Energy East, 2013

I understand the need for a pipeline.
It helps the economy.
Is a nationwide boon.
Jobs from here to Alberta.
How much natural landscape will
Really be affected?
Think about the great projects of nature:
Isn't the Natural World
One big Pipeline?
Or how about the Spiritual Plane;
In the last book of his Republic
Plato posits that the souls of rational beings 
Are pumped across the Elysian national dreamscape
A la tube.
I think Hegel saw history as something
Of an interplay of natural resources
Criss crossing the bare skeleton of nature
In pipelines of Absolute Reason.
Lenin would like them well enough.
Mao would love them.
Pipelines will defeat Nazis and Communists
By becoming Nazi and Communist.
A pipeline is the worst form of government
Except for all those others.
A pipeline is the stuff of Habermasian communication,
Democracy, friction-less capitalism,
The Internet!
A pipeline!
Love in the abstract
Is a swirling cascade of my natural gases
Pumped to your processing plant!
Don't you grasp how important this is!
The future is not just about stasis,
Not just about ideals,
Not just about the triumph or fall of Party or Nation,
Not just the return of divinity to
Mortal substance...
The future can be about making money too.

1649–1793–1917-????

• July 28: 1794 – French Revolution: Maximilien de Robespierre and Louis Antoine de Saint-Just (pictured left and right respectively), architects of the Reign of Terror, were executed after having been arrested the previous day.

The Brits appear themselves quite snide

And unrefined as Regicides;

Sleepless was Charles the first alright

In Whitehall on his final night.

Before his window sang the rabble

And he was trundled to the scaffold.

Not much nicer were the French.

In a fiacre they rushed

Lou Capet to the chopping bench;

They gave him no Calèche

As was the due etiquette

For such a Magisterial Head.

But even worse for Antoinette

She only got a wagonette!

In lieu of dame and chamberlain

A sans-cullotte was in her train;

Widow Capet so high and mighty

With that old Hapsburg under-bitey!

But what about those pushy Reds!

They rushed Tsar Nicholas out of bed

As if to get his fam in toto

To pose for a nice family photo!

If you thought camera-men were quick

You’ve never seen a Bolshevik.

But while the Soviets pushed along

The Chinese sung with Mao Zedong.

Forget a family to get rid of

The whole Han culture cut its head off.

How Unconfucian! With manners dread

They sing-a-long “the East is Red”.

But have the French learned politesse?

A ’68 will pass a test…

But barely pass – a mark that falls

Short of the standards of de Gaulle.

But maybe one or two learned manners

When they switched red for green banners.

French, British, Commies! They are wholly

Without tact; such tact is only

For the Amer'can – he’ll remain tactful

As long as Terror is attackable.

To the American tact sees

That only friendliness can please.

Act chummy and hop in the car

And drive out to the country, far

-With a cheerful smile – out past the border

To some lone camp called something or other

And there the bad guy’s treated fairly

And kept happy and living (barely).

Ottawa Festival Season (A Chanson in She-Minor)

In Ottawa down by the river
There's a season for every receptacle:
One for hunting of deer,
One for chugging of beer,
And there's even a season for festivals!

Yes, even a season for festivals!
They call it the "festival season"
And the sum of its content
Is more wished for than wanted
(If that statement aligns with good reason).

Let me clarify: here one can see
All the subcultures out in full armament
And though different in taste
They have one common base,
Namely love for loud aural bombardament.

Nor is this just strictly for young'uns;
One can see large contingents of ladies
In their baby boom larking
Scanning widely for parking
And their youth (which they lost in the 80's).

As for flavour, the tastes vary wildly:
Some like "blues", some like "folk", some like "rib"...
But however inspired
There are two things required
For all fests: some wet-naps and a bib.

Though the festival names are all lame
The music is far from the lamest:
Bluesfest booked the Wu-Tang,
K. Lamar's in that folk thang;
They say Riff-Raff is hitting up chamb-fest.

But the cherry on top of the pie
Is that wonderful piece de resist...
Our big celebration
For the birth of the nation
Canada Day! (...or St. Jean Baptiste!)

Ah what an amazing four months!
To see them pass by is a bummer.
All the singers done singing!
All the bongers done binging!
Do you remember when that was called "summer"?

I remember when that was called "summer",
But no need for nostalgia or mourning!
We'll preserve it forever
Without need for a sever
Thanks to Instagram -- and global warming!

Brecht and the Thatched Roof

Homer had no home

And Dante had to leave his behind.

Li Po and Tu Fu wandered through civil wars

That did in 30 million men.

They threatened Euripides with lawsuits

And one keeps silent about

The dying Shakespeare;

Wasn't only the muse who sought Francois Villon

The police also

(nicknamed "the beloved")

Lucretius went into exile

And Heine, and so fled

Brecht underneath the Danish straw-roof.

