. Let me know your thoughts. I wait for the smoke signal.

Poem first published at: http://www.wordsontheweb.net/
Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/
and music blog: http://www.medleymakers.blogspot.com/
Poem copyright 2008 by Maurice Oliver. All Rights Reserved.

Brooklyn Bridge

2008-07-09T23:29:00.000-07:00

The Brooklyn Bridge, one of the oldest suspension bridges in the U.S., stretches 5,989 feet (1825 m) over the East River and connects the New York City boroughs of Manhattan and Brooklyn. At the time it was built, it was the largest suspension bridge in the world and the first steel-wire suspension bridge ever built. Originally called the New York and Brooklyn Bridge the name was changed in 1915. The bridge crosses the East River and was designed to carry motor vehicles (cars only), elevated trains (until 1944), streetcars (until 1950), pedestrians, and bicycles.

The bridge was designed by German-born John Augustus Roebling. He designed a bridge and truss system that was six times as strong as he thought it needed to be. Because of this, the Brooklyn Bridge is still standing when many of the bridges built around the same time have vanished into history and been replaced. An addition of 250 cables were added to make the bridge stronger. As things turned out, they proved to be unnecessary, but were kept for their distinctive beauty.Construction work began on January 3, 1870 and the bridge was finished 13 years later and opened on May 24, 1883. On that first day, a total of 1,800 vehicles and 150,300 people crossed.

The bridge's main span over the East River is 1,595 feet 6 inches (486.3 m). The bridge’s clearance below is 135 ft. at mid-span. The bridge cost $15.5 million to build and approximately 27 people died during its construction. A week after the opening, a rumor that the Bridge was going to break down caused a stampede which crushed and killed twelve people.

At the time it opened, it was the longest suspension bridge in the world — 50% longer than any bridge built before. For many years the towers were the tallest structures in the Western Hemisphere. Since the 1980s, it has been floodlit at night to highlight its architectural features. The towers are built of limestone, granite, and cement in a Gothic style with pointed arches above the passageways through the stone towers.

At various times, the bridge has carried horse-drawn and trolley traffic; at present, it has six lanes for motor vehicles, with a separate walkway along the centerline for pedestrians and bicycles. Commercial vehicles and buses are not allowed on the bridge. A $725 million project to replace the approach motorways and repaint the bridge is scheduled to begin in 2009. The first person to jump from the bridge was Robert E. Odlum, a swimming teacher, in 1885. He survived the planned jump, but died shortly thereafter from internal injuries. In 1964 the bridge was designated a National Historic Landmark. Find out more at: www.nyctourist.com/bridge2.htm

Research gathered at: http://www.wikipedia.org/

Now, here's one of my poems you can jump off:

J' Attends

Whisper stumbles awardly upon the ear

in a real landscape someone has invented

where aliens sweep down for painted skies

wearing hero smiles edged in palest blue

they whoop & poke & harass a forest

sealed in approximate light pine-scented

between colored stones that have no value

the monkey is allowed to speak in its place

while acrobats reappear by the letter "B"

to perform before viewers all expendable.

Poem first published at: http://www.stridemagazine.co.uk/
Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/
and music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/

The Smithsonian Institute

2008-07-02T18:07:00.000-07:00

Summertime means travel time. I've been lucky when it comes to travel. I've seen many of the world's landmarks up close and personal. Places like the Eiffel Tower, The Acropolis, Vatican City, Ayres Rock, Franz Josep Glacier, Norte Dame and Big Ben. For the next few postings I want to share some lesson plans I use for my students as I present some of America's outstanding landmarks and places of interest. So get your luggage packed and gas-up your mental car because we're off. Let's go to the Smithsonian Institute in Washington D. C.:

The Smithsonian Institution was founded by a bequest to the U.S. by the British scientist James Smithson (1765–1829), who had never visited the United States himself. In Smithson's will, he stated that should his nephew, Henry James Hungerford, die without heirs, the Smithson estate would go to the government of the United States for creating an "Establishment for the increase & diffusion of Knowledge among men".

After the nephew died without heirs in 1835, President Andrew Jackson told Congress of the bequest, which amounted to $500,000 (which would be $9,235,277 today after inflation). Eight years later, Congress passed an act establishing the Smithsonian Institute, a hybird public and private partnership, and it was signed into law on August 10, 1846 by President James Polk.

The building that houses the Institute on the National Mall in Washington D.C. has been nicknamed "The Castle". It was built by architect James Renwick Jr. and finished in 1855. The Institute includes 19 museums, a zoo, and eight research centers in New York City, Virginia, Panama, and elsewhere. It has over 142 million items in its collections.

Though the Smithsonian's first secretary, Joseph Henry, wanted the Institution to be a center for scientific research, before long it became a home for various Washington and U.S. government collections.

The voyage of the U.S. Navy circumnavigated the globe between 1838 and 1842 and the explorations gathered thousands of animal specimens, an herbarium of 50,000 examples, shells and minerals, tropical birds, jars of seawater and ethnographic specimens from the South Pacific. These specimens and artifacts became part of the Smithsonian collections, as did those collected by the military and civilian surveys in the American West, such as the Mexican Boundary Survey and Pacific Railroad Surveys, which assembled many Native American artifacts as well as natural history specimens. The National Air and Space Museum, National Museum of Natural History and Smithsonian National Zoological Park are all part of the Institute. Find out more about this American institution at: http://www.mnh.si.edu/

Research info gathered at: http://www.wikipedia.com/

Now here's one of my poems full of museum ghosts:

Harry Houdini On Holiday

In the poem version about the untied military boots
war breaks out in a virtual car chase allowing
vandals a bumper-sticker of green lights for miles
before the night is lit-up by artillery fire.
Two sacred mounds of prickly hats are blindfolded
then forced to stand before the hangman's noose
where scat looks like a lavish Hollywood movie where
identity theft grows up to be urban blight's stage prop.
The blindfolds don't care. Neither does bird flu. It brings
a twig to the empty c-cup then brides porcupine quills
to boycott any notice of amnesty, so long as those little
metal weighs are still sown in buttons of window drapes.

Poem first published at: http://www.foame.org/
Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/
and music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/
Poem copyright 2008 by Maurice Oliver. All Rights Reserved.

Mount Rushmore

2008-06-28T21:15:00.000-07:00

Mount Rushmore National Memorial, near Keystone, South Dakota, is a monumental granite sculpture by Gutzon Borglum, that represents the first 150 years of the history of the United States of America. The 60 ft. (18m) sculptures are designed to look like the heads of former U.S. Presidents George Washington (1732–1799), Thomas Jefferson, (1743–1826), Theodore Roosevelt (1858–1919), and Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865).

The entire memorial covers 1,278.45 acres (5.17 km²) and is 5,725 feet (1,745 m) above sea level. The faces were blasted out of the mountain between 1927 and 1941 by 400 workers under the direction of Borglum, and cost of just under $1 million. The heads are carved to the proportion of men 465' tall. Originally, Borglum planned to carve the bodies from the waist up, but only Washington's lapels were completed. He left no room for more figures to be added later.

Mt. Rushmore, which was originally known to the Lakota Sioux Indian tribe as Six Grandfathers, got its name from a joke. In 1885 a young New York lawyer named George Rushmore was vacationing in what was then Dakota Territory. Pointing to the then-unnamed peak, he asked his guide what it was called. "I call it Mount Rushmore," joked the guide...and the name stuck. Forty years later, when sculptor Gutzon Borglum selected the mountain for his carvings, the astonished George Rushmore contributed $5,000 toward the project.

As Six Grandfathers, the mountain was part of the route that Lakota leader Black Elk took in a spiritual journey that ended at Harney Peak. After military battles with the Indians from 1876 to 1877, the United States took control over the area, a claim that is still disputed based on the 1868 Treaty of Fort Laramie. White American settlers called the peak may names including Cougar Mountain, Sugarloaf Mountain, Slaughterhouse Mountain, and Keystone Cliffs.

Historian Doane Robinson got the idea for a Mount Rushmore concept in 1923 as a way to promote tourism in South Dakota. In 1924, he persuaded Borglum to travel to the Black Hills region to see if the idea could be done. Borglum had worked on the huge bas-relief memorial to Confederate leaders on Stone Mountain in Georgia. He chose Mount Rushmore partly because it faced southeast and enjoyed maximum exposure to the sun. Congress set-up a Mount Rushmore National Memorial Commission on March 3, 1925. President Coolidge insisted that along with Washington, two Republicans and one Democrat be portrayed. Today, the monument attracts about two million people annually and is managed by the National Park Service. Find out more about this granite marvel at: www.nps.gov/moru/

Research info gathered at: http://www.wikipedia.org/

Now, here's one of my stoned face poems:

Sylvia Plath - Awaiting Our Applause

The eggs.

The boiling water.

And an empty salt shaker.

Or it could be a poem filled with streets and

sewers and a thick overcast that burns off at

noon. You know, the kind that seems to hoop

around on that good leg it broke falling from

a branch high up in the tree of life. And it

might wear an exotic apron stolen from the

kitchen of illicit greasy spoons. Or it might

be a pustule camouflaged on a parking meter

only a stanza could come from. One unpolluted

stop sign. A couple of left-winged construction

cranes. A billboard sacred to lip-synch. And if

you happen to take the alternative way to the

dry cleaners you could drive right by a rundown

elementary school with a playground longing for

its muse to repair the lopsided merry-go-round.

You have plenty of time prepare to applause. As

for me, I have a blind date with a wrist slash
who's online profile is innocent and cruel too. It

will be dressed in an orange jumpsuit and will be

carrying a plank card implying that every faith is

created by infidels and that even the path to the

Pearly Gate leads straight to hell.

Poem first published at: http://www.wordsontheweb.net/

Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/

and music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/

Yosemite National Park

2008-06-24T00:24:00.000-07:00

Yosemite National Park (pronounced "yo-SEM-it-ee") is a national park in east central California in the U.S. The park covers an area of 761,266 acres or 1,189 square miles (3,081 km²) and reaches across the western slopes of the Sierra Nevada mountain range. Yosemite is visited by over 3.5 million people annually, many of whom only spend time in the seven square miles (18 km²) of Yosemite Valley. The park is world famous for its granite cliffs, waterfalls, clear streams, Giant Sequoia groves, and biological differences. Almost 95% of the park is wilderness. The park set an example of what a national park should be thanks to the work of people like John Muir.

Yosemite is one of the largest natural habitats that still is left in the Sierra Nevada. The park has an elevation range from 2,000 to 13,114 feet (600 to 4,000 m) and has five major vegetation zones: chaparral/oak woodland, lower montane, upper montane, subapine, and alpine. Of California's 7,000 plant species, about 20% are within Yosemite, including more than 160 rare plants.

Yosemite was formed about 10 million years ago, when the Sierra Nevada was uplifted and then tilted to form its relatively gentle western slopes and the more rugged eastern slopes. The uplift increased the steepness of stream and river beds, resulting in formation of deep, narrow canyons. About 1 million years ago, sown and ice collected, forming glaciers at the higher alpine meadows that moved down the river valleys. Ice thickness in Yosemite Valley may have reached 4,000 feet (1200 m) during the early glacial age. The downslope movement of the ice masses cut and sculpted the U-shaped valley that offers wonderful scenic vistas today.

The park has thousands of lakes and ponds, 1,600 miles of streams, 800 miles of hiking trails, and 350 miles of roads. Two rivers, the Merced and the Tuolumne begin within the park and flow westward into the Central Valley of California. Yosemite Valley represents only 1% of the park area, but this is where most visitors arrive and stay. El Captain, a prominent granite cliff is one of the most popular rock climbing destinations in the world because of its different climbing routes and year-round accessibility. The granite domes of Sentinel Rock and Half Dome rise 3,000 feet and 4,800 feet (900 and 1,450 m), respectively, above the valley floor. The high country of Yosemite also has beautiful areas such as Tuolumne Meadows and Dana Meadows.

The park has three groves of ancient Giant Sequoia trees; the Mariposa Grove (200 trees), the Tuolumne Grove (25 trees) and the Merced Grove (20 trees). The trees are the largest and the oldest in the world and they date back to before the start of the last ice age. The Ahwahneechee Indians lived in Yosemite Valley when the first European explorers arrived. The park, which is a national treasure, and was designated a World Heritage Site in 1984. Find out more at: www.nps.gov/yose/

Research info gathered at: www.wikipedia.org

Now, here's one of my poems that loves the outdoors:

I'll Let You Decide

Once unpacked it can be used in any number of various ways:

-As a first class seat on an express train to Paris.

-As a polka-dot blouse floating down a red river.

-As the utter beauty that is an onion behind the skin.

-As an umbrella sturdy enough to be showered by gravel.

-As ashes that lets dust know who's the boss.

-As a cat lucky enough to have ten lives.

-As handlebars of the first-ever bicycle.

-As a reflecting pool surrounded by naked goddesses.

-As the original instruction manual for the Twist.

-As a hill born and breed to recognize only other hills.

-As a wave that can mean either hello or good-bye.

Poem first published at: http://www.jacketmagazine.com/

Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/

and music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/

Central Park - NYC

2008-06-20T18:19:00.000-07:00

Summertime is travel time. I've been lucky when it comes to travel. I've seen many of the world's landmarks up close and personal. Places like the Eiffel Tower, The Acropolis, Vatican City, Ayres Rock, Franz Josep Glacier, Norte Dame and Big Ben. For the next few postings I want to share some lesson plans I use for my students as I present some of America's outstanding landmarks and places of interest. So get your luggage packed and gas-up your mental car because we're off. Let's go to Central Park in NYC:

Central Park is a large public park, which sits on 843 acres (3.41 km²) in a rectangle of 2.6 miles on Manhattan in New York City. The park has about 25 million visitors annually, making it the most visited park in the U.S.

It is bordered on the north by West 110th Street, on the south by West 59th Street, on the west by Eighth Avenue. Fifth Avenue runs along the eastern border of the park. All the area around the park is very valuable real estate.

As late as 1811 no park was planned for New York City. But between 1821 and 1855 it grew 4 times larger and the only open spaces where people could get away from the noise and busy city life were the few cemeteries. Andrew Jackson Downing, a landscape architect, began to make speeches about the need for a public park. He believed what was needed was a place for open-air driving, like the Bois de Boulogne in Paris or London’s Hyde park. And in 1853 the state legislature designated a 700 acre (2.8 km²) area from 59th to 106th Streets for the creation of a park for a cost of more than $5 million for the land alone.

The park was designed by landscape architect Frederick Law Olmsted and architect Calvert Vaux. It was finished in 1857. Even though the park looks natural, it is in fact almost entirely landscaped. It contains several natural-looking lakes and ponds, many walking trails, two ice-skating rinks, the Central Park Zoo and Conservatory Garden, a wildlife sanctuary, a 106-acre (0.43 km²) natural woods, a billion gallon reservoir with an encircling running track, and an outdoor amphitheater called the Delacorte Theater which hosts the "Shakespeare in the Park" summer festivals. Indoor attractions include Belvedere Castle with its nature center, the Swedish Cottage Marionette Theatre, and the historic Carousel. In addition there are many grassy areas, some of which are used for informal or team sports, some are set aside as quiet areas, and there are a number of enclosed playgrounds for children.

The park is taken care of by the Central Park Conservancy, a private, non-profit organization. The park has its own wildlife and also serves as an oasis for migrating birds, especially in the fall and the spring, attracting bird watchers. The 6 miles (10 km) of drives within the park are used by joggers, bicyclists and inline skaters, especially on weekends, and in the evenings after 7:00 p.m., when automobile traffic is banned. The real-estate value of Central Park is estimated to be $528,783,552,000. In 1963 the park was placed on the National Historical List where it could be protected forever. Find out more about the park at: http://www.centralparknyc.org/

Research info gathered at: http://www.wikipedia.org/

Now here's one of my poems with a grassy knoll:

Eye Glance Or Glide

Scales uncolored in themselves produce a series of rainbows

Blue delicate curly petals with leaves flat almost dandelions

Almost invisible glacier tundra peat bog prairie

All alone in the yard silver lawnmower blades

The sun trees flowers that exist grabs all my attention

What about more delicate redwood needles in the shadows

Sun so brilliant here giant lilies grow in the shade

Cut straight down the center as hand lotion soothes the mind

Poem first published at: http://www.wordriot.org/
Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/
and music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.com/
Poem copyright 2008 by Maurice Oliver. All Rights Reserved.

