In Search of Lost Times (The New Yorker)

In Search of Lost Times

She lay with her eyes closed,

Head back against the edge.

She sang in an errant, unidentifiable tune.

Lifting her arms one by one,

Cleaning between her breasts and her legs.

She was crying

As if silence trumped pain.

“Beautiful girl,

Are you mad?”

She was always tempered by disappointment.

She’d just stand,

Angry

Hands on hips, facing the emptiness.

Her dirty, pretty smell still hung in the air.

She looked pretty lying there,

Lying asleep,

Like the illustration of Sleeping Beauty.

Her mind wandered.

In that peaceful oblivion,

Divorced from the feelings that usually plagued her,

Unworried about what she looked like in her homemade clothing

Or what others thought of the girl with invisible wounds.

You can see her counting the minutes

Until she can get the hell out of there.

It’s not easy to see something destroyed.

She disappeared.

She was torn from her dreams.

Women in Danger (The New Yorker & Glamour Magazine)

Women in Danger

Now that her husband has gone on to his glory

The Waiting Woman wears a long dark skirt.

She befits her role as a female living in America,

The sound of silence, of loneliness, that pervades her house.

We are so attached to our identities as independent women,

We rarely show men our weaknesses.

I wanted to show him

I could handle myself.

I know you can do it.

He said,

But today, I’m going to do it for you.

The Dashing Man will not go away,

His continuing presence is a testament to her charm.

“Ode to the Man Who Kneels”

He lays his heavy head on her lap

Whenever he gets tired of the violence in his life.

She’s too frightened to explore.

These are the essential learning moments

Every woman needs.

You really do get smarter

By going where you shouldn’t in love.

Drunk and swept away

Big strong girl,

Let him help you…

The King's Riots (The New Yorker)

The King's Riots

Sitting on the back porch,

Drinking tea, listening to crickets, and talking.

Talking with people who've pulled a trigger.

They were considered terrorists.

Local landmarks

A grassy area nearby.

The main body drop

Up to eleven bodies a week

Most were brutally mutilated.

We've already taken our revenge.

American bombing.

We're the ones who've made them crawl.

American patrols ambushed.

They had death squads.

Now we're the ones to pick them up.

They were killing too many people.

They never killed anyone who was innocent.

Neighbors celebrate

When some were killed.

Victims really are all "bad guys"

"Please don't kill me,"

Hunt a bad guy

Kill a bad guy

Get out of there alive.

The people realized they had let something in that they couldn't control.

they don't train you for this.

Among Reason and Plants (The New Yorker)

Among Reason and Plants

The forest was like a crowded city.

The trees and grass

stop thinking altogether and just droop.

They lived in this land as best they could.

The hunter was like his father

caressing flowers and trees

with trembling pleasure,

waging war on the birds and beasts

as if they were ferocious enemies.

And then returning home

a kind, sensitive family man

Longing to be back in nature.

His day would be taken over by bushes and soil.

I'll carry on living in darkness.

He disappeared into the forest,

putting aside his recent grief

for the sake of future life.

While at home, a choir of young girls

Were singing far away,

but the sense of their music remained clear:

People should live in bliss,

Not in need and torment.

The gloom of nature

The loveliness of the world

His own heart's joy.

Listen to the voices of fate.

Fallen Idols (The New Yorker)

Fallen Idols

In bed by nine-thirty

out of bed by 6 A.M.

For the past few years,

His wife has been dreaming

More and more in French.

These conversations are oddly soothing.

Nothing could be more natural

than the cadences of

one language summoning the other.

We had finished dinner

Were sitting in the living room.

Cocktails are at six-thirty.

Why must you find trauma

Where there is none?

When the shells began to fall,

The visits gradually ceased.

Soon came the names of the dead.

Their brief descriptions

scribbles on three-by-five inch index cards.

The war shattered the world

Visibly destroyed that nursery of living culture.

Someone starts speaking in French.

The boy became depressed

hinting at suicide.

He brews coffee

and head down the hall to his study.

White brick walls

Black-and-white tiled floor.

Conceal the losses.

He dips into the manuscripts and books that

people send him

seeking a moment

when all the world spoke French.