-Bertolt Brecht

Plain Cornflakes, or, The Vagaries of Cereal Dating

“To a patio, yes! To a patio!

To a patio must we go!

To a patio, with a pitcher!

I declare it must be so.”

We agree to meet in the afternoon

On a patio for a beer.

A guy who couldn’t agree to that

(She felt) was kinda queer.

We agree to meet anywhere downtown

So long as it had a patio.

A guy who couldn’t agree to that

(She felt) was lacking Ratio.

She loves quinoa (and don’t you know!)

She loves to do photography.

Her ideal man (or chick) must boast:

Tattoos and good orthography.

Oh a lovely, lovely patio

Dear sir, (I heard her sigh)

A beer and a patio right ‘bout now

Oh sir, and I could die!

She’s “fun-loving” and “down to earth”

And “totally easy going”.

(I don’t know what she meant and I

Felt awkward for not knowing.)

Supposedly she “loves to read”

When she “has the time, but any-waaay...”

She’s read at least one book, I’m sure,

One book by Ernest Hemingway.

“Ah, patty, oh patty, how pretty-o!

Underneath an umbrella and drinking

A lovely old beer on St. Patty-o’s

What else could a woman be thinking?”

She loves to visit far-off lands

And she loves to get outdoors.

She loves so many lovely things -

But a patio! Nothing more!

Ah girls, I know you’re interesting…

Pardon my non-complacency.

I`m glad you all have likes but must

You be so damn Renaissancy?

Ah girls I know you love things

So much as loving’s able

So won’t you settle for a cup of wine

And a notched-up picnic table?

Oh men of the world who would date

And would catch you a fish on the line

Just hook on a “patio” as bait

And you’ll do (as I see it) just fine.

Ali Bey

Ali Bey

 the faith’s defender

Happy lay in

maidens’ arms;

Of paradise         a semi- preview

Allah

grants him

here on Earth

Odalisques pretty

as Huris

And

 as supple as

 gazelles-

One

is combing 

out

 his

 mustache

And another

 presses at his temples.

And a third

 plucks on a lute

sings,

dances,

kisses him 

on the heart

 where

the fires

of all

piety kindle.

But outside

all of a sudden

Sound the

 trumpets-swords-and-clatter

Weapon’s crash 

and flint

lock-shots

“Lord, the Franks are on the attack!”

The defender mounts                                  

his warhorse

Flies    

                    like a dream

 towards the battle;

He’s still in mind

 of when he lay there 

among the maidens’ arms.

All the while that

he is chopping

here

 and there

 at

Frankish heads

he is lauging

       like a lover

Yes,

softly 

       he chuckles .

King Goujian and the Toad

Goujian, King of ancient Yué

Despaired at the cowardice of his Grande Armée;

He was at a loss how to inspire

Their milksop hearts with fire

And like heroes how to risk their lives

Instead of grumbling about their crops and their wives.

One day, while leading his corps

He discerned a green splotch near the hooves of his horse.

On inspection the ribbitin'

Revealed an amphibian,

A toad who, enraged at the army approaching

(Finding its men to be rudely encroaching)

Got up on its hind quarters

And beat its chest to drive off the invaders.

The King, so impressed with this bellicose brute

Clasped his hands in a full military salute.

“Hail, brave toad,” he solemnly declared

“Who, though outnumbered, are not at all scared;

If only my men were as fearless as you

We’d have nothing to fear from the Kingdom of Wu.”

Whereupon he lowered his bonnet

And coaxed the toad upon it

Thus to flatter the creature with grandeur

Admitting it singly to his Legion D’Honneur.

His men, shamed by the honour the toad got

Became fearless of fire, and arrow, and sword-cut.

They drove off any foe that got in their way;
Acting something quite Prussian for soldiers from Yué.

Cupid and Psych-Out

In her hand a little lamp-light,

In her breast a mighty flame,

Sidles Psyche to the bedside

Where the sacred sleeper lays.

She is blushing, she is shaking

As his prettiness she sees

The unclothed God of Loving;

He awakes and off he flees.

Eighteen-hundred year atonement!

And the poor thing dies anon.

Psyche fasts and self-chastizes

'Cause she saw Love in the Raw.

The Merry Flags of Sussex

Have you been on Sussex drive this week?

My friend, you must go and take a peek.

Near the Chapters, where all the hobos leak

You’ll see our tax dollars dispensative

On some brand new things

Full of battles and kings

That fall under the bracket "commemorative"!

There the merry flags flutter, on old Sussex drive

That keep our royal heritage alive!

I saw one just the other day:

“Remember the battle of Chateauguay!”