Tim Russert: Easy Like A Sunday Morning

2008-06-15T23:16:00.000-07:00

Tim Russert was the Managing Editor and Moderator of "Meet the Press" and political analyst for "NBC Nightly News" and the "TODAY" program. He anchored "The Tim Russert Show," a weekly interview program on MSNBC. Russert also served as senior vice president and Washington bureau chief of NBC News.

He died Friday, June 13 at the Washington D.C. bureau. He was 58.

His two books-Big Russ and Me in 2004 and Wisdom of Our Fathers in 2006-were both New York Times #1 bestsellers.

Russert took over the helm of "Meet the Press" in December 1991. Since then, MTP has become the most watched Sunday morning interview program in America and the most quoted news program in the world. Now in its 60th year, "Meet the Press" is the longest-running program in the history of television. Russert has interviewed every major figure on the American political scene.

Russert joined NBC News in 1984. In April 1985, he supervised the live broadcasts of the Today program from Rome, negotiating and arranging an appearance by Pope John Paul II, a first for American television. In 1986 and 1987 Russert led NBC News weeklong broadcasts from South America, Australia and China.

Washingtonian Magazine dubbed Tim Russert the best and most influential journalist in Washington, D. C. describing "Meet the Press" as “the most interesting and important hour on television.”

I have had only two journalist/reporter/commentator "TV heroes" in my life. One was not even American. His name was Alistair Cooke. The other was Tim Russert. Both men reflected a fundamental decency that I feel can never be faked. I have four Sunday routines; an omlette, listening to the CD of the soundtrack to Princess Diana's funeral, working on my lesson plans for the coming week, and watching "Meet The Press" over my laptop, something I've done every week since I got the device nearly three years again. Sometimes I just listen, but I never miss it. I will miss Tim Russert tough. I will miss his tough but fair questions. My Sunday will never be quite the same. Find out more about him and his life at: www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tim_Russert

Research info gathered at: www.msnbc.msn.com

Now, here's one of my poems that is tough but fair too:

"Imitation Bowling Shirts" Sonnet

Cry me a story the river begins. Gospel music peeled off

to drip-dry in plaid. A windowsill parade. A choral

recital that clings like bats to a ceiling. Harp

geysers. Fire hose sulfur. A whole bottle

inside a genie. A nail of beds. A floor

squeezer. Breath that likes to

invade unsuspecting

nostrils.

Tambourine trees.

Piano pincers. A rain

slicker with sex appeal.

Backseat stove. Boats on a

steam. A refrigerator after midnight

curfew. Drapes in a phone booth. A whole

truck stop tucked under her wig. Marquee

trial. Fickle orange soda. Bowling shirts especially

designed to fondle. Telescopes substituting for cigars.

Lightening in a spoon. Mummy ice cubes. Yellow ribbons

tied around bubbles. Spit on a boil. Vinegar or

vulgarity. Nuts or napalm. Or maybe pest

control for honeymooners.

Poem first published at: http://www.sundress.net/wickedalice
Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/
and music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/
Poem Copyright 2008 by Maurice Oliver. All Rights Reserved.

Sami People: Northern Europe's Aboriginals

2008-06-12T21:25:00.000-07:00

I often get poetry books from poets from all over the world thanks to being the editor of an ezine. I carefully read every one and try to pay special attention to the titles because I think titles mean a lot. One of the recent collections to come through the mail was from an Irish poet and had a one-word title in a word I'd never seen before. I curious about it, so I sent an email to the poet and received a response the very next day. The title, I came to find out, was a word taken from the Sami Language. What were the Sami and where in the world did they live, and why had I not heard about them before now. Well, I headed to Google and found out about their interesting history. I shared it with my students and now I'll share it with you:

The Sami People are an indigenous people of northern Europe that once lived in the kingdom of Sapmi, which today covers parts of northern Sweden, Norway, Finland and the Kola Peninsula of Russia in an area once the size of Sweden. The Sami people are among the largest indigenous groups in Europe. They speak the Sami languages which are classified as Finno-Ugric.

The Sami people have intermarried over many years with people in the four countries where the Sami once lived so it is hard to just how many people there are left today. However, the population is estimated to be between 80,000 and 100,000.

The Norwegian government considers any Norwegian as Sami if he or she has one great-grandparent whose home language was Sami, but Norway has never kept records of things like that. Roughly half of all Sami live in Norway, but many live in Sweden as well. Finland and Russia are also home to smaller groups located in the far north. The Sami in Russia were forced by the Soviet government to relocate to a collective (reservation) called Lovozero, in the middle of the Kola Peninsula.

For hundreds of years the Sami had a variety of livelihoods; fishing on the coast and in the inland, trapping animals for fur, and sheep herding. The best known livelihood is reindeer herding, but only a small percentage of the Sami have been mainly reindeer herders over the last centuries. Today, many Sami lead modern lives in the cities inside and outside the traditional Sami area, with modern jobs. Some 10% still practice reindeer herding, which for traditional and cultural reasons is reserved for Sami people in some parts of Nordic countries. Today Sami people are usually called Laplanders. Find out more about their culture at: http://www.galdu.org/

Research gathered at: http://www.wikipedia.org/

Now, here's one of my poems that actually eats reindeer meat:

The “Standby Ticket” Sonnet

Start with a fish hook stuck in your lip. A
lunar eclipse at dawn. Blood on the
dance floor. A queen’s handbag.
Minty toothpaste. Gauze
bandages. Add the
oldest building in Oxford.
Crows feet. A cleft chin. Smudges
on the tapestry. Smokehouses. Cardboard
boxes. An orange nylon jacket knotted
on the pier. Carnival rides. Cotton
candy. Flypaper lit with a zippo.
Ether. Lemonade. Artichoke
or parsnip? A leaky
burlap sack of
eels. No
sundial. No suitcase.
No sushi. No difference.
Just make sure all the cabins
have linoleum floors.

Craig Brewer: Reconstructing The South

2008-06-08T11:52:00.000-07:00

Criag Brewer is one of those amazing director/screenwriters that come along every July snow. He was born in Virginia on December 6, 1971. His father Walter worked in a number of high-level corporate positions for Matson Navigation Company, culminating in the position of director of corporate development from 1990-1998, when he died. His work caused the family to move from Vallejo, California (where Craig attended elementary school and junior high) to Orange County, returning to Vallejo in the early 1990s. Walter frequently rented out local theaters to present young Craig's plays and often financed Craig's productions.

Craig's mother, Gail, was a school board member for Vallejo's district both times the family lived there and taught English and Drama in nearby Mt. Diablo School District. She allowed her son, fresh out of high school, to teach her drama courses at College Park High School in Pleasant Hill, CA and produce/direct the school's plays, with the school occasionally serving as a showcase for his original works. Craig's father also helped finance school productions, and helped to rent out local theaters for additional shows. Craig's high school friends, including future wife Jodi and Chris Barella, took an active role in CPHS's drama department productions. Craig's younger sister, Amanda Brewer attended CPHS from 1992-1995. Because o this early experience Craig was able to go on to work with the American Conservatory Theater in San Francisco.

After moving to Memphis with his wife, Jodi, Brewer wrote and directed his first feature, The Poor and Hungry (2000). Set in Memphis, about a car thief who falls in love with one of his victims, the film won the Hollywood Discovery Award for Best Digital Feature at the Hollywood Film Festival; Best Feature Film at the Magnolia Independent Film Festival; and Audience Choice Award, Dreammaker Award and Special Award of Merit at the Nashville Independent Festival. It later aired on the Independent Film Channel.

By the time Brewer teamed-up with Stephanie Allain and John Singleton for his next film, Hustle & Flow (2005), starring Terrence Dashon Howard and Anthony Anderson, he was soon to be an award-winning screen-wrtier. The movie was about a Memphis pimp who dreams of becoming a successful rapper, and the film won the Audience Award at the 2005 Sundance Film Festival.

Brewer continues to live in Memphis and included the regional elements in his 2007 film, Black Snake Moan, about a white nymphomaniac (Christina Ricci) who has to be cured by an older black man (Samuel L. Jackson). The unapologetically lurid posters for "Black Snake Moan," showing a chained-up Ricci in a crop top and cut-off shorts, was designed to shock, and seem to have done the trick: When Salon's Andrew O'Hehir wrote about Black Sanke Moan from Sundance, plenty of readers chimed in to denounce the movie for its misogyny, despite the fact that none of them had yet seen it. Nevertheless,this picture about the redemptive possibilities of the blues (Jackson does his own singing), and it also featured Justin Timberlake, as Ricci's soldier boyfriend, in a nonsinging role. The movie won critical aclaim.

A new film, Maggie Lynn, is currently in pre-production, this film is also Produced by Stephanie Allain. Craig was named among Fade In Magazine's "100 People in Hollywood You Need to Know" in 2005. Find out more about him at: www.imdb.com/name/nm/0108132

Research info gathered at: www.wikipedia.org

Now, here's one of my poems with "southern hospitality":

Am I Going To Prison?

In this scenario every other public school is a

federal prison. The nation’s inner courtyard

has been transformed into a theme park with

cotton candy machines dressed in bunny suits.

I’m responsible for organizing the egg hunt.

You’re in charge of the soap oprea commercial

projected on a snowy screen. I wear a rented

trampoline and an Afro wig and you sport pink

pedal-pushers and a clip-on bow tie. We are

convinced no child should be left behind and

insist on staying the entire length of the visiting

hour staring at life in the aquarium but not

talking. Words are cheap. Sex is an identifiable

bacteria founded in the produce section of the

supermarket. Fact is, lights from the maximum

penitentiary burns so intensely the stars have all

given up and gone dark. We quickly learn not to

idealize, not to judge, not to demonize, not to

anathematize, naked eyed and borne out in the

statistics that only Russia approaches our rate

of incarceration, which makes you wonder who’s

left to look after the dog.

Poem first published at: www.leafscape.org/press1
Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/
and music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/
Poem Copyright 2008 by Maurice Oliver. All Rights Reserved.

America's Historic Moment: The Giant Slayer

2008-06-04T12:38:00.000-07:00

Across the globe, pundits and politicians of all stripes competed for hyperbole on Wednesday to applaud Senator Barack Obama’s claim of victory in the race for the Democratic presidential nomination, almost as if he had already been elected to the White House. The Times of London saw Obama's victory as evidence that "the United States remains a land of opportunity." "This moment's significance is its resounding proof of the truism about America as a land of opportunity: Mr Obama's opportunity to graduate from Harvard and take Washington by storm," it wrote.

It said his victory also demonstrates "the opportunity that the world's most responsive democratic system gives its voters to be inspired by an unknown; the opportunity that outsiders now have to reassess the superpower that too many of them love to hate. "Win or lose in November, he will have gone farther than anyone in history to bury the toxic enmity that fueled America's civil war and has haunted it ever since."

The Financial Times opened a post-mortem on Clinton's campaign, indicating that her defeat was not about her shortcomings but about Obama's political potency. The Independent newspaper, however, placed the blame on "loyal husband" Bill Clinton who "more than anyone sabotaged his wife's chances by airing too many outspoken opinions on the way."

But the paper hinted the Clintons may still have another shot at the White House -- although it could be a few years away. "Hillary has been beaten. Bill has dishonored himself. And Chelsea? Chelsea need have no regrets. She may be the candidate that brings the family back to the campaign trail again. But that drama is for another decade."

The French newspaper Le Monde also examined Bill Clinton's role in Hillary's failure. The former president was both her greatest asset and her worst, the paper said, delivering a blunt assessment of her campaign with an emphatic: "C'est fini."

Find out more at: http://www.cnnpolitics.com/

Now, here's one of my poems that can slay dragons too:

A Slick Tool & Vaseline

In this scenario your name crawls through a megaphone
then sits on a stump in the shade along the river
bank to catch its breath. Daily life stands
in the bus’s crowded aisle glancing
at newspaper headlines in
Braille. It’s one of
those days
when you manage
to forge happiness’s signature
perfectly but the check bounces anyway
and you’re stranded on a deserted alpine road
with a migraine for a homeroom teacher. Someone
steals your bag of elbows while you’re taking a leak in the
woods and you are forced to run the three-legged
race alone. Romance becomes just a humid
gymnasium with jock itch. Foreplay turns
out to be a lame mare with a sway
back. The jar of Vaseline is
empty and the silly
love songs all
have rust
behind their
ears. So you wiggle
your hornet’s nest until
the bleachers fits. You puck
the hair on your tongue and will
your eyes to moor in their sockets as
your pet rock finds its way home. You take
comfort knowing that another world crisis is at
that very moment trying on another pair of kid gloves, that
a crop-duster is all set to sky-write your surrender.

Poem first published online at: http://www.myfavoritebullet.com/
Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/
and music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/
Poem Copyright 2008 by Maurice Oliver. All Rights Reserved.

The Past Month In Cartoons

2008-06-01T11:33:00.001-07:00

The following cartoons were gathered at: www.time.com/time

Visit my ezine: www.concelebratory.blogspot.com

and music blog: www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com

The Mother: A Film Review

2008-05-29T01:20:00.000-07:00

I recently saw an intriguing DVD that I happen to stumbble upon at the main library here in Portland, and I thought it would be worth sharing in a blog posting. The review was written by Steven Holden of The new New Times and it goes like this:

Anne Reid's character, May, is a recently widowed grandmother who pursues an affair with her daughter's hunky, unhappily married boyfriend (Mr. Craig). The sight of a dilapidated woman besotted with a careless young god in his 30's may be uncomfortably taboo busting. But the extraordinarily clear-sighted and psychologically balanced British drama stares as calmly at May's perilous leap into churning emotional rapids as a medical show does when keeping its gaze fixed on a tricky surgical procedure. The bravery of Ms. Reid's screen performance can be measured by her utter lack of self-consciousness when naked before the camera. When desire trumps May's maternal feelings, and she knowingly (and guiltily) risks exile from her family to pursue a hopeless infatuation, she is achingly believable.

Hanif Kureishi's screenplay is infused with an unwavering Chekhovian compassion. Neither good nor evil, its characters are complicated, ordinary people coping as best they can with their emotional wounds and their fear of the future, grabbing at illusions of salvation and whatever zest they can drag into their lives, even while suspecting that the most passion can provide is a temporary quick fix. Find out more about the movie at: http://www.imdb.com/

Research info gathered at: http://movies.nytimes.com/

Now here's a poem of mine that flickers on a screen too:

Elegy For A Paper Shrine

In this scenario everyone wants a snip from prosperity’s

true vine. The women use their thumbs to cover the

sun while reclining on davenports balled-up in a

bedspread. The men weight the beast of

their nest eggs determined by the

jewelweed of marriage. Beads

of life’s sweat turn into

real beads then into

white grapes

of wrath in a crystal

bowl. Any old paper cut

can be the court jester as long

as the flame-thrower gets the publishing

rights. Pennies that don’t except buy-out deals

are placed on a busy railway line to be severed in half.

Even the live audience must have a paucity of orchestral

knowledge. All the world wants to know is if it will be rich or

if it will be poor. The answer is behind door #2, where a

paper shrine welcomes the homeless then years later

admits to having a flesh-eating heart. Blue lilies

into a lace handkerchief. A wool blanket’s

in ordinately long nap. And it’s the

queen who must decide if the

knight is properly dressed

for battle. First, he

must wear a

forget-me-not cloak

and have figs in his beard.

O yeah, and he is not allowed

to let the water for the tea boil away.

Of course, exceptions are made if he is blind.

Poem first published at: http://www.ghotamag.com/
Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/
and music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/

World's Oldest Person

2008-05-25T17:09:00.000-07:00

Edna (Scott) Parker was born on April 20, 1893 and is 114 years old. She is the oldest known person living today after the death of Yone Minagawa of Japan who died on August 13, 2007.
Parker became the state of Indiana’s oldest living person on April 7, 2005 when Minnie Kearby (who was six days older) died. She became the oldest living American on Febuary 14, 2007, after the death of Corinne Dixon Taylor of Washington D.C.

Parker was born on a farm in Morgan County, Indiana, and raised eating a typical farm diet of meat and starch. She attended Franklin High School, then took classes at Franklin College where she earned a teaching certificate. Parker taught at a two-room schoolhouse in Smithland for several years, until she married her next door neighbor, Earl Parker, in 1911. Earl died on February 23, 1939. They had two sons, both of whom she has outlived.

