[Feb 28, 2008]
From the PMO, a found poem loop
"There is absolutely no truth in it"
the Prime Minister said of the allegations
"I wish everyone would accept his word"
"There is absolutely no truth in it"
[Feb 8, 2008]
For Athletes, and the Laity, I recommend rhinokopia
And here's why.
Ever see those commercials for 'Opti-Breathers,' the band-aid looking things that football players sometimes wear across their noses? Apparently they flex the nostril cavities allowing for increased air flow. Well, if its true, it may explain the success of Justinian II who was Emperor of Constantinople, on and off, for about 16 years from 685-711 A.D.
You see, back in them days, it was popular to punish deposed Emperors by cutting their noses off, this is rhinokopia. Apparently this rendered them unfit to rule because no Emperor could have a physical deformity, and a missing nose is a very public deformity indeed. Rhinokopia was no such barrier to Justinian II. This is where the Opti-Breather comes in. If 'Opti-Breath' gives you extra strength because of its increased air flow through the nostril cavities then rhinokopia must lead to super human strength since it involves complete nostril removal. Imagine the air flow! The super human strength! In the light of the evidence of the Opti-Breather it would appear that rhinokopia actually led to Justinian's re-ascension. When he was attacked by two would be assassins, who were sent by his brother-in-law as a favour to the current Emperor who feared Justinian's revival, he overpowered and strangled them both with a cord. They had noses, and he didn't! He then set sail for Bulgaria and marched noseless into Constantinople at the head of a large and victorious army. Knowing the hidden power of rhinokopia Justinian had the two previous Emperors decapitated. Decapitation is not an aid to better inhalation. Justinian ruled again for six more years, breathing deeply 10's of thousands of times, but rhinokopia is not to be confused with the fountain of youth. In 711 at the age of 42 Justinian was decapitated in mortal combat with a man half his age.
I wonder what sort of athletic trends we can expect when the medical advancements of rhinokopia are seized upon by the press? Will we then hold our noses, or hand them over?
[Feb 4, 2008]
In this light, we don't look so good.
from The Notes of Nic Coivert
"What one does with power, for we are all granted it, is a crucial issue, and one that is necessarily guided by culture. So what do we do, culturally, with the power granted us?
Is power used to gratify the self, or is it put back, somehow re-gifted, into the energizing primary body, the primal source?
What we do with our gifts shall shape the future.
Vroom Vroom"
-
[jan 29, 2008] -a poem
APRIL INC
1)
We hear a lot these days
What it means
Some insist
This argument
Yet
the whole
April, as you know
They love
They are
the poets emerge
sodden drab
Treacherous,
shiver over books
2)
In the cities
gritty deposits
Why should they?
The street
nostrils and home
to bed
It has been
you should offer
That means April
Time was
I spent years
But in retrospect
afterwards
the time
No matter
3)
we passed
thousands
ourselves
their farms
trailers attached
at ninety degrees
Honey Bear
rattle-snake
barren hill
preacher
prophet
press
northern bargain/
American dream-
Nirvana
bathing the latest fad
haunted bridge
seven inches wide
4)
sinking mind
streamlined groceteria
pavement
bland-eye lolling
eating the mail
What letters
One time father
pale, meaningless
perpetual –gone
5)
March had been
cut back
folding stool
beautiful
beside an
ocean
at last, the car
crossed Oklahoma
ninety miles from the city
got there
in front of the cottage
6)
on the puddle
The air was damp
all right
we saw them, the thin
blades the cruellest
as T.S. Eliot says
in prelude
Nobody arrives warm
Sherbrooke balconie
the mountain in the twilight
When will
be will
-
Kemeny Babineau
Kick Ass Prunes, or, How Suave Diplomacy Dissuades
a Big Stick
[from Jan 23 , 2008]Circa 1910
(Laurier is Prime Minister and Taft has recently succeeded T. Roosevelt as President): The following is a spliced quotation from Joseph Schull’s “Laurier: The First Canadian.”
"Any country that refused to give American products the lowest tariff it granted to any other country was to be met with a flat increase of twenty-five per cent on all its exports to the United States. No concessions were offered in return...one by one.. most countries had given way. Canada remained....
If the American act came into force, (Laurier let it be known), he would immediately impose export duties on Canadian pulp and the first result would be the closing of some twenty paper mills in New Hampshire... Taft admitted that American demands were outrageous, but he could not escape from the provisions of the law.
The excuse, when found, had been beautiful in its simplicity. Out of the categories to which Canada gave preferential entry, thirteen insignificant items ranging from photographs to prunes had been selected and the preference on them had been granted...(and) the Americans lifted the threat of a twenty five per cent super tariff." (p 500-01)
....
bravenet.com