The Critics (The New Yorker)

The Critics

There was young couple.

He was a likable man

A talented, cunning suitor

Desirable and independent

with all the subtlety of a supernova.

She was likely to be awake.

A believer in strong voices,

She had taught The Boy

how to speak like a poem.

He lives here with his cat

and occasionally his wife.

The wedding was a mourning song

without death.

Their youth is apparent

with the ticking of clocks.

They lost focus,

Lacked vigor.

Generations passed

It grew harder to act.

And, in the end, could not resist themselves.

She did not want to be disturbed

He will change his view.

They fell apart.

It's not the space one has,

It's the time.

There is no end.

They will come to life again

after a good rain.

Music Under Attack (Rolling Stone)

Music Under Attack

Support the art,

and the truth that is music.

Explicit lyrics

explicit language

"nigga" "bitch" and "ho."

You can't improve anything

if you ban three words.

Increased regulation of obscenities

Opposition to censorship.

One man's vulgarity

is another's lyric

His fundamental right to express

To change people's lives.

People don't sing happy songs

if they're broke.

Fix our communities,

We'll fix our lyrics.

Jolting Innovation (New York Times)

Jolting Innovation

Declined outlook

weighed down

shouted down

by the misjudging weak.

Keep going

tighten the reins.

Jolted

Growing

Cutting

Making big cuts to everything.

Cutting waste, fraud, abuse

Cutting signs of weakness

that could slow and crimp the recovery.

We won't bring the down the curtain

don't fall out from the fight.

Set off investigations

Grab the headlines.

We're not at the end

We're at the beginning.

Think a bit about how

this world

should be changed.

We need a mind like his

to push, to be precise,

to glow.

The torch has been passed

Congratulations, have fun.

City Born Unpeopled (New York Times)

City Born Unpeopled

The tomorrowland version

built from scratch

is all but deserted.

Weeds are beginning to sprout.

Broad boulevards are unimpeded.

Office buildings stand vacant.

Pedestrians are in short supply.

"It's pretty lonely here."

I just wanted to reach across

the airwaves and the years

face-to-face.

I would love for you to consider

an apology

relatively small

not fully understood.

People say it's an empty city

but I don't find any inconveniences living by myself.

One day you will understand

why you did what you did.

Justice Asks for an Apology (New York Times)

Justice Asks for an Apology

The deadly attack into

the deadliest day

"don't ask, don't tell."

Three weeks before

he stood among

a litany of breakdowns.

A suicide at the base.

Help us.

Pray about this.

Seven killed

secretly leaving their sanctuaries.

Guerrilla factions fighting

the boarded and border bound

where they are believed to

enjoy at least protection

at least hope.

That will end of my watch.

"don't ask, don't tell."

Handwritten Murder (New York Times)

Handwritten Murder

He was not in the courtroom

to tell his tangled story

to avoid a death sentence.

For nearly three hours

the hushed courtroom

heard his life and crimes

slipped into, spattered across

prison writings He wrote.

My dark shadow was let loose

Self-serving, suicidal and grandiose.

He beat the sleeping father

with a baseball bat.

A calculated, cold blooded predator

passed through their fear

into the calm waters of abject terror.

He claimed that he had not

raped the younger child.

He praised the bravery of

her sister

who tried to escape.

Their mother had been

a coward.

I am no angel.

He used words like darkness

demons and depravity.

He said he had

been trying to kill himself.

The scars on my

soul have forever defined me.

he had never healed.

Spiritual Tourists (New York Times)

Spiritual Tourists

There is negative energy in the air here

emanating from the earth

keeping people away.

We're sitting on a graveyard

The tragedy, the woes

Shattering the tranquillity.

Questions about who did what to whom.

It's been a long process.

She is optimistic though.

This is about learning harmony

and appreciating life.

It will come back, in its own time

expanding our understanding

of life and death.

We are spiritual visitors.

He's so wildly imaginative

she suffers for lack of imagination.

She didn't want to come back at first

because of how long it's taken

to get to this level.

Art came from the depths

of his imagination.

All one needs is infinite patience

and an entire afternoon.

Powerful transition

could happen

anywhere.