As of October 2007, she has five grandchildren, fourteen great-grandchildren and thirteen great-great-grandchildren.

Parker currently lives at Heritage House Convalescent Center, a retirement community in Shelbyville, Indiana. She is still in good health and able to walk. She lives in the same retirement center as Sandy Allen, the second tallest living woman verified by Guinness World Records. She enjoys reading and reciting poetry. Find out more about current title holders in the strangest categories at: http://www.guinnessworldrecords.com/

Research info gathered at: http://www.wikipedia.com/

Now, here's one of my "youthful" poems:

Roommates: Numbly Oblige, Nocturnal

Companionship just now notable for imprecision.

But mainly, we agree that joy is nothing but a rash

judgment of voices rising from the floorboards and

that much of life could eventually become worrisome.

Our conversations are nothing more than bridges

across deep abyss. I sometimes like to stand at the

edge and admire its smart use of line breaks. She

occasionally likes to sort out its faults then distribute

them among the armed camp. Neither of us can find

a metaphor for our tweedy, rumpled city-gun feeling or

the fact that our mountainside walks with a limp. “I

think what the world needs is more calamity on the

third floor”, she confuses, using words accustomed to

being pampered. “Funny, I thought losing the remaining

leg to diabetes would be a sure-fire wake-up call”, I

reply, as I bake a cake for the after-funeral gathering…

and we both long to be a pair of socks…

or that one day missing from February.

Stories of fables without morals.

Nightingales without copyrights to songs.

And if you had a choice, would you rather be

“enormously gifted” or “exceedingly bright” ?

Poem first published at: http://www.undergroundvoices.com/

Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/

and music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/

World's Oldest College Graduate

2008-05-21T15:31:00.000-07:00

Nola Ochs holds the world record as the oldest person to ever graduate from college at the age of 95. According to Guinness Book of Records when she graduated on May 27, 2007 she bet the previous record held by Mozelle Richardson, who received her journalism degree from the University of Oklahoma in 2004 when she was 90.

Nola Ochs is a 5ft. 3in. tall great-grandmother who was born in 1912, and grew up on a farm in Kansas. She says she always loved learning. After high school, she became a teacher at a one-room schoolhouse, before leaving the profession to be a wife and mother on her own farm. She had four sons, and now has 13 grandchildren and 15 great-grandchildren. She told reporters, "They’re all such fine boys. Our main crop is our children, and the farm is a good place to raise them."

Ochs lived through World War I, the Dust Bowl, the Great Depression, World War II and shared a farm with her husband and through it all she says she longed to study and learn about the world around her.

She first began taking courses at a local community college in 1972, when her husband Vernon died. She kept taking a class here and a class there, and her credits started to add up. When she had almost enough to complete a degree, she moved to the campus of Fort Hays State in Kansas. She wanted to study there because her 21 year-old granddaughter Alexandra studied there also. Both of them graduated last year together.

When Ochs was asked what kind of job she wanted now that she had a degree she said she wanted to find one working on a cruise ship as a story-teller. She wants to make history come alive with stories like ones of growing soybeans during World War II on a farm she shared with her husband or living through the Dust Bowl, when families had to light lamps during daylight hours because it was so dark from the dust storms. Find out more about current title holders in the strangest categories at: http://www.guinnessworldrecords.com/

Research info gathered at: http://www.wikipedia.com/

Now, here's one of my "cap and gown" poems:

Ways To Become A Visionary Butterfly

No one knows exactly how it came to be this way. I suppose

irony can often be the richest dessert. On the other hand,

wallpaper has never been my obsession. And like any

artist, I crave solitude, as long as no earthquakes

or wars intercede by sundown. Anyway, I

credit my short attention-span on living

in L.A. where even a typhoon would

be forgotten the next day. I also

think it’s because of too many

people wearing too many

tattoos. It could be

because the

angel’s feet are on

fire or simply because

of the bed of hot coals cleverly

disguised in a voluptuous body. All I

know is that most wheat fields were once

drive-in movies and that the Pillsbury dough

boy has a thing for shepherds. What ever happens to

be left-over is an accordion-playing lesbian? O yeah, and the

black hairnet might even tangle in the tree.

Poem first published at: http://webdelsol.com/The_Potomac

Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/

and music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/

World's Hairiest Man

2008-05-17T10:41:00.000-07:00

Yu Zhenhuan, who in Chinese and lives in Hong Kong, holds the title of the world’s hairiest man in the Guinness World Records. He has held the title since 2002.

96% of Mr. Yu’s body is covered with hair. He sports an average of 41 hairs per square centimetre of his skin thanks to a condition known as atavism. Although he remains realistic about his physical appearance, he doesn’t believe it should be a barrier to finding a girlfriend. “I feel like King Kong” he told one reporter in an interview. “Hideous, but with a soft and tender heart”.

He has never allowed his condition to make him sad. He says he is happy that his appearance has brought him such notoriety. At the age of six, he starred in his own film “A Hairy Child’s Adventure” and, after being named the world’s hairiest man, pursued a career as a rock star playing both the guitar and saxophone.

Having so much hair has been a real problem too. He has had five operations to remove hair from his nose and ears. He also needed help from dentists to repair his gums which, at one point, threatened to engulf his teeth.

He believes he can find wife by using online dating because women can see his picture and not be as surprised when they meet him in person. Find out more about current title holders in the strangest categories at: http://www.guinnessworldrecords.com/

Research info gathered at: http://www.wikipedia.com/

Now, here's one of my hairiest poems:

What Color Does It Hurt?

Two weeks later, the first signs of things gone amok appear:

– Thick toenail clippings won’t come down from a tree.

– Hundreds of bowls of Thai soup are smudged with India ink.

– A paper snowflake sends an ultimatum to the kidnappers.

– Land snails grow to the size of hockey pucks.

– Mini-marts float like ice in glasses of tea.

– Sunflowers become concerned about their carbon footprints.

– Pictures surface of Russian Roulette after being cooked.

– Ohio suddenly can press one hundred sixty pounds.

– Pale scissors send signals by raising a hind leg up.

– Red ants gain national notoriety for being afraid of nothing.

Poem first published at: http://www.leafscape.org/

Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/

and music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/

World's Fattest Man

2008-05-13T00:11:00.000-07:00

Manuel Uribe, who is 42 years old, was born in Monterrey, Mexico. He holds the record of being the heaviest man alive on earth. He weights 560 kg (over 1200 pounds.)

To get a feel of exactly how heavy he is, you need imagine an adult male, and another, and another, and another (this can go on for a little while more)… He is almost as heavy as seven adult men.

At his fattest, he weighed 560kg, or 1234lb. That's half a ton. Small Japanese cars are lighter weight. Doctors are not sure whether is weight problem is genetic or just from eating too much.

They think that there might be a fault in his genes which triggered the inflammation of his molecular structure, therefore causing him to gain weight uncontrollably. Mr. Uribe has no high blood pressure, no high cholesterol, diabetes, he's a healthy man who is just overweight.

A sample of the diet he is on right now includes a bowl of fish soup, complete with large chunks of fish, a grapefruit, half an apple and ending it off with 18 peanuts. Yes, 18 peanuts.

In the past year, Manuel has shed 180kg/400lbs off his body, that’s almost equivalent to two full grown man climbing out of his body! Manuel says his aim is to get down to 120kg/264lbs. On February 13, 2008 the team of doctors helping him with his weight problem reported that Manuel had lost 570lbs, far more than they had at first expected he would. But he still is the world’s fattest man alive. Find out more about current title holders in the strangest categories at: http://www.guinnessworldrecords.com/

Research info gathered at: http://www.wikipedia.com/

Now, here's one of my poems that is a big eater too:

Am I Going To Prison?

In this scenario every other public school is a

federal prison. The nation’s inner courtyard

has been transformed into a theme park with

cotton candy machines dressed in bunny suits.

I’m responsible for organizing the egg hunt.

You’re in charge of the soap oprea commercial

projected on a snowy screen. I wear a rented

trampoline and an Afro wig and you sport pink

pedal-pushers and a clip-on bow tie. We are

convinced no child should be left behind and

insist on staying the entire length of the visiting

hour staring at life in the aquarium but not

talking. Words are cheap. Sex is an identifiable

bacteria founded in the produce section of the

supermarket. Fact is, lights from the maximum

penitentiary burns so intensely the stars have all

given up and gone dark. We quickly learn not to

idealize, not to judge, not to demonize, not to

anathematize, naked eyed and borne out in the

statistics that only Russia approaches our rate

of incarceration, which makes you wonder who’s

left to look after the dog.

Poem first published at: http://www.leafscape.org/

Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/

and music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/

World's Tallest Woman

2008-05-07T23:06:00.000-07:00

Today's posting continues a series on lessons I use to keep the idea for learning alive with the boys aged 6-9 that I find myself tutoring this school year. For those of you with kids, you know how hard it is to control the short attention spans kids have at that age, especially boys. So, I've come up with little lessons that keep them interested and anxious to learn. Here's one about the current title holder of the world's tallest woman:

Yao Defen was born in 1972 and is listed in Guinness World Records as the tallest female in the world. After 3 days of measuring (in the morning, afternoon, at midnight) it was confirmed that she is, generally, 7 feet, 8 inches (233.6 cm) tall. She weighs about 440 lbs (200 kg). Her gigantism is due to a tumor in her pituitary gland.

She was born to poor farmers in the town of Liuan in Anhui province.

At birth she weighed 6.16 pounds. At age 3 she was eating more than 3 times the amount of food that other 3 year-olds were eating.

When she was 11 years old she was about 6 feet 2 inches tall. She was 6 feet 8 inches tall by the age of 15.

The story of this "woman giant" began to spread rapidly after she went to see a doctor at age 15 for an illness. After that, many companies attempted to train her to be a talented sports star. However, the plans were discarded because Defen was too weak.

Because she is illiterate, since 1992 Yao Defen has been forced to earn a living by traveling with her father and performing.

Defen currently suffers from hypertension, heart disease, poor nutrition and osteoporosis. She also has acute acromegaly (or gigantism) as a result of a tumor in her pituitary gland that causes excess growth hormone secretion. Find out more about current title holders in the strangest categories at: http://www.guinnessworldrecords.com/

Research info gathered at: www.wikipedia.com

Now, here's one of my poem that weaars big shoes too:

Sylvia Plath, Awaiting Our Applause

The eggs.

The boiling water.

And an empty salt shaker.

Or it could be a poem filled with streets and

sewers and a thick overcast that burns off

at noon. You know, the kind that seems to

hop around on that good leg it broke falling

from a branch high up in the tree of life. And

it might wear an exotic apron stolen from

the kitchen of illicit greasy spoons. Or it might

be a pustule camouflaged on a parking meter

only a stanza could come from. One unpolluted

stop sign. A couple of left-winged construction

cranes. A billboard sacred to lip-synch. And if

you happen to take the alternative way to the

dry cleaners you could drive right by a rundown

elementary school with a playground longing for

its muse to repair the lopsided merry-go-round.

You have plenty of time to prepare to applause.

As for me, I have a blind date with a wrist slasher

who’s online profile is innocent and cruel too. It

will be dressed in an orange jumpsuit and will be

carrying a plank card implying that every faith is

created by infidels and that even the path to the

Pearly Gates leads straight to hell.

Poem first published at: http://www.asiancha.com/
Visit my ezine: http://www.conclelebratory.blogspot.com/
and music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/

World's Tallest Man

2008-05-03T14:44:00.000-07:00

Today's posting begins a series on lessons I use to keep the idea for learning alive with the boys aged 6-9 that I find myself tutoring this school year. For those of you with kids, you know how hard it is to control the short attention spans kids have at that age, especially boys. So, I've come up with little lessons that keep them interested and anxious to learn. Here's one about the current title holder of the world's tallest man:

Leonid Ivanovyc Stadnyk was born in 1971 in central Ukraine in Russia. He is the world's tallest living man according to the 2008 Guinness World Records, measuring 8ft 5in. He is a certified veterinarian and animal surgeon. He lives with his mother.

His rapid growth began after brain surgery when he was 12. He developed a pituitary gland tumor which caused the gland to secrete large amounts of growth hormone, resulting in what is known as gigantism.

He is an only child who was born to parents who were 1.73m (5ft 8in) and 1.52m (5ft) tall and was not unusually large as a young boy.

By the time he begun his training to become a vet at a clinic an hour away from his home, he measured 2.03m (6ft 8in).

He soon outgrew his bike and began taking the bus. He later became too large for the bus and had to use the family's horse-drawn cart.

He now takes care of his mother's livestock and grows vegetables on their farm in the village of Podolyantsi.

But Mr Stadnyk still must grow 15cm (6in) if he wants to be the tallest man in history. That title goes to Robert Wadlow, who was 8ft 11in. He lived in the state of Illinois and he died in 1940 when he was only 22.

Find out more about current title holders in the strangest categories at: http://www.guinnessworldrecords.com/

Research info gathered at: http://www.wikipedia.org/

Now, here's one of my "tall" poems:

Ways to Become a Visionary Butterfly

No one knows exactly how it came to be this way.

I suppose irony can often be the richest dessert.

On the other hand, wallpaper has never been

my obsession. And like any artist, I crave

solitude, as long as no earthquakes

or wars intercede by sundown.

Anyway, I credit my short

attention-span on living

in L.A. where even a

typhoon would be

forgotten the

next day.

I also think it’s

because of too many

people wearing too many

tattoos. It could be because the

angel’s feet are on fire or simply because

of the bed of hot coals cleverly disguised in a

voluptuous body. All I know is that most wheat

fields were once drive-in movies and that the Pillsbury

dough boy has a thing for shepherds. What ever happens

to be left-over is an accordion-playing lesbian? O yeah,

and the black hairnet might even tangle in the tree.

Poem first published at: http://webdelsol.com/The_Pomotac

Visit my ezine: http://www.concelbratory.blogspot.com/

and music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/

A Cross-Culture Literary Conference

2008-04-29T15:42:00.002-07:00

For today's posting I thought I'd make a pitch for the upcoming freelance poetry feast at Evergreen State College in Olympia, WA set tp take place in May. I have been invited to be one of poetry readers/panel speakers. Instead of me telling you what the schedule will be, why don't I just show you the info that was sent to me:

May 24-5 2008
Keynote speakers will include: experimental playwright, poet and activist Rodrigo Toscano (author of To Leveling Swerve), Gertrude Stein Prize-Winning writer Mark Wallace (author of Temporary Worker Rides a Subway), poet Laura Elrick (author of Fantasies In Permeable Structures), novelist and columnist Randall Kenan (author of Walking on Water: Black American Lives at the Turn of the 21stCentury), poet and film theorist Tung-Hui Hu (author of Mine)poet Leonard Schwartz (author of Gnostic Blessing), poet and essayist Kristin Prevallet (author of Shadow Evidence Intelligence and Third Mind: Creative Writing Through Visual Art), John Bellamy Foster (Editor of The Monthly Review) and many others.

This year’s theme is “Activism & the Avant-Garde.” We are seeking papers, prose, poetics, groups of poems, and any hybrid text-based work that would advance discussion of at least one of the central questions posed at this conference: 1) Where is the intersection between political resistance and the Avant-Garde, both historically and now? 2) What is the function (if any) of “non-mainstream” literary work—and what do we mean by “non-mainstream”? 3) How has non-mainstream writing evolved recently? Any work that addresses literary matters in relation to commercialism and the economics of particular literary landscapes, imperialism, ethnography, feminism, postcolonialism, translation, globalization, web technology, or particular writers and/or small presses is especially welcome. All writers awarded panel and/or workshop spots will have their work published as part of an anthology.

To Submit: Deadline is May 1, 2008. See guidelines on website.

To Attend: Press is open to the public. See website.

Visit: www.evergreen.edu/writingcenter/press/mission.htm

Now, what about a dose of one of my poems:

Or Merely Vague Terrain

An ocean parked in the driveway of Italy.

Seats warmed by ghost. A red buoy meant to mark

a diver. Stunted pebbles eluding capture. Exhaust

fumes. Or just to curse the sea she captained, he says,

once on dry land. Wind rattling a window. Two broken
blossoms. Any gravedigger. The time between spring

& summer in an unsynchronized green...

in the afternoon, the sun, a gull --

or the chatter of flip-flaps along a boardwalk.
More signs pointing towards nothing to fight for.
Or a son and mother mistaken for sisters...

as dusk agrees to hide every stain...
on a coastal road narrower than accident.