(I’d not known it once, I have to say)

But I’ve since done my best to keep it in store:

“Chateauguay, what glory!

Chateauguay! Wait, I’m sorry...

I remember the battle, but forget the war...”

There the merry flags flutter, on old Sussex drive

That keep our royal heritage alive!

"Ah, it was old 1812," I came to learn

“That wonderful fight wherein we did burn

The White House! Huzzah! But I can’t discern

Exactly the reason, or gain for our nation...

Wait, who fought it again?

Wasn’t it Great Britain?”

“Meh, it came with the building on Confederation!”

There the merry flags flutter, on old Sussex drive

That keep our royal heritage alive!

So hurry down and pay your respects

To the flags and the heroes down on old Sussex!

Where the PM is watching from his royal complex

Making sure our bureacracy’s littler:

And besides that, you see

Watching the NDP

Just in-case they once more support Hitler!

There the merry flags flutter, on old Sussex drive

That keep our royal heritage alive!

Doggerel for my Bloggerel

the ottawa mandarin's epitaph

here lies a civil servant after severance

(he lies, but isn’t dead – no weeping, him ).

the letter many feared, was his deliverance;

he’s earned 12 months (well paid) of sleeping in.

 the young

since his or her momentous graduation
the youth spends half their time on applications;
they spend a fourth lamenting for the nation
bewailing this our civic degradation;
the final fourth? what left for perturbation
except inglorious hours of ******bation.

the cbc

“here lies the cbc. you know,

 it was that channel

that would play The Monkees

 right after Friedrich Handel?”

the intern

at “internship the first” her sunny mantra

was  “i’m here to lend you guys a helping hand-ra!”

by number 2 she’s learnt rousseau’s refrain:

“man is born free, but everywhere’s in chains”.

by internship the 3^rd our marxist molly

has learned to sing “the internationale-ly”.

by internship the fourth, she hits the bottle

and traces slavery back to aristotle.

but number 5 rounds off the whole adventure;

she gets full time – in other words, indenture.

bloggerissimus

don’t know enough to write? i wouldn’t stress it;

the blogger knows much less than you AND says it.

the twitteratus

bit better than a blogger’s common sense

cause where the blogger rambles, he'll condense.

for twtitterspeak’s the scholar’s new best friend:

 “@Strunk&White: Well fuck. #ThisIsTheEnd”

staying informed

some say that journalism’s dead and gone

and so’s unbiased informay-SHI-un.

so it’s becoming needful, more and more

to pick up what you can from Jersey Shore.

(and here the english major up and groans:

“BS! we get our news from Game of Thrones!”)

prime minister

our pater patriae

who loves us muchy.

a sane and sober head

but kind of touchy.

whenever i address him

he gets grouchy;

i always mix “right honourable”

up with “duce”.

Things I Happen to Know

I know damn well wasps like ketchup,

I know a man by his cap,

I know an awesome time from a fuck up,

I know a pine tree’s got sap,

I know a hobo from a chap,

I know a Quebecois by his “oui?”

I know a wink from a slap.

I know it all, but not me.

I know the smoker by his smell,

I know the hipster by his taste,

I know a liar by his "well...",

I know the student’s life (a waste)

I know a slutty top from a chaste

I know a neckbeard goes with geeks

I know a hot wing by its glaze

I know it all, but not me.

I know a Costco from a Loblaws

I know a Mac from a PC

I know safe drugs by the bylaws

I know a pug dog is wheezy

I know a cat by my sneezing

I know a public servant’s card-key

I know a good book from a sleazy

I know it all, but not me.

Cheap or expensive, willing or loath,

Boss, I know everything, see?

I know Death comes for us both

I know it all, but not me.

The Antiquities of College

Like the Frenchmen who wandered south-east in the Spring

and come through the verdure to mouldering Rome

Beforehand prepared by a Latin sequence of poems

Are, arrived, fallen deep in the dusts of the thing

And consider of Earth, and its splendour

How marble comes often apart

As Time with her cronies depart

So too how do men to their essential powder.

Like these when into the Bookstore

the First Year, before his first class

enticed by a wood-cut or antique looking cover

Finds when he gives the money over

And to his learning (thinks he) comes at last

The whole of his hours to bore, bore bore...

On the list

"We read, we read" they say "evER-y-day!"

Say my gen., who've time for novels

.................but little for poetry.

The denser the text, shorter the wordcount;

there's not much in a few pages

.................to brag about.

Of indecorous Villon, pushy Catullus, and steady John Donne

big-hearted Du Fu, muck-loving Basho, or even whimpering Novalis

.................they'll have little or none.

Short and steep; long and casual;

That people go where others lead

.................Is it so unusual?