Poem first published at: http://www.poetrybay.com/
Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/
and music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/
Copyright 2008 by Maurice Oliver. All Rights Reserved.

More Evidence Of Global Warming

2008-04-27T12:33:00.000-07:00

In 1995 I went around the world for eight months. One of the highlights of the trip was the afternoon a hippie in his late fifties pulled up to the youth hostal where I was staying and opened the door to his mini-van so that the half-dozen people that waited could pay him and then claim one of the seats so he could play driver and then tour guide on a short excursion on a road through a subtropical forest to Franz Josep Glacier, one of the few remaining remnants of this planet's period of the ice age. I still have a pebble from the ice bedded bottom of this valley that runs up a mountain and is surrounded by lush green ferns. I suppose that's why this recent article caught my eye:

New Zealand's largest glacier is shrinking fast due to climate change and will eventually disappear altogether, scientists said Thursday (April 24, 2008).

The 23-kilometer (14.3 mile) long glacier in the South Island's Southern Alps is likely to shrink at a rate of between 500 and 820 metres a year, said Martin Brook, a physical geography lecturer at Massey University.

"In the last 10 years the glacier has receded a hell of a lot," Brook said on the university website.

"It's just too warm for a glacier to be sustained at such a low altitude -- 730 metres above sea level -- so it melts rapidly and it is going to disappear altogether."

The rapid melting has seen a lake seven kilometers long and two kilometers wide form at the base of the glacier. Thirty-five years ago, the lake did not exist.

"The last major survey was in the 1990s and since then the glacier has retreated back 180 metres a year on average," Brook said.

The lake at the foot of the glacier is speeding up the melting as more ice is submerged under the surface of the water.

A study last year by the National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research found the volume of ice in the Southern Alps had shrunk almost 11 percent in the past 30 years. More than 90 percent of this loss was due to the melting of the 12 largest glaciers in the mountain range due to rising temperatures, the university report said.

You can visit Franz Josep Glacier too before it melts away, online at: http://www.franzjosepglacier.com/

Research info gathered at: www.news.yahoo.com

Now, here's one of my poems that's icy:

A Hood Ornament To Unbotton...

then lay out my struggle iron with no

ransom note built to shine

maybe get my bomb up a hollow tree so

bark with your freak whip mouth fur

behind moonlight's steamy window

about to ricochet

in a rooftop summing up the rollercoaster of

my rope to slide the cooler door to wide-open

be stud & hot enough to melt a knee size tens

dangling off a diving board to seesaw with

your fingerprints all over my tool box if I

were a bumblebee to scotch lube traces never

trifling a remedy & careful not to paste blossoms

all over the brand new upholstery.

Poem first published at: http://www.megaera.com/
Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/
and music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/
Copyright 2008 by Maurice Oliver. All Rights Reserved.

The Two-Faced Baby

2008-04-22T17:32:00.000-07:00

On March 11, 2008 a baby girl was born with two faces in India. Since then, people in her rural village have been singing and dancing — offering money and asking for her blessings. The baby is seen as an incarnation of a Hindu Goddess and people make offerings and ask for the baby's blessing.

The baby, Lali, has a rare condition known as craniofacial duplication, where a single head has two faces. Except for her ears, all of Lali's facial features are duplicated — she has two noses, two pairs of lips and two pairs of eyes.

"My daughter is fine — like any other child," said the baby’s father, Vinod Singh, a poor 23 year old farm worker.

Lali’s parents live in the dusty village of Saini Sunpura, 25 miles east of India’s capital New Delhi. When she left the hospital, eight hours after being born many of the people of the village waited outside, Sabir Ali, the director of Saifi Hospital said.

"She drinks milk from her two mouths and opens and shuts all the four eyes at one time," Ali said.

Rural India is deeply superstitious and people believe the baby is a return of the Hindu goddess of valor, Durga, a fiery deity usually illustrated with three eyes and many arms.

Up to 100 people have been visiting Lali at her home every day to touch her feet out of respect, offer money and receive blessings her mother told reporters.

Lali's parents were married in February 2007. Lali is their first child.

Singh said he took his daughter to a hospital in New Delhi where doctors suggested a CT scan to determine whether her internal organs were normal, but Singh said he felt it was unnecessary.

Research info gathered at: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/

Now, here's one of my poems with four eyes too:

Nuts, Said The Black Suit

Imagine! A dream of summer & self-doubt galloping by bareback

on a horse. A man naked except for his ripe courage. Your first

necklace of raisins. The tiny tinbox of nothing you hide under

the sink. Red socks as an option. A singing tornado. The

elderly couple left to dangle off a cliff. Full of foolish

French windows. Empty suitcases or suit of

clothes. Wind-up rabbits or hare. An

all-male audience moonlighting as

museum goers. Dollars stuck

between a G-string.

Counting

sunspots. They pause

for tea. Or sometimes there’s

window boxes of red geraniums in

the viewfinder. A disco with its flashing

lights. A bowling alley that stays open all-night.

Her satin slippers. My white towel draped across one

shoulder. A fat song that allows us to trim away any

unnecessary words. A riddle about a journey. A

smell that fills the room like perfume. White

caps of an ocean. A yellow ribbon. But

more often than not, it’s just our

voyeur neighbor with those

ridiculous binoculars as

he watches from his

balcony next door.

Poem first published at: http://www.hamiltonstone.org/

Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/

and music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/

Obama Closes In

2008-04-18T14:21:00.000-07:00

With four days to go until the Pennsylvania primary, a new Zogby poll shows Hillary Clinton's lead has eroded to a statistical tie with her opponent. She now leads Barack Obama by only one point, garnering 45 percent to his 44 percent. That's down from a four-point lead a week ago.

Although she trounces Obama in the question of who understands Pennsylvania better (58 percent to 27 percent), voters do not agree with the characterization of his "bitter" remarks as elitist. By a margin of 31 points (60 percent to 29 percent), voters were more likely to agree with Obama's suggestion that economic troubles have led to bitterness than with Clinton's suggestion that he is out of touch.

These data are in accord with Pollster's Mark Blumenthal, who recently suggested in his National Journal column that Clinton does better when undecided voters are pushed to declare a preference. At 9 percent, Zogby's poll has a relatively high level of undecided voters, which could explain Obama's strong showing. (A week ago, the Zogby poll had a 10 percent undecided total.)

However, Sunday's Rasmussen poll, which also recorded 9 percent of voters as undecided, showed Clinton leading Obama 50 percent to 41 percent. Rasmussen's poll was automated; Zogby's was not. Support the candidate with a fresh new approach to resolving the problems this nation faces at: http://www.barackobama.com/

Research info gathered at: www.slate.com

Now here's one of my poems meant to close in on its opponents too:

To Somewhere Or By

A forest that gives way to paper.
Tarpaulin scratched across pages of verbs.
A door leading to your porcelain yes.
Pink undertones entwined or a cold sore.
Her spine curves into the turnstile.
He nuzzles closer, twice her size.
Language concealed in flashing signals.
There is rain on the rails.
The lavender in a dream (with ruffles).
Oil-slick bubbles in a burnt-blue shimmer.
The O in a vowel made from oak.
Mail that consists mostly of bills.
A leaf against my cheek.
Knew it was, anyway, and tug-of-warring.

Poem first published at: http://www.42opus.com/
Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/
and music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/
Copyright 2008 by Maurice Oliver. All Rights Reserved.

Latest Polls Good News For Obama

2008-04-15T23:48:00.000-07:00

Despite a weekend of negative coverage following his controversial remarks about some small town Americans, Barack Obama appears to be holding steady or making gains in the next three primary states, according to a just released poll.

Most surprisingly, the new LA Times/Bloomberg poll shows Obama ahead of Hillary Clinton by 5 points in Indiana (40 to 35 percent), a state with demographics that favor the New York senator and one where other recent polls have shown her with a lead.

The poll also shows Clinton only holds a 5 point lead in Pennsylvania (48 to 43 percent). That margin is among the slimmest measured between to the two candidates and is significantly less than the double digit lead Clinton held there two weeks ago.

In North Carolina, the new survey shows Obama with a 13 point lead (47-34 percent), a margin that is consistent with other recent polls in that state. Pennsylvania votes April 22 while Indiana and North Carolina vote two weeks later on May 6. Should Clinton win in Pennsylvania, some political observers have said she must score a victory in at least one of the May 6 states to make a compelling argument to continue her presidential campaign. The poll was conducted over five days (April 10-14), the majority of which came after Obama's now famous "bitter" comments first surfaced.

It's amazing how the media can try to make a mountain out of a molehill. It seems they have their "let's pick-on this candidate this week" each week. Obama only spoke the truth and we all know it. Sure blue-collar America is "bitter". Just drive to your nearest gas station and fill up your tank and see if you don't feel "bitter" too. What the media doesn't get yet is that voters are finally beginning to refuse to fall for the same old "sidetrack tatics" used to distract us from the real issues. Americans want the problems this nation faces resolved, and they want it done using fresh new ideas like the ones Sen. Obama speaks about. O yeah, and we as a nation will hold a collective breath and hope that "change" is not too late.

Research info gathered at: http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/

Now, here's one of my poems that's asking for your vote:

With Background Music & A Dance Sequence

War was never a good listener. But it is a master of disguises:

-Gunfire that sounds like a beating heart.

-A cave that requires an access code to enter.

-Modern conveniences found in a sleazy bar.

-Loose change that adds-up to a fifty-cent deficient.

-A packing slip that smells like sulfuric acid.

-One Peeping Tom at a glory hole convention.

-The zipper in the fly of Global Warming.

-Any of the spaces between the rings of Saturn.

-Methadone boarding a plane at LaGuardia.

-The pastoral setting in a kung-fu movie.

-House lights that remain on during the day.

-A military strategy suffering from jock-itch.

Poem first published at: http://www.whyvandalism.com/

Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/

and music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/

Condoleezza Rice: A Josef Korbel Prodigy

2008-04-12T19:14:00.000-07:00

I was looking through some of my paperwork I use as a teaching tool for my high school students and thought I'd posted a reading comprehension quiz for today's posting. Here is an example of some of a tutor's arsenal:

A Short Biography on Condoleezza Rice

Born: 14 November 1954
Birthplace: Birmingham, Alabama
Best known as: U.S. Secretary of State, 2005-

Condoleezza Rice became U.S. Secretary of State in 2005. She had earlier served as National Security Advisor under President George W Bush from 2001-2005. As a child, Rice was a gifted student and a prodigy on the piano, and she entered college at the age of 15 with the intention of becoming a concert pianist. Along the way she was influenced by political scientist Josef Korbel, the father of former U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright. Rice changed her plans and studied international politics, and by the early 1980s she was teaching at Stanford University and becoming a prominent public voice on international affairs. She also worked with the Pentagon and with the administration of George Bush the elder as an expert on foreign affairs. She returned to Stanford during the Bill Clinton administration before being tapped as NSA by the younger President Bush. In January of 2005, after Bush was elected to a second term, Rice replaced Colin Powell as Secretary of State.

Extra credit: Rice remains a talented musician; in 2002 she performed a concert in Washington, D.C. with cellist Yo Yo Ma... Rice had an oil tanker named for her while she was a member of the Chevron Corporation board of directors during the 1990s. In 2001 the company changed the name of the ship to the Altair Voyager... Rice is the first African-American woman to hold the post of Secretary of State. The first woman to hold the post was Colin Powell's predecessor, Madeleine Albright.

Now, here's an example of what the accompanying quiz would look like:

True or False Questions:

1. She is the first woman Secretary of State in the U. S. history. True False
2. Ms. Rice was born in the state of Arizona. True False
3. Ms. Rice entered college at the age of 16. True False
4. In college Ms. Rice changed her studies to become a concert pianist. True False
5. She worked at the Pentagon during the administration of George W Bush. True False
6. She was influenced by political scientist Josef Korbel. True False
7. She is currently 55 years old. True False
8. In the early 80’s she was teaching at Stanford University. True False
9. In 2002 she gave a classical guitar concert with Yo Yo Ma. True False
10. She is the second African-American woman to be Secretary of State. True False

How did you score? Find out more about her at: http://wikipedia.org/wiki/Condoleezza_Rice

Research info gathered at: http://www.infoplease.com/

Now, here's one of my poems with diplomatic muscle too:

More Blue Inflatable Muse

Then other times
things singe the sides
of a hazy notion
about miniature lungworth
fluttering in a trawler
of knock-out punches
organized at the grassroots
or homemade in a knit-wear
of treehouse professor-mentor
ski bum beads dressed
in mid-ranged silo sedans
to attract the germinal
mountainside fall or slippery
slide into a mixed or an
extended metaphor depicting
immutable hands that offer
the scythe the seed the pulley of
an orphan raise or brush of auric
light on maraschino cherries
that tattoo tiny mayflies
to life's indescribable wrist.

Poem first published at: http://www.thegreensilkjournal.citymax.com/
Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/
and music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogpsot.com/

Session 9

2008-04-09T00:10:00.000-07:00

I found an intriguing horror/thriller movie a while ago at Portland's main library called "Session 9". Almost the entire movie was shot at an abandoned mental hospital that was either an excellent Hollywood cardboard cut-out or the real thing. After the DVD was over I went directly to Google and run the name of this either real or fictional hospital through and here's what I found:

Danvers State Hospital, officially known as the State Lunatic Hospital at Danvers, was a psychiatric hospital located in Danvers, Massachusetts.

It was built in 1878 and opened in the spring of that year under the supervision of prominent Boston architect Nathaniel Jeremiah Bradlee, on an isolated site in rural Massachusetts. It was a multi-acre, self-contained psychiatric hospital designed and built according to the Kirkbride Plan.

Constructed at a cost of $1.5 million, with the estimated yearly per capita cost of patients being $3,000 the hospital originally consisted of two main center buildings, housing the administration, with four radiating wings. The administration building measured 90 by 60 feet, with a tower 130 feet in height. Connected in the rear was a building 180 by 60 feet, in which the kitchens, laundries, chapel, and dormitories for the attendants. In the rear is the boiler house of 70 feet square, with boilers of 450 horsepower, used for heating and ventilation. Water was pumped from Middleton Pond. On each side of the main building are the wings, for male and female patients respectively, connected by small square towers, with the exception of the last ones on each side, which are joined by octagonal towers. The former measured 10 feet square, and were used to separate the buildings. The original plan was designed to house 500 patients, with 100 more possible to accommodate in the attic. However, by the late 1930s and 1940s, over 2,000 patients were being housed, and overcrowding was severe.

While the hospital was originally established to provide residential treatment and care to the mentally ill, its functions expanded to include a training program for nurses in 1889 and a pathological research laboratory in 1895.

In the 1890s, Dr. Charles Page, the superintendent, declared mechanical restraint unnecessary and harmful in cases of mental illness. By the 1920s the hospital was operating school clinics to help determine mental deficiency in children.

During the 1960s as a result of increased emphasis on alternative methods of treatment, deinstitutionalization, and community-based mental health care, the inpatient population started to decrease.

Due to budget cuts within the mental health system the hospital was closed in June 1992. The area itself is completely closed and monitored closely by campus security.

In December of 2005, the property was sold to Avalon Bay Development. Demolition of most of the buildings began in January of 2006, with the intent to build 497 apartments and condominiums on the 77 acre site. By June 2006, all of the Danvers State Hospital buildings that were marked for demolition had been torn down, including all of the buildings on the lower grounds and all of the buildings on the hill except for the center-most sections of the Kirkbride buildings. Avalon Bay predicted that they would have properties available for rent/sale by Fall 2007. However, on April 7, 2007, four of the new apartment complex buildings and four of Avalon bay's construction trailers burned down in a large fire visible from Boston, some seventeen miles away. Find out more at: http://www.danversstateinsaneasylum.com/

Research ino gathered at: http://www.wikipedia.org/

Now, one of my poems that totally nuts:

To Somewhere Or By

A forest that gives way to paper.
Tarpaulin scratched across pages of verbs.
A door leading to your porcelain yes.
Pink undertones entwined or a cold sore.
Her spine curves into the turnstile.
He nuzzles closer, twice her size.
Language concealed in flashing signals.
There is rain on the rails.
The lavender in a dream (with ruffles).
Oil-slick bubbles in a burnt-blue shimmer.
The O in a vowel made from oak.
Mail that consists mostly of bills.
A leaf against my cheek.
Knew it was, anyway, and tug-of-warring.

Poem first published online at: http://www.42opus.com/
Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/
and music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/
Copyright 2008 by Maurice Oliver. All Rights Reserved.

Shared Values

2008-04-05T23:53:00.000-07:00

CBS News and the New York Times a few days ago released a comprehensive new poll chock-full of fresh insights on the state of the race nationwide. Seventy percent of voters say that Barack Obama is the candidate who most resembles American values—more so than Hillary Clinton or John McCain. Obama's emphasis on what pundits call his "American story" seems to have outweighed the smear tactics that have dogged him throughout the campaign. Also of note: 52 percent of Republicans think Obama shares American values. Only 27 percent of GOP voters think Clinton does. (Fifty percent of Democrats think McCain has American values.) An equal number of independents (68 percent) think Obama and McCain have American values.

More poll fun:

Fifty-three percent of voters think John McCain's policies would favor the rich. Thirteen percent say the same about Barack Obama.

Eleven percent of voters are very confident that John McCain will make correct decisions about the economy. Forty-two percent are not confident. He's the worst-rated of the three remaining candidates in this regard.

Sixty-nine percent of voters (Democrats and Republicans) expect Barack Obama to win the Democratic nomination.

Fifty-six percent of Democratic-primary voters think Obama is better able to beat McCain in November. Thirty-two percent think Clinton is.

Election Scorecard uses data supplied by Mark Blumenthal and Charles Franklin at: http://www.pollster.com/

Research ino gathered at: http://www.slate.com/

Now, here's one of my poems that kisses babies for votes:

Or Low-Life A Ceiling

A man jumps from the twentieth floor but floats down.

Escapism hanging on a coat rack. A banquet honoring
vinegar. Falling leaves. A crowd waiting for the
arrival. Or on a park bench with a grassy knoll to
fondle. Shopping at a best friend's house. A telephone
with two mouthpieces. A cookbook story of our lives.
Busy crosswalks. Phony street signs. To have a
pre-conceived notion of downtown Phoenix. "I see you've
learned to travel light", she says, noticing the
flight bags under my eyes. "Yeah, and you must be on
your way to palm reading class", I reply, searching
for the tube of hand lotion. Hot bath. Fragrance-free
shampoo. Pickpockets working the market stalls. Then

later, I dream that weapons are the witnesses...

naked with sunlight entering our forest...
or we could test drive an Italian hair dryer.

A full stomach or sky adrift in a lifeboat.
Until everything around us looks like shoelaces or
maybe just a bit rambunctious in a rash, wearing a
dark catacomb and paste-on mustaches as disguises.

Poem first published at: http://www.umlikelystories.org/
Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/
and music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/
Copyright 2008 by Maurice Oliver. All Rights Reserved.

Obama Reveals March Donor Haul

2008-04-03T11:53:00.000-07:00

Mr Obama raised $40m (£20m) in March after taking a record $55m in February. The campaign of his Democratic rival, Hillary Clinton, admitted it had been outraised but said it had enough funds to compete.

Hillary Clinton is hoping to peg back Obama's lead when Pennsylvania holds its primary election on 22 April.

The latest count of pledged delegates to the National Convention in August, according to Associated Press, puts Obama at 1,634 and Mrs Clinton at 1,500.

A total of 2,024 is needed to win the Democratic nomination.

The key upcoming votes for the Democrats are Pennsylvania, with 158 delegates up for grabs, and North Carolina and Indiana in May.

A new telephone opinion poll by Quinnipiac University suggested Clinton held a nine-point lead over Sen. Obama in Pennsylvania, down from 12 points two weeks before.

Neither candidate can secure the 2,024 delegates needed by winning the remaining primaries alone, analysts say, and will need the votes of so-called super-delegates who are not bound by pledges.

I have been a supporter of Sen. Obama from the start, sumply because he is the best person to guide America through the challenges we face as a nation, both on a national and international scale. Like John Kennedy, Obama is God sent and the only sensible choice without question for the next four years. Find out more about his campaign at: http://www.barackobama.com/

Research info gathered at: www.bbc.co.uk

Now, here's on of my poems that's seeking votes:

Do You Read Me, Copy?

His chair can purr.

He takes it everywhere he goes.

Some say he feels this unusual

closeness because the chair

reminds him of the basic animal

instinct in all of us. Others insist

the chair is simply his “security

blanket” he’ll never have to wash.

Whatever the reason, year after

year he carries it over a shoulder.

He once even had it upholstered in

a flame-stitch pattern using colors

taken from the rainbow. But thec

hair remained non-committal with

sturdy legs. It prides itself in being

a perfect dance partner and never

eats meat. It can be positioned in

an endless variety of angles and

has a built-in microphone. Best of

all, when he finishes this life he can

just fold it up and ship it by parcel

post to that place, rumored to be

somewhere beyond the white light.

Poem first published at: http://www.sundress.net/21stars
Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/
and music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/
Copyright 2008 by Maurice Oliver. All Rights Reserved.

The Month In Political Cartoons

2008-03-29T12:47:00.000-07:00

Cartoons gathered at: http://www.time.com/

The Peace Symbol At 50

2008-03-25T17:57:00.000-07:00

It started life as the emblem of the British anti-nuclear movement but it has become an international sign for peace, and arguably the most widely used protest symbol in the world. It has also been adapted, attacked and commercialised.

It had its first public outing 50 years ago on a chilly Good Friday as thousands of British anti-nuclear campaigners set off from London’s Trafalgar Square on a 50-mile march to the weapons factory at Aldermaston. The demonstration had been organised by the Direct Action Committee Against Nuclear War (DAC) and the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (CND) joined in.

Gerald Holtom, a designer and former World War II conscientious objector from West London, persuaded DAC that their aims would have greater impact if they were conveyed in a visual image. The “Ban the Bomb” symbol was born.

He considered using a Christian cross motif but, instead, settled on using letters from the semaphore - or flag-signalling - alphabet, super-imposing N (uclear) on D (isarmament) and placing them within a circle symbolising Earth.

The sign was quickly adopted by CND.

Holtom later explained that the design was “to mean a human being in despair” with arms outstretched downwards.

I especially have a fondness for the symbol because an off-white version of it against a matted yellow background graced the first checks of the first checking account I ever owned, at the ripe old age of 17. Find out more about this icon at: http://www.peacesymbol.org/

Research info gathered at: www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice

Now here's one of my poems full of symbols:

Or A Ceiling, Undecided

Starlight flaming down a furry hallway.

Planets that pass close behind airplane routes. A

whole sub-division of memory wading through water.
Candy chasing down an ambulance. Do sailboats have

skin? When does sweetener become sweet? A one-room

dwelling occupied by two persons. Winter upholstery.

Simmering saucepan. "The dough can be shaped with

your hands," she says, her smile already set on

pre-heat. "Yeah, and a weevil could set up a home in

the likes of this bread box," I reply, making myself

busy with the fly-buttons. Nautical books. A whole ship

of meaning. Wondering where pigeons go at night...

a glass receptacle (as in cup or jar)...

or maybe try correspondence by mail.

A tide arching under a limp night sky.
A part of the wall below the picture frames.

Passing through Palm Springs in a sandstorm on empty.
Or maybe as long as it takes to live a hundred pages.

Poem first published at: http://www.megaera.org/
Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/
and music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/
Copyright 2008 by Maurice Oliver. All Rights Reserved

Richardson Endorses Sen. Obama

2008-03-22T12:56:00.000-07:00

The city where I live was offered a special treat yesterday (Friday, March 21st) and here's what happened:

Declaring that Sen. Barack Obama is an "extraordinary American," Gov. Bill Richardson of New Mexico endorsed Obama for the Democratic nominee for president on Friday.

Richardson -- who sought this year's Democratic nomination for president himself -- joined Obama at a rally in Portland, Oregon, where the senator from Illinois is campaigning.

"Barack Obama will make a great and historic president," Richardson said, Obama standing at his side. "[It] is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for our nation and you are a once-in-a-lifetime leader."

"He's done the kind of work that you want from your public servants, somebody who's driven not just by raw ambition, not just by an interest in personal aggrandizement," Obama added. "He's been somebody who's been motivated by the desire to make the lives of his constituents and working people a little bit better."

Richardson praised Obama for his speech this week on race in America, saying "he appealed to the best in us."

Richardson is the nation's only Hispanic governor. Hispanics have tended to support Sen. Hillary Clinton in her quest for the Democratic nomination. Obama and Clinton both lobbied Richardson for his endorsement after he dropped out of the race January 10. Richardson called Clinton Thursday to tell her of his decision. Richardson was secretary of energy and U.S. ambassador to the United Nations under President Bill Clinton. He said he remains friends with the Clintons, and watched the Super Bowl with Bill Clinton this year. Find out more about Gov. Richard at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_Richardson. And if you would like to hear Sen. Obama's eloquent, thoughtful, and self-penned speech on the state of race relations in America, which won Richards endorsement just go to: http://my.barackobama.com/hisownwords

Research info gathered at: www.cnn.com

Now, here's a poem from this Portland poet:

"Roots, Thick As A Pencil" Sonnet

Begin with tractor treads in the snow.
A train track with a flattened penny on
it. Clods of regional clay. Fog rolling in
over a chalky lake. A city's lights in the
far distance. Farms nestled in thickets
of woodlands. A smokehouse. Rusty
garden tools. The way night birds roost
in the barn's ledges. A danger sign
posted near an abandoned quarry. The
word "rural" in print. Footwear suited
for manual labor. Lichen hanging rock.
Rain that insist on freezing by midnight.
Feather beds. Tin roofs. A recently drained
wetlands beseiged by land developers.
Kernels of loose grain in the wind. Or just
a small amount of preening required.

Poem first published Blue Fifth Review
Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/
and music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/
Copyright 2008 by Maurice Oliver. All Rights Reserved.

Saddam And The Al Qaeda Link?

2008-03-19T22:03:00.000-07:00

According to an ABC News exclusive on March 13th, the Pentagon was set to release a report White House doesn't' want you to read: on March 12th the Pentagon canceled plans to send out a press release announcing the report's availability and didn't make the report available via email or online.

Based on the analysis of some 600,000 official Iraqi documents seized by US forces after the invasion and thousands of hours of interrogations of former officials in Saddam's government now in US custody, the government report is the first official acknowledgment from the US military that there is no evidence Saddam had ties to al Qaeda.

The Bush administration apparently didn't want the study to get any attention. The report was to be posted on the Joint Forces Command website yesterday, followed by a background briefing with the authors. No more. The report was made available to those who asked for it, and was sent via overnight mail from Joint Forces Command in Norfolk, Virginia.

Asked on march 12th why the report would not be posted online and could not be emailed, the spokesman for Joint Forces Command said: "We're making the report available to anyone who wishes to have it, and we'll send it out via CD in the mail."

Another Pentagon official said initial press reports on the study made it "too politically sensitive." So, I guess just as Sen. Obama said in a campaign speech, it looks like there was no Al Qaeda in Iraq until Bush decided to send America troops there nearly half a decade ago. And by the way, if you're counting like I am, nearly 4000 of our combat forces have been killed there with the Iraqi politicians no closer to working together as they were when they were "elected'. It all makes for an interesting read on this, the fifth anniversary of America's of declaring war on the people of Iraq. If you can stand to see pictures of the human carnage that has occured during the course of our military occupation of this nation go to: http://mindprod.com/politics/iraqwarpix.html

Research info gathered at: www.abcnews.go.com

Now, here's one of my battle wary poems:

Mauled By Ape Leaves

We have our cake and eat it too!

Then later, we watch a movie where poverty is

victimized by capital punishment in a car park.

There's a re-trial but it becomes paralyzed while

crooning a Perry Como of life's hard knocks. Poetry

is tenderly portrayed as having startling bravado

and everyone with a camera is either a tourist or a

voyeur. The whole town becomes partly cloudy with

intermittent light showers. Miles Davis is no cornet

player and there's a county-wide ordinance banning

the use of pink plastic flamingos as lawn decoration.

After the weekly pray meeting, stage fright seduces

the fiery sermon of a secular fundamentalist disguised

as round three. San Francisco wakes up with the Bay

Bridge in its bed and then belts out a dramatic

monologue about possible conspiracy theories. Thom

Gunn has a holster or a banana glad to see us. Life

is content to be intimidated by a colossal cleavage or

the same woman in the gorilla suit. And all the while,

the rabbi insists he has a reputation to accidentally

overdose. This movie really has the power to make

people mad. And I dare you to try and find the segue.

Poem first published at: http://www.whyvandalism.com/
Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/
and muisc blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/
Copyright 2008 by Maurice Oliver. All Rights Reserved.

New York's New Governor

2008-03-17T12:57:00.000-07:00

David Alexander Paterson (born May 20, 1954) is an American politician and the current Lieutenant Governor of New York. He is the first African American and the first legally blind person to hold this position. He was selected as running mate by New York Attorney General and Democratic Party nominee Eliot Spitzer in the 2006 New York gubernatorial election. In addition to serving as lieutenant governor, Paterson serves as an adjunct professor at Columbia University's School for International and Public Affairs.

Following a sex scandal, Spitzer announced his intent to resign as governor, effective at noon on March 17, 2008. The date was requested by Paterson to provide for a smooth and orderly transition, also allowing for him to be sworn in before a joint session of the legislature.

Paterson is the first African American Governor of New York and the fourth in any U.S. state (following current Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick, former Virginia Gov. Douglas Wilder, and Reconstruction-era Louisiana Gov. P. B. S. Pinchback).

Paterson was born in Brooklyn. An infection during infancy left him with no sight in his left eye and severely limited vision in his right, due to optic atrophy. His family moved to the Long Island suburb of Hempstead so that he could attend mainstream classes. An excellent student, he graduated from Hempstead High School in 1971. He received a BA in history from Columbia University in 1977 and a law degree from Hofstra Law School in 1983.

He is the son of former New York Secretary of State Basil Paterson, who was the first African American Deputy Mayor of New York City, and the second African American to run for statewide office in New York in 1962. He and his wife Michelle Paige Paterson live in Harlem. They have two children: Ashley, who entered Ithaca College in fall 2006, and Alex, who attends school in New York City.

Paterson is an active advocate for people with visual and physical impairments. He was elected as a member of the American Foundation for the Blind. He serves on the board of directors of the the Achilles Track Club, an organization which sponsors disabled Paterson is an active advocate for people with visual and physical impairments. Paterson himself completed the New York City Marathon in 1999. Find out more about him at: www.ny.gov/Itgov

Research info gathered at: www.wikipedia.org

Now, here's one of my poems voted homecoming queen:

Melancholy-Meets-Exoticism (Piano Version)

-Dawn arrives peeling off night's lingerie.

-Or marble reliefs of a goddess sniffing lotus.

-She rings my doorbell pretending to borrow sugar.

-Neat rows of houses with the lawns all mowed.

-She is barefoot with a gardenia in her hair.

-At a picnic spot by some monumental ruin.

-I tell her I have a sister named sky.

-Or a wheat field rippling in yellow.

-But instead, I offer to wash her feet.

-With piano music playing in the background.

-I pour some liquid soap in my palm.

-Or through a dusty village on camel.

-With a face that belongs on stamps.

-As rivers meander then change their course.

-Or the wind belly dancing across the dunes.

Poem first published online at: www.explaid.com/subtletea
Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/
and music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/
Copyright 2008 by Maurice Oliver. All Rights Reserved.

Iraq: The $12 Billion A Month War

2008-03-10T15:27:00.000-07:00

In 2008, its sixth year, the Iraq War will cost approximately $12 billion a month, triple the "burn" rate of its earliest years, Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph E. Stiglitz and co-author Linda J. Bilmes report in a new book.

Beyond 2008, working with "best-case" and "realistic-moderate" scenarios, they project the Iraq and Afghan wars, including long-term U.S. military occupations of those countries, will cost the U.S. budget between $1.7 trillion and $2.7 trillion — or more — by 2017. Interest alone on money borrowed to pay those costs could add another $816 billion to that bottom line, they say.

The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) has done its own projections and comes in lower, forecasting a cumulative cost by 2017 of $1.2 trillion to $1.7 trillion for the two wars, with Iraq generally accounting for three-quarters of the costs.

Variations in such estimates stem from the sliding scales of assumptions, scenarios and budget items that are counted. But whatever the estimate, the cost will be huge, the auditors of the Government Accountability Office say.

In their book, "The Three Trillion Dollar War," Stiglitz, of Columbia University, and Bilmes, of Harvard, report the two wars will have cost the U.S. budget $845 billion in 2007 dollars by next Sept. 30, end of fiscal year 2008, assuming Congress fully funds Bush administration requests. That counts not just military operations, but embassy costs, reconstruction and other war-related expenses.

That total far surpasses the $670 billion in 2007 dollars the Congressional Research Service says was the U.S. price tag for the 12-year Vietnam War.

The two economists say their calculations are conservative, because they don't encompass many "hidden" items in the U.S. budget. Their basic projections also exclude the potentially huge debt-service cost — on which CBO approximately agrees — and the cost to the U.S. economy of global oil prices that have quadrupled since 2003, an increase analysts blame partly on the Iraq upheaval. Estimating all economic and social costs might push the U.S. war bill up toward $5 trillion by 2017, they say. All this makes one wonder if anyone is home in Washington D.C. I'm sure co-author Joseph E. Stiglitz wonders the same. Find out more about his books at: http://www2.gsb.columbia.edu/faculty/jstiglitz/index.cfm

Research info gathered at: www.apdigitalnews.com

Now, here's one of my poems longing for peace:

The Important Words Are Underlined

Did I ever tell you about the time oil from

a leaky canister seeped into my thoughts

then expressed its dissatisfaction with my

sexual life. Or what about the time a wisp

broom popped-up out of my shoulder and

then preceded to brush the dandruff away.

Then there was the time I drew a circle in

my bathroom mirror with shaving cream

and Beethoven’s Fifth came pouring out

through it. See what always happens when

you unfurl the celestial flag of pure astral

physiognomy from vast dripping muzzles.

Automatically a one-horned unicorn will

appear, and you can bet your lift it’s been

dry cleaned and disinfected first. Now, sit

back and feet up like a sunrise.

Poem first published at: http://litchaos.com/
Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/
and music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/
Copyright by Maurice Oliver. All Rights Reserved.

The Bu$h Agenda

2008-03-05T21:38:00.000-08:00

A few days ago I got up earlier than normal and caught a progressive talk radio show on a Portland, OR FM station called KBOO. The speaker sounded like NPR's Middle East reporter Linda Gradstein but the words that were coming out of her mouth quickly caused me to think otherwise. The speaker turned out to be Antonia Juhasz talking about her 2006 book which is reviewed in today's posting:

The Bush Agenda is the first book to expose the Bush Administration's radical economic agenda for global domination, a plan more extreme, unilateral and audacious than any of his predecessors, a plan that has created the greatest level of violent opposition to America and Americans in recent history.

The Bush Agenda: Invading the World, One Economy at a Time explores the Bush Administration's plan to invade the world through a corporate globalization agenda, first in Iraq, then the Middle East with the proposed U.S.-Middle East Free Trade Area, and ultimately as a cornerstone to the global Bush Doctrine of Pax Americana. What is Bush's "free trade?" It's an economic model that argues that by removing restrictions on multinational corporations, these companies will be freed to become engines of economic growth in countries around the world, but in fact bring vast wealth of a small number of global elites while entire populations suffer dislocation, poverty and violence, creating a perfect Petri dish for breeding terrorists. The instruments for this takeover include such corporations as Bechtel, Lockheed Martin, ChevronTexaco, Halliburton, and many others.

This book addresses the history of U.S. economic relations throughout the world over the past 25 years, the key role of U.S. corporations, and the larger Bush economic agenda and what the potential impact of this agenda will be on the United States and the world. It concludes with specific alternatives to guide the U.S. on a more peaceful and sustainable course in the future. Using Naomi Klein's No Logo and Eric Schlosser's Fast Food Nation as models, The Bush Agenda is based on hard analytic fact and presented so that it will not only be persuasive, but highly engaging and entertaining to a broad audience.

Synopsis: A leading expert on international trade and finance policy exposes the Bush Administration's radical economic agenda for global domination, which she says will create the greatest level of violent opposition to America and Americans in recent history.

About the Author: Antonia Juhasz is a leading expert on international trade and finance policy with a master’s degree in Public Policy from Georgetown University. She has served as a congressional aide and as the project director of the International Forum on Globalization. She is currently a visiting scholar with the Institute for Policy Studies in Washington DC. An award-winning writer, her work has appeared in dozens of publications, including the Los Angeles Timesand Miami Herald, and she has appeared on CBS News, CNN, Hannity &Colmes, Washington Journal, and NPR’s Talk of the Nation. She lives in San Francisco.

Find out more at: www.powells.com/biblio/1-9780060846879-3

or the author's website at: http://www.thebushangenda.net/

Now, here's a poem that's black gold:

Play Me

At some point between midnight and albuquerque the instrument
wakes up with an ice-cream headache on a train heading west.

the boys in the band are all asleep but the cigarette across the
aisle with long antelope legs seems willing.she bats her lids like
signals.gradually as if on cue her stare reaches his valves.she
leans over to stroke them twice.he allows her to run a trembling

wet tongue all over the reed.then he pulls her to him where she
sticks like masking tape.by then passion flares and without so

much as a word of article they read each others palms until the
seat is stained in e major and the windows go blank.but no black

madonna appears and their tune ends up a mere whiny bugaboo.
so in frustration the saxophone picks up his case and simply

wanders out of the spotlight while the desert unfurls.but by then a
stagehand has already begun to carry off the last upright mirror to

a crammed storage room reserved for props.

Poem first published at: http://www.onefortytwo.com/
Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/
and music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/
Copyright 2008 by Maurice Oliver. All Rights Reserved.

A Global Seed Vault

2008-02-29T14:37:00.000-08:00

The Svalbard Global Seed Vault, or the Doomsday Vault as the media have nicknamed it, will be the ultimate safety net for the world’s most important natural resource. It had its official opening on Feb. 26, 2008.

The Seed Vault is managed under terms spelled out in a tripartite agreement between the Norwegian government, the Global Crop Diversity Trust and the Nordic Gene Bank (a cooperative effort of the Nordic countries under the Nordic Council of Ministers). The Norwegian government has funded all of the approximately $8 million construction cost. The Global Crop Diversity Trust has played a key role in the planning of the Seed Vault and is coordinating shipments of seed samples to the Vault in conjunction with the Nordic Gene Bank.

The Trust will provide most of the annual operating costs for the facility, and has set aside endowment funds to do so, while the Norwegian government will finance upkeep of the structure itself. The Gates Foundation has provided approximately $750,000 to assist developing countries and international agricultural research centers to package and ship seeds to the Seed Vault. An International Advisory Council is being established to provide guidance and advice. It will include representatives from FAO, the CGIAR, the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources and other institutions. The vault is located on the Norwegian island of Spitsbergen near the town of Longyearbyen (population 1900) in the remote arctic Svalbard archipelago. The island is about 1,120 km from the North Pole.

The world's seed collections are vulnerable to a wide range of threats - civil strife, war, natural catastrophes, and more routinely but no less damagingly, poor management, lack of adequate funding, and equipment failures. Unique varieties of our most important crops are lost whenever any such disaster strikes, and therefore securing duplicates of all collections in a global facility provides an insurance policy for the world’s food supply.

The seed vault is an answer to a call from the international community to provide the best possible assurance of safety for the world’s crop diversity, and in fact the idea for such a facility dates back to the 1980s. However, it was only with the coming into force of the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources, and an agreed international legal framework for conserving and accessing crop diversity, that the seed vault became a practical possibility. The vault is being dug into a mountainside near the village of Longyearbyen, Svalbard. Construction is due to be completed in September 2007. Svalbard is a group of islands nearly a thousand kilometres north of mainland Norway. Remote by any standards, Svalbard’s airport is in fact the northernmost point in the world to be serviced by scheduled flights – usually one a day. For nearly four months a year the islands are enveloped in total darkness. It is here that the Norwegian government has built the Svalbard Global Seed Vault, to provide this ultimate safety net for the world’s seeds.

Permafrost and thick rock will ensure that even without electricity, the samples will remain frozen. The vault’s construction has been funded by the Norwegian government as a service to the world community. The Global Crop Diversity Trust considers the vault an essential component of a rational and secure global system for conserving the diversity of all our crops. The Trust is therefore committed to supporting ongoing operational costs, and is assisting developing countries with preparing, packaging and transporting their representative seeds to the Arctic. Find out more about this international project at http://www.croptrust.org/

Research info gathered at: www.wikipedia.org

Now, here's one of my poems intnet on going to seed:

Busenfreund

A clould shaped like an elephant's head.

Birds, smitten with wings and throat-calls.

Foilage with the unique ability to back-stroke.

A tunnel cut through one lust green mountain.

Soft pink blossoms intnet on survival.

The prime and painted nailheads of the moon.

A complete habitat in a shoebox, underneath my bed.

Poem published at: www.angelfire.com/zine/bluefifth/Winter2008/poems2W08.html
Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/
and music blog: http://www.medleymakers.blogspot.com/

The Real Michelle Obama

2008-02-24T18:10:00.000-08:00

Michelle LaVaughn Robinson Obama (born January 17, 1964) is a lawyer and the wife of Illinois senator Barack Obama, who is a candidate for the 2008 Democratic Party nomination for United States President.

She was born and raised on the South Side of Chicago, Illinois and then educated at Princeton University and Harvard Law School. She returned to Chicago after completing her formal education to work for the law firm Sidley Austin, on the staff of the Mayor of Chicago Richard M. Daley, and for the University of Chicago and the University of Chicago Hospitals.

She met Barack when he came to work for Sidley Austin. The Obamas live on Chicago's South Side in Cook County, Illinois, United States, choosing to remain in Chicago rather than moving to Washington, D.C. In January of this year she gave up a $200,000 a year job to become what some would perceive as Barack's closest adviser.

Michelle Robinson was born to Frasier Robinson (who died in 1990), a city water plant employee and Democratic precinct captain, and Marian Robinson, a secretary at Spiegel's catalog store and unlike her husband Obama, she was raised in a conventional two-parent home where the family convened around the dinner table nightly. She and her brother, Craig (who is 16 months older), skipped the second grade. She went on to major in sociology and minor in African American studies at Princeton University, where she graduated cum laude with an Artium Baccalaureus in 1985. She obtained her Juris Doctor degree from Harvard Law School in 1988.

She met Barack Obama when they were the only two African Americans at their law firm and she was assigned to mentor him while he was a summer associate. Their relationship started with a business lunch and then a community organization meeting where he first impressed her. The couple's first date was to the Spike Lee movie Do The Right Thing. The couple married in October 1992, and they have two daughters, Malia Ann (born 1999) and Natasha (known as Sasha) (born 2001). Her brother Craig was the 4th leading scorer in Princeton University's men's basketball history, and is now Brown University's men's basketball coach.

With the ascent of her husband as a prominent national politician, she has become a part of pop culture. In May 2006, Essence magazine listed her among "25 of the World's Most Inspiring Women." In July 2007, Vanity Fair magazine listed her among "10 of the World's Best Dressed People." In September 2007, 02138 magazine listed her 58th of "The Harvard 100," a list of the prior year's most influential Harvard alumni. Her husband was ranked 4th.
Find out more at: www.barackobama.com/about/michelle_obama

Research info gathered at: www.wikipedia.org

Now, here's one of my poems that loves politics:

Such A Halo!

At night,

there's birds in the violin music

and both can be habit-forming.

The birds use cups when they

want a sip from the Big Dipper.

The violin music has lived only

on sound for the last ten years.

As for me, I think I'd settle for

just being an ordinary bladder

if it meant I could masquerade

as a tree or a shabby coat no

one would want to steal.

Poem first published at: http://www.interpoetry.com/
Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/
and music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/

Obama Extends Winning Streak

2008-02-20T12:52:00.000-08:00

Barack Obama cruised past a fading Hillary Rodham Clinton in the Wisconsin and Hawaii primaries last night, gaining the upper hand in a Democratic presidential race for the ages. It was Obama's ninth and tenth straight victory over the past three weeks, and left the former first lady in desperate need of a comeback in a race she long commanded as front-runner.He garnered broad support from nearly all types of Wisconsin voters Tuesday and showed strong signs of eroding Hillary Rodham Clinton's usual coalition, including white women and working-class whites, according to exit polls.

He also was performing strongly with young whites, middle-aged people and moderates while expanding his decisive leads with independents, college-educated, high income and very liberal voters.Clinton's strengths were coming from less-educated and older voters, two of her mainstays this year. Just over half of those with no more than a high school diploma were supporting the New York senator, as were six in 10 of those over age 65.

That was about her average margin among both groups in the 21 competitive Democratic primaries so far this year. Clinton's muscle also has come in part from a 22 percentage point lead she has held over Obama among white women in earlier primaries. last night they were running even.About nine in 10 Wisconsin Democratic voters were white. There was not enough early data for any meaningful information on how blacks were voting, but in the past eight in 10, or more, have backed Obama.

Six in 10 men were supporting Obama, including the same proportion of white men. That is a group Obama has done increasingly well with, especially since former North Carolina Sen. John Edwards left the race two weeks ago. Obama has dominated young voters all year, leading Clinton by nearly 20 points in the primaries and typically drawing huge crowds on college campuses.

There was also a primary held in Hawaii but the results will not be known until sometime today. What is known is that Democratic voter turnout in Wisconsin outnumered the Republican turnout by two to one. Will Republican voters simply stay home come the national election in November or will they become equally fired-up, that is the question. Find out more about Sen. Obama at his website: http://www.barackobama.com/

Research info gathered at: http://news.yahoo.com

Now, here's one of my poems seeking your vote:

You Decide

Five rows of green
tomatoes. Crayons spread
across a table. Page after
page of shorthand. Two
meadowlark in plain view.
A vending machine
of peanuts for pennies.
Ripe strawberries in a
yellow dish. Headlights
beyond the driveway.
Fresh sheets on a
mattress. An ice cream
truck melting through
summer. Life that grabs
us already screaming.

Poem first published at: http://www.halfdruckmuse.org/

Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/

and music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/

The Original Black Russian

2008-02-16T15:29:00.000-08:00

As we Americans observe Black History Month in February, Russians will celebrate their own link to black history. This year marks the 171st anniversary of the death of their greatest national poet, Alexander Pushkin. Yes, Pushkin, who died on Feb 10, 1837, was part black.

Pushkin's great-grandfather, Abram Gannibal, was born in Sub-Saharan Africa, probably on the territory of what is now Cameroon, in the late 17th century. Taken captive in his boyhood, he was transported in 1705 by a Russian emissary from the court of the Turkish Sultan and presented as a gift to Peter the Great. Peter had the boy baptized and made him his godson. Since Abram was apparently a quick study, Peter gave him a job as his personal secretary then, as part of his crash program of modernizing Russia, sent him to France to study military engineering.

After his return to Russia, Gannibal (who named himself after Hannibal, the greatest African military commander in the ancient world) went on to enjoy an exceptionally long life. He survived six tsars, rose to the rank of general, was granted nobility and estates, and was decorated for distinguished service.

Pushkin himself was fascinated by his African heritage and did not hesitate to identify himself as a "descendant of Negroes." In a famous line from his masterpiece Eugene Onegin, he imagines fleeing "under the sky of my Africa to sigh for gloomy Russia." African American writers and intellectuals including Frederick Douglass took inspiration from Pushkin's poetry and from his pride in his African roots.

Yet Pushkin was also proud to trace the other side of his lineage back to one of the oldest boyar families in Russia. While he sympathized with the plight of his "brother Negroes," in the United States, and wrote poetry eloquently promoting freedom from tsarist oppression, Pushkin himself owned serfs. The poet himself, it would seem, was torn by the same competing vectors of race, class, national identity and political allegiance that have haunted his posthumous image for two centuries.

In 1899, the tsarist government staged an elaborate, empire-wide celebration of the centennial of the poet's birth, attempting to harness Pushkin's status as a metaphor of Russia in service to the state. Ironically today though, a growing wave of Russian nationalism is spurring ugly instances of xenophobic violence. A major Russian monitoring center recently reported a rise in hate crimes against dark-skinned people from the former Russian republics and against African students.

Nevertheless, Pushkin remains a mirror in which Russians profess to see reflected back at them their fondest aspirations and best impulses. The country would do well to take a good look into that mirror today. Find out more about this world-famous poet at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aleksandr_Pushkin

Research info gathered at: www.theroot.com

Now, here's a poet that's never heard of Russia:

Progress, Disguised As A Centipedes

And when the dust finally settles, here’s what’s left:

-A row of concrete dividers on a receding hairline.

-Every wood-framed church in the Bible Belt.

-Trains that are only used to scare away ghosts.

-A building that was originally scheduled for demolition.

-Thickly spread peanut butter wedged between two silos.

-A coat rack made from barrels of Agent Orange.

-One lamppost that longs to be a lighthouse.

-A pair of spectacles that desperately need polishing.

Poem first published at: http://litchaos.com/
Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/
and music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/

A Coming-Of-Age With Death

2008-02-12T00:31:00.000-08:00

I've become a real movie buff over the last couple of years what with the fact that I got myself a laptop with a DVD player and mainly because the public library here in Portland where I live has one of the greatest selections of DVDs around. I try to watch a movie every evening after a day of either writing poetry or tutoring or both. I've not owned a TV in 14 years so movies and novels are the way I escape.

About a year ago, I found "The Barbarian Invasion" at the library and was spellbound by the plot even if I did have to spend part of the time reading the subtitles (the movie is in French and was shot in and around Montreal.

For today's posting I thought I'd do two reviews of the Academy Award Winning movie (the best foreign film for 2003). Here we go:

Amazon.com
The intriguing Denys Arcand (director of Jesus of Montreal and Stardom) returns to the lusty, cantankerous intellectuals of his first film, The Decline of the American Empire. Remy (Remy Girard), a history professor, is dying of cancer, and his estranged and financially successful son Sebastien (Stephane Rousseau) returns to care for the old man. With the power of money, Sebastien cuts through bureaucracy and the law to give his father some comfort--comfort that Remy accepts with reluctance, because in his eyes the unintellectual Sebastian has betrayed all of Remy's principles. Old friends arrive and soon the conversation turns to sex, religion, history, sex, academia, sex--The Barbarian Invasions isn't very focused, but the very breadth of its ideas makes it worth seeing; few movies even try to grapple with morality or the state of our culture, let alone with this kind of intelligence and grace. --Bret Fetzer

Product Description
Academy Award(R) winner for Best Foreign Language Film in 2003, THE BARBARIAN INVASIONS is a provocative look at the many ties that bind a group of friends and lovers. It's not easy for a narrow-minded professor (Rémy Girard) to reconcile with his equally stubborn son. But soon, father and son find themselves gathering with their wide and colorful circle of family and friends to confront their differences, confess their secrets, and celebrate life! Winner of the Best Actress (Marie-Josée Croze) and Best Screenplay awards at the prestigious Cannes Film Festival -- critics everywhere hailed this outstanding motion picture as one of the year's best!

Find out more about the film and its actors at: http://www.imdb.com/

Redearch info gathered at: www.amazon.com

Now, here's one of my poems willing to confess a secret:

Then She Describes What Would happen If Aliens Took Over

—They would lift every pant leg and shake out rats.

—Use the world as if it were a hammock full of mushroom bones.

—Demand that all laundry lists to kneel at their feet.

—Tattoo a barcode for the price of heaven onto selected wrists.

—Cut-off echoes at the halfway point.

—Move the stage props of skid row to Beverly Hills.

—Insist on reforms that would cause the penal code to self-destruct.

—Invent a revolutionary red to lipstick sunsets.

—Relocate poetry to some undisclosed remote lake.

—Teach mattresses how to wake-up without hangovers.

—Make sure there's a slur in the evening news report.

—Propose that each shirt be based on a previous tale.

—Condemn hospital gurneys to a squeaky-wheeled fate.

Poem first published at: http://www.cadenza-magazine.co.uk/
Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/
and music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/

It's A Train

2008-02-08T22:26:00.000-08:00

230 mph. That is the speed of the new Automotrice à Grande Vitesse (AGV) trainset, which was unveiled on Feb 5. Made by Allstom Transport in collaboration with SNCF, this new trainset is considerably lighter, and consumes less fuel than it's older sister, the famous French TGV train, which it was designed to replace.

The train is 10 years and $147 in the making, and was very proudly announced by Alstom, which is responsible for the construction of 70 percent of the world's trains capable of achieving 186mph. With a capacity large enough to carry 900 passengers per ride, the new train is expected to be operational between Milan and Naples in 2011. Existing trains today like the TGV can carry a mere 400 passengers.

The France - based company hopes to take global orders for AGV, to compete with other industry conglomerates such as Germany - based Siemens and Canada - based Bombardier. AGV already set a record before it's announcement when a test train utilizing the technology of AGV set a speed record of 357mph, which is only 3.7mph behind the world record, held by Japan's Maglev train. Find out more at: http://www.alstom.com/

Research info gathered at: http://ejacobi.newsvine.com

Now, here's a poem with lots of speed:

Categorical Imperatives

Try to imagine a small room where the only furniture is a TV.

The TV has a hundred channels and two sets of memories.

The room suffers from amnesia and has a leaky ceiling.

There’s a bowl of fruit on the TV and the room’s

floor once was the life of an oak tree. Neither

the TV nor the room has ever had a

headache or felt contempt for a

total stranger. But, the TV

does wear glasses and

the room is terrified

of the dark. The

TV wonders

what it

would be like

to have a dent in

the bridge of its nose and

the room longs to know what a

clock sounds like when it ticks. Personally,

I try not to wonder about much of anything other

than how robust this exercise in the use of your imagination

has been. I’ve provided a space below where you can

leave comments. While you scribble yours, I’ll go

stand at the window and watch the Pepsi

truck pull up to the asylum so a

bottle opener can fill the

vending machine.

Poem first published at: http://litchoas.com/
Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/
and personal blog: http://www.copyat5.blogspot.com/

Michelle Obama: A Policy Lite Meassage

2008-02-04T00:17:00.000-08:00

Presidential candidate Barack Obama leans on his wife in many ways — for support, for advice, for grounding and increasingly for her fighting words. In an increasingly nasty race that seems to pit the Illinois Senator against not just a former First Lady but her ex-President husband as well, Obama needs Michelle more than ever.

Now, for the first time since Barack Obama launched his campaign 11 months ago, Michelle Obama has left the couple's two young girls at home with her mother and hit the campaign trail full-time. While she's no Bill Clinton, Obama does have sharp elbows. One of her more pointed remarks is about how "things have gotten continually worse over my lifetime," implying the Clinton era did little to help "regular folks" like her and her family. And in a forcefully worded fund-raising letter sent out in the middle of January, she says, "What we didn't expect, at least not from our fellow Democrats, are the win-at-all-costs tactics we've seen recently. We didn't expect misleading accusations that willfully distort Barack's record... We've seen disingenuous attacks and smear tactics turn people off from the political process for too long, and enough is enough."

Michelle Obama's conventional south-side Chicago working-class background contrasts with her husband's childhood, growing up between Hawaii and Indonesia, to which few of his supporters can relate. Where Barack Obama's speeches are all about soaring rhetoric, with very few mentions of his personal upbringing, his wife focuses on her childhood, telling her story from the ground up. "You think of my parents who didn't go to college, who sent not one but two of us to Princeton, my brother and I," she told the 200 or so students that came to hear her speak. "And the one thing that is clear to me as I've traveled the country is the story of my father is the story of America, I don't care what color what folks are, I don't care if they grew up on a farm or in the inner city."

Michelle doesn't credit Obama with lifting her up. She is clear she did it on her own, but stresses that he is what the country needs to get back to a time when people like her had the opportunity to rise — a time, she said, that has not existed since her childhood. "You know every time somebody told me, 'No, you can't do that,' I pushed past the their doubts and I took my seat at the table," she told the group of students at Bennett College in South Carolina during one of her own rally speeches.

From her shy, awkward first months in a role that she talks frankly about not wanting, Michelle Obama is finding her voice. And her husband will need it. If he was exhausted in New Hampshire, they have 22 states coming up on February 5th that could well determine the nominee. Find out more about the Obama campaign at: http://www.barackobama.com/

Research info gathered at: www.time.com

Now here's one of my poems that you'd never find on the ballot:

Or Dreaming In A Coat Room

Not to forget the way back-

that path etched along a faraway wash of sequoias

in an ellipse then slipped between two seasons,
or in a configuration posing as a trail of wet leaves

and pine cones that wish they weren't so useless,
or entwined in a hedge that twists itself through the

rust-gray of reason in a dream only sleepers believe,
arriving at the wide brown of a dying field using a

plow to drag aqueous spirits inside.

All of this could easily be part of the persuasion.

Poem first published at: http://www.mannequinenvy.com/
Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/
and music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/
Copyright 2008 by Maurice Oliver. All Rights Reserved.
Copyright by Maurice Oliver. All Rights Reserved.

Caroline Kennedy Endores Sen. Obama

2008-01-31T15:30:00.000-08:00

The daughter of President John F. Kennedy endorsed Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama, saying he could inspire Americans in the same way her father once did. "I have never had a president who inspired me the way people tell me that my father inspired them," Caroline Kennedy wrote in an op-ed posted Saturday on the Web site of The New York Times. "But for the first time, I believe I have found the man who could be that president - not just for me, but for a new generation of Americans."

Kennedy, who was four days shy of her 6th birthday when her father was assassinated, wrote that Obama "has a special ability to get us to believe in ourselves, to tie that belief to our highest ideals and imagine that together we can do great things."

And she appealed to other parents to pick a candidate who she said could invigorate a younger generation that is too often "hopeless, defeated and disengaged."Kennedy wrote that she wants a president "who appeals to the hopes of those who still believe in the American Dream, and those around the world who still believe in the American ideal; and who can lift our spirits, and make us believe again that our country needs every one of us to get involved." Find out more about the late President Kennedy's daugther at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CarolineKennedy

Research info taken from: www.theledger.com

Now, here's one of my Presidential poems:

Harry Houdini On Holiday

In the poem version about the untied military boots

war breaks out in a virtual car chase allowing

vandals a bumper-sticker of green lights for miles

before the night is lit-up by artillery fire.

Two sacred mounds of prickly hats are blindfolded

then forced to stand before the hangman's noose

where scat looks like a lavish Hollywood movie where

identity theft grows up to be urban blight's stage prop.

The blindfolds don't care. Neither does bird flu. It brings

a twig to the empty c-cup then brides porcupine quills

to boycott any notice of amnesty, so long as those little

metal weighs are still sown in buttons of window drapes.

Poem first published at: http://www.foame.org/
Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/
and music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/
Copyright 2008 by Maurice Oliver. All Rights Reserved.

Obama: "Yes We Can"

2008-01-27T14:02:00.000-08:00

Sen. Barack Obama overwhelmingly beat Sen. Hillary Clinton with 55 percent support to her 27 percent, and former Sen. John Edwards, trailing with 18 percent support, with almost all preccints reporting in the South Carolina primary on Saturday the 26th of January.

Clinton left South Carolina that same evening for Nashville, Tenn., where she sought to minimize her loss and emphasize the upcoming Super-Duper Tuesday votes Feb. 5.

Yet to win any primary contest thus far, John Edwards lost again tonight, another crushing blow to the former senator, who was born in South Carolina and won the state in 2004.

Congratulating Obama and Clinton tonight, Edwards told supporters, "Our campaign from the very beginning has been about one central thing, and that is to give voice to millions of Americans who have absolutely no voice," Edwards said.

This is the second win in the nomination battle for Obama, who won the Iowa caucuses earlier this month, but this is his first win in a state with a sizable African-American population.

Clinton started out strong in the state, but began to trail Obama in December. In recent weeks her campaign has tried to lower expectations, positioning her as the underdog in the race, and largely leaving her husband, former President Bill Clinton, to campaign for her in the Palmetto State.

But in a campaign dominated by talk of race, South Carolinians went into the polls with the economy on their minds; just over half called it the most important issue in their vote. South Carolina has the fourth-highest unemployment rate in the nation, and has lost more than 90,000 manufacturing jobs over the last decade.

In a race that has increasingly become a delegate war leading up to the Super-Duper Feb.5 primaries and caucuses, Obama won an estimated 25 delegates in the South Carolina primary, Clinton won an estimated 12 and John Edwards recieved 8 delegates. He has won the Democratic primaries in states with some of America's whitiest and blackest populations, and now goes into Super Tuesday on Feb. 9th with added wind in his campaign's sail. He is the only '08 Presidential candidate to offer real change and people all over the nation are beginning to take notion. If you have not registered to vote yet, you can at: http://www.beavoter.org/

Research info gathered at: http://abcnews.go.com

Now, here's a poem looking for your vote:

Landscaping The Future

in scene 6 the script calls for patches of the hellgate world

to suck a gree-swollen hill of all its exhaust-resistant trees

then surround innocent saplingsin a solid schoolyard circle

piercing every crease and crevice while the sky turns pure
purple but on the other side of town it's 1999 in a honey-only
club as a waitress appears on cue wearing a submachine
gun smile in halo heels hooked on phonics and stuffed in a
skimpy dress the barely conceals her sung song with padded
hips and goldfish legs all to no avail as every patron stares in
unison towards center stage where a lone spotlight illuminates
several feather penstrokes of flesh in an apricot hue until
darkness pales in between and the dancer pauses to gain her
balance just before stepping into the mext millenia to cat calls

and wild applause that almost sounds holy.

Poem first published at: http://dash30dash.com/
Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/
and music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/
Copyright 2008 by Maurice Oliver. All Rights Reserved.

Amy Goes To Rehab

2008-01-24T23:59:00.000-08:00

On Thursday January 24th Amy Winehouse checked into rehab as she finally admitted the need for treatment on her drug addiction, her record company has confirmed.

Video footage that showed the singer smoking crack cocaine was published on the internet this week and appears to have brought a long-standing problem to its head. "Amy decided to enter the facility today after talks with her record label, management, family and doctors," Universal Music Group said in a statement.

"She has come to understand that she requires specialist treatment to continue her ongoing recovery from drug addiction."

Winehouse, who had the biggest selling album in the UK last year and whose most famous song is, of course, about a refusal to go into rehab, has cancelled a scheduled appearance at the NRJ music awards ceremony in France this weekend.

Earlier yesterday, Winehouse's father Mitch told the BBC that she was still reluctant to undergo treatment.

"Part of the problem is she doesn't think she's got a problem. She thinks she can do what she does recreationally and get on with the rest of her life," he told BBC London 94.9.

"The moment she says she wants to go into a facility, within half an hour she will be in a facility. But unless she wants to do it of her own accord, it's pointless."

It is believed that Winehouse still hopes to perform at the forthcoming Grammy Awards, to be presented on February 10 in Los Angeles. She is nominated for six awards including best new artist and album of the year. As a big fan of her music I can only hope so. Find out more about this new promising artist at: http://www.amywinehouse.co.uk/

Research info gathered at: http://www.guardian.co.uk/

Now, here's a poem that's considering rehab too:

Instructions To H/She Who Waits

Then finally, I make a list of the things we won’t need:

-Hula honey in the airplane propeller.

-A stand-in knot of arsenal bondage.

-Any spittish trail that pours out of chance.

-Straw bales from your marooned pelvic purse.

-Any trifle act of a same-sex drought.

-Every go-go boot germ in a robot’s heartbeat.

-Four synonyms for male perversity worry beads.

-All ink fountains of mastectomy cheeks.

-The rejection slip of a steel-toed jodhpurs.

-Chest wax designed for a cruise missile.

-Fragrant stirrups encased in a falsetto toll box.

-And of course, the rubber pulley of gesture implants.

Poem first published at: http://coupremine.com/

Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/

The History of Hula Hoops

2008-01-21T23:14:00.000-08:00

The hula hoop is a toy hoop, usually made of plastic, that is twirled around the waist, limbs, or neck.

In Egypt around 3,000 years ago, hoops made out of grape vines were propelled around the ground with sticks. In the 14th century, "hooping" was popular in England and medics blamed it for heart attacks and back dislocations. The word "hula" was added in the early 18th century as sailors who visited Hawaii noticed the similarity between hula dancing and hooping.

In 1957 the hula (also frequently spelled "hoola") hoop was reinvented by Richard Knerr and Arthur "Spud" Melin, founders of the Wham-O toy company. (The two had founded the company in a Los Angeles garage in 1948 to market the "Wham-O" slingshot, which was originally invented to shoot pieces of meat into the air, as a training device for falcons). The idea came from an Australian who had visited California who told Knerr and Melin about children twirling bamboo hoops around the waist in gym class. The new Hula Hoops were made possible by Marlex, a recently invented durable plastic.

Knerr and Medlin were unable to patent their vastly profitable "re-invention", as it had been in use for thousands of years; making the device out of a new material did not meet patent requirements of originality. They were largely able, however, to protect their invention by trademarking "Hula hoop".

After the hoop was released in 1958, Wham-O sold over 100 million in two years. As the fad ran its course, Wham-O again struck lucky with the release of their Frisbee.

To relaunch the Hula Hoop in the late 1960s, Wham-O staged a national competition in the US in conjunction with the National Parks & Recreation Network. The National Hula Hoop Contest (subsequently re-named the World Hula Hoop Championships) grew in scope from 500 U. S. cities in 1968 to over 2,000 cities in 1980, with 2 million participants. Competitors were judged on their performance of compulsory maneuvers (Knee Knocker, Stork, Hula Hop, Wrap the Mummy, Alley Oop) as well as freestyle routines set to music, establishing the roots of the contemporary freestyle Hula Hoop movement.

Richard Knerr, co-founder of the company responsible for turning the Hula Hoop, Frisbee and many other ingenious creations into iconic toys died on Jan.14th at age 82. Find out more about a "fad" that is still around today at a website devoted to it: http://www.hooping.org/

Research info gathered at: www.wikipedia.org

Now, here's a poem that knows how it hula:

"So Like You.Ever Predictable.Angel-Butch."

Just remember,

no one ever considered the power of change to be great enough

to become twin towers with a preference for redheads. Or

that the story would be so predictable it would float. Or

that the by-line of diplomacy would speak with a

lisp. That the forecast of bad memories would

be dressed to kill or even held tight against

a forever to come. Spilling out like a

liquid necklace with the jewels

ordinary cut glass. Or

perhaps just the

romantic

passage of an

assassin's bullet in

the middle of a Caribbean

cruise. Tangerine toast. Tar graves.
Galoshes that have never felt water. Either
way, we'll hold this fat ledger of the future up high
enough in the air that the world can see its faults, or at

least until the freight train passes or the shaman can

return with a fistful of the scared calf's heart.

Poem first published at: http://www.eastvillagepoetry.com/
Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/
and music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/
Copyright 2008 by Maurice Oliver. All Rights Reserved.

Adopt A Sofa?

2008-01-17T00:09:00.000-08:00

I hate to see things go to waste, especially when the things are nice and could be recycled by using them. Just before Xmas I saw a sofa downstairs at the dumpster of the apartment building where I live. It was really nice with a plush Navajo pattern and it even had one of those hide-a-way beds inside. It was too nice just to be carted off to some landfill, or at least that's what I thought. Someone in the building was just getting rid of it to make room for a new Xmas sofa is what I figured. WRONG!

The sofa had bedbugs! I paid another tenant in the building to help me carry it upstairs, set my old sofa out on the curb (it was gone the next day) and proceeded to curl up on it with a good book before I began to notice the welts on my skin an hour later and the the little red bite marks. Sadly, I allow it to go on for another two weeks until I went to Wikipedia to look-up the different kinds of indoor insects it might be. By then, I'd actually bagged two bugs so I knew what they looked liked. Well, here's what I found:

Bedbugs (or bed bugs) are small nocturnal insects of the family Cimicidae that live by hematophagy, that is by feeding on the blood of humans and other warm-blooded hosts.

The common bedbug (Cimex lectularius) is the best adapted to human environments. It is found in temperate climates throughout the world and has been known since ancient times. Other species include Cimex hemipterus, found in tropical regions (including Florida), which also infests poultry and bats, and Leptocimex boueti, found in the tropics of West Africa and South America, which infests bats and humans. Cimex pilosellus and C. pipistrella primarily infest bats, while Haematosiphon inodora, a species of North America, primarily infests poultry.

Adult bedbugs are a reddish brown, flattened, oval, and wingless, with microscopic hairs that give them a banded appearance. A common misconception is that they are not visible to the naked eye. Adults grow to 4 to 5 mm (one-eighth to three-sixteenths of an inch) in length and do not move quickly enough to escape the notice of an attentive observer. Newly hatched nymphs are translucent, lighter in color and continue to become browner and moult as they reach maturity. When it comes to size, they are often compared to lentils or appleseeds.

Bedbugs are generally active only at dawn, with a peak attack period about an hour before dawn, though given the opportunity, they may attempt to feed at other times. Attracted by warmth and the presence of carbon dioxide, the bug pierces the skin of its host with two hollow tubes. With one tube it injects its saliva, which contains anticoagulants and anesthetics, while with the other it withdraws the blood of its host. After feeding for about five minutes, the bug returns to its hiding place. The bites cannot usually be felt until some minutes or hours later, as a dermatological reaction to the injected agents.

Although bedbugs can live for a year or as much as 18 months without feeding, they typically seek blood every five to ten days. While bedbugs that go dormant for lack of food often live longer than a year, well-fed specimens typically live four to six months. Low infestations may be difficult to detect, and it is not unusual for the victim not to even realize they have bedbugs early on. Patterns of bites in a row or a cluster are typical as they may be disturbed while feeding. Bites may be found in a variety of places on the body.

Bedbugs may be erroneously associated with filth in the mistaken notion that this attracts them. However, severe infestations are often associated with poor housekeeping and clutter. Bedbugs are attracted by exhaled carbon dioxide and body heat, not by dirt, and they feed on blood, not waste. In short, the cleanliness of their environments has effect on the control of bedbugs but, unlike cockroaches, does not have a direct effect on bedbugs as they feed on their hosts and not on waste. Good housekeeping in association with proper preparation and mechanical removal by vacuuming will certainly assist in control.

Scary stuff huh! Don't worry, I got the sofa out of my place days again. Now I just have to figure out a way to get rid of the bugs. Now that part won't be so easy. Find out more about this cardon dioxide drawn (every time you exhale), body heat sensitive, bleed sucking six-legged pest at: www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bed_bugs

Now, here's a poem that will leave you itching:

Provocative, But No Documentary

She says she dismantles explosives for a hobby.

But the conversation really accelerates when I tell her

I’ve never put much faith in Father X’mas. It’s at that

point we realize we’re wearing identical hearing aids and

that a psychological suspense writer usually has a thumb

missing. The bond is complete. She shows me evidence

of gun powder stains using words that bounce against

my rubber dinghy as my toes dangle in the sea water.

She’s confused sometimes; she feels the cry of the world

sounds more like a dog’s yelp than pimples popping. She

says she would personally wipe-up every crisis if she’d

only remembered to pack a ratty gym towel in the duffelbag.

And the fog rolls in turning out to be colossal…

a Trojan horse with reclusive habits…

a phantom of utopia suffering from Down’s syndrome.

And life never utters just one complaint. The equator

strikes out in the third inning with men on base. An

asterisk precedes summer with a little reference in the

footnote. Even the lighthouse flashes back to more

murderous thoughts and the entire epidermis would turn

gray were it not for the high-voltage lines.

Whatever happens though, she’ll blame it on the soy sauce.

Poem forst published at: http://www.mannequinenvy.com/
Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/
and music blog: http://www.maedleymakersant.blogspot.com/
Copyright 2008 by Maurice Oliver. All Rights Reserved.

Emperor Pengiuns

2008-01-13T01:43:00.000-08:00

Today's posting is compiled from another one of those lessons I teach to students that seek a private tutor and come to me for my services. Not all the kids that come are behind in school. Many come because their parents simply want their kids to learn far beyond what America's classrooms are teaching. This particular posting is a lesson plan I used for two brothers aged 8 and 6. Read the text and then try to imagine a 6 year old mastering it enough to get a perfect score on a quiz, one of several that always comes after these little bits of info:

Emperor Penguins are black and white diving birds that live in large colonies among the pack ice of Antarctica. They have a narrow downward-curving beak and webbed feet with long toenails.
They call with a yapping sound.

Emperor Penguins search the waters beneath the pack ice and dive into cracks and holes in the ice to look for crustaceans, fish and squid. They search for crustaceans and small fish on shallow dives and bigger fish and squid on deeper dives. They catch their prey in their beak and swallow it whole underwater or they go to the surface to swallow it.

Emperor Penguins do not make nests. The female lays her single egg on the ice and the male places it on his feet and covers it with his stomach fat and feathers to keep it warm. The male keeps the egg warm for nine weeks until the female returns from feeding at sea and the egg is transferred to her feet. The male goes to sea and feeds, having eaten nothing for nine weeks while keeping the egg warm. The egg soon hatches and the female gives the chick its first meal. Both parents then take turns looking after the chick.

All of the chicks in a colony stay on shore together, while their parents go out and hunt for their food. The chicks begin to swim and feed themselves when they are four months old.

Cool Facts: Emperor Penguins are the largest of all penguins. Males can grow over 1 m (5ft) in height. They are also the deepest divers of any birds, reaching depths of 565 m (about 1000ft), and can stay underwater for 22 minutes. They live on the open sea and only go on land to have their chicks in Antarctica. They are predators of fish, squid, and shellfish. Their main predator is leopard seals which hunt in the same waters as the penguins.

Ready for your quiz?

Research info gathered at: www.en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emperor_Penguin

Now, a poem that knows how to reproduce:

The Facts About "Modern Sex"

What is modern sex?

Well, for the record,
it's bull dung heroically
sprayed over a mock-up
image of fork in the pork or
one finger pie licking good. It's
a whole night of lap soup at $300
a plate dinner organized in defiance
of the Labor Standards Act down lover's
lane. It's a varied assortment of girls attracted
to other pearls to lace your riddle. It's a pair of firm
mitts easily converted into foreign currency. It is not a
union between the body & mind stolen by cattle rustlers.
Nor is it less than 70 hours of mandatory community
service originally designed to be ornamental.

And for heaven sakes, stop spreading the rumor that
it's some kind of cross-gendered blood-sucking bat.

Poem first published at: http://litchaos.com/
Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/
and music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/
Copyright 2008 by Maurice Oliver. All Rights Reserved.

River Amazon: The World's Faucet

2008-01-09T00:04:00.000-08:00

I'm a private tutor, and this week my students are learning about, or in most cases, learning more about the Amazon River. So I thought I'd share a little of the information with you.

The Amazon River, or River Amazon, as it is known in South America, begins high in the Andes Mountains. From there the river snakes through the entire northern half of the nation of Brazil.

The river moves 4.2 million cubic feet of water per SECOND and empties into the Atlantic Ocean at its mouth. During the rainy season the amount is increased to 7 million feet per second! It is the greatest river in the world because of the amount of water it carries to the sea (approximately 20% of all the freshwater that flows into the oceans), the area of land that drains into it, and because of its length and width.

It is one of the longest rivers in the world. The Amazon is between 6,259km/3,903mi and 6,712km/4,195mi long. For the last century the length of the Amazon and the Nile Rivers have been fighting for title of the world's longest river. The length of both rivers keep changing. The Nile River in Africa is said to be anywhere between 5,499km/3,437mi to 6,690km/4,180mi long. But there is no question as to which of the two great rivers carries the greater volume of water. It’s the Amazon.

At its widest point the Amazon River can be 11km/6.8 mi wide during the dry season. In an average dry season 110,000 square km of land are water-covered, while in the wet season the flooded area of the Amazon Basin rises to 350,000 square km. When the Amazon River Basin floods during the rainy season the river can be up to 40km/24.8 mi wide. Where the Amazon meets the Atlantic Ocean the river is over 325km/202 mi wide! Ocean going ships can travel two-thirds of the way up the length of the river because it is so deep.

Because the Amazon drains the entire Northern half of the continent (about 40% landmass), including all the tropical rains that fall in the rainforests, it carries a huge amount of water. It is also home to some extreme creatures like the Anaconda (the biggest snake in the world), and Piranha (the most ferocious fish in the world). One of the largest freshwater fisn in the world is found living in the waters of the Amazon. The Arapaima are the largest fresh water fish in the world. They can measure up to a length of 15 ft./4m and can weigh up to 400lbs/200kg. Find out more about this amazing river at: http://maps.pomocnik.com/thr-amazon-river-peru-columbia-ecuador-brazil

Research info gathered from: www.extremescience.com

Now, here's a poem with plenty of water flowing under it:

The Virtue Of Plainspokenness

in a landscape defined by corrugated

sheet metal & negation somebody coughs

dancing in front of the doorway in front

of the window open or shut we finger pop:

with just ten cents between us a shirt

a dress a summons pressed together we

firmly believe a feather boa fur tortoise

lava snake diamond lizard all possible:

after all she insists

that's why we live-for splendor:

then cast the first cold morning of the

year in a plaster mold folded in rubber

with edgewater & a Capella withheld as

evidence until midnight unlocks its arms

or at least answer your telephone then

we might even quarrel if nothing else

or that trap door into the attic

moss-covered & stained by its matrix

with a seam of crystal some of quartz

so hold your breath & keep breathing

Poem first published at: http://www.wordriot.org/
Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/
and music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/
Copyright 2008 by Maurice Oliver. All Rights Reserved.

Obama's Victory, America's Victory

2008-01-04T11:07:00.000-08:00

Today's entry is an artical I found in the morning at MSNBC, written by Aswini Anburajan:

It was a small and packed crowd that greeted the race's new front-runner at an airport hanger in Portsmouth this morning. Obama, fresh off his Iowa win and his voice hoarse and raspy, entered to chants of "We want change! We want change! We want change!"

And he promised to deliver that change, telling the crowd that if they voted for him in the primary just four days from now, he would deliver them the promise of a new government, health care, clean energy, and end the war in Iraq.

"If you stand with me and work like you you've never worked before ... then I'm absolutely sure we will win in New Hampshire and then Nevada and South Carolina and on February 5th, and we will go on to Denver and unify our party and gather Republicans and Independents and create a new working majority and we will win in November," he hoarsely shouted.

Obama's look ahead, not just to the primary next Tuesday but to February 5th and the Democratic convention, simply underscores how much weight his campaign placed on winning the Iowa caucuses.

"Change is coming to New Hampshire in four days time. If you gave me the same chance that Iowa gave me last night, I truly believe I will be the next president of the United States of America," Obama told the crowd.

He also used the tremendous turnout in Iowa last night as evidence that he could deliver on the unity that he had promised. "The pundits are still scratching their heads. They said it couldn't be done. But we won with everybody. We won with Democrats, Republicans, and independents. We won the young vote. We won the old vote. We won the union vote. We won the non union vote. We won man and woman, black and white. We gave thousands who had never participated in politics before a reason to believe."

And though Obama tried to stay above the fray, he did take one swipe at Clinton and her campaign upon immediately taking the stage. "This feels good, just like I imagined it when I talked to my kindergarten teacher," he told the crowd to roars of laughter.

After the rally in Portsmouth, Obama headed to Dover New Hampshire where he stopped at Cafe on the Corner and spent about 40 minutes talking to voters, who clapped as he entered the restaurant.

Then, further down the same page, I found this comment by a reader:

...Obama, like Bobby Kennedy, connects with the better, more compassionate, and more sane sensibilities of everyday people. That's why he won in Iowa, that's why he'll win In NH and that's why my vote for Hillary will now go the Senator from Illinois.

And I have my own comment: For those who say Obama should wait a while, that he is not ready to lead this nation I say they are wrong; he is just the man we need to give this nation a good dose of mouth-to-mouth resuscitation, before it's too late. Way to go Barack!

Now, here's a previously published poem seeking your vote:

& Hearts, Tattooed On A Sleeve

Begin with an image of the Pearly Gates

covered with graffiti. Draw a picture of

the ozone swinging from a trapeze. Find

the German lyrics to “Mack The Knife”

and memorize each word backwards.

Brush your teeth with lava. Walk across

hot coals. Sell New Orleans back to the

French. Adopt an armadillo for a pet. Or,

why not write your apartment number in

the palm of your hand when you go to the

laundry room just in case you get lost. Try

eating shoelaces. Stick your shiny sword in

a stone. And if none of the above works,

find comfort in knowing that you’ve never

met a grain of sand you didn’t like.

Poem first published at: http://www.madswirl.com/
Visit my ezine: http://www.concelebratory.blogspot.com/
and music blog: http://www.medleymakersant.blogspot.com/