JANUARY: our history

*note: Emotional distress and general Hot-Mess-ness forced me to make up all of January's entries in the spring, as opposed to compose them in real time.  Please enjoy "our history," one poem inspired by all the the January articles listed below:

THE ARTICLES:

"Career Shift Often Means Drop in Living Standards"
by Catherine Rampell
January 1, 2011
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/01/business/economy/01hires.html

"Sustainable Love: The Happy Marriage Is the ‘Me’ Marriage"
by Tara Parker-Pope 
January 2, 2011
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/02/weekinreview/02parkerpope.html

A Bronx Elementary School, Surrounded by Prostitutes
by Yardena Schwartz
January 3, 2011
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/03/nyregion/03bronx.html

"Iran Invites Some Nations, Not U.S., for Nuclear Tour"
by Mark Landler
January 4, 2011
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/04/world/middleeast/04tehran.html

"Do Word Changes Alter 'Huckleberry Finn'?"
January 5, 2011
http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2011/01/05/does-one-word-change-huckleberry-finn

"China’s Push to Modernize Military Is Bearing Fruit"
by Michael Wines and Edward Wong
January 6, 2011
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/06/world/asia/06china.html

"Religious Leaders Call for New Efforts to Lower the City’s ‘Chilling’ Abortion Rate"
by Paul Vitello
January 7, 2011
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/07/nyregion/07abortion.html

"The Handwritten Letter, an Art All but Lost, Thrives in Prison"
by Jeremy W. Peters
January 8, 2011
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/08/business/media/08jailmail.html

"Study Finds Family Connections Give Big Advantage in College Admissions"
by Tamar Lewin
January 9, 2011
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/09/education/09legacies.html

"For Poor, Bail System Can Be an Obstacle to Freedom"
by John Eligon
January 10, 2011
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/10/nyregion/10bailbonds.html

"Depth of the Kindness Hormone Appears to Know Some Bounds"
by Nicholas Wade
January 11, 2011
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/11/science/11hormone.html

"At One School, a Push for More Play Time"
by Sharon Otterman
January 12, 2011
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/12/education/12kindergarten.html

"Autism Fraud"
January 13, 2011
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/13/opinion/13thu2.html

"White House Memo: Girl’s Death Hits Home for Obama"
by Helene Cooper
January 14, 2011
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/14/us/14obama.html

"Did Your Horoscope Predict This?"
by Jesse McKinley
January 15, 2011
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/15/us/15zodiac.html

"Local Intelligence: Rosie the Riveter Memorial"
by Hank Pellissier
January 16, 2011
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/16/us/16bcintel.html?

"Transforming Africa Through Higher Education"
by Nazanin Lankarani
January 17, 2011
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/17/world/africa/17iht-educSide17.html

"Mind: When Self-Knowledge Is Only the Beginning"
by Richard A. Friedman,
January 18, 2011
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/18/health/views/18mind.html

"Getting Someone to Psychiatric Treatment Can Be Difficult and Inconclusive"
by A. G. Submerge and Benedict Carey
January 19, 2011
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/19/us/19mental.html

"A Racy Show With Teenagers Steps Back From a Boundary"
by Brian Stelter
January 20, 2011
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/20/business/media/20mtv.html

"A Firm Commitment to Casual"
by A. O. Scott
January 21, 2011
http://movies.nytimes.com/2011/01/21/movies/21nostringsattached.html

"For Women, Sundance Is Sunnier Than Hollywood"
by Brooks Barnes
January 22, 2011
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/22/movies/22sundance.html

"Can Wal-Mart Make Us Healthier?"
January 23, 2011
http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2011/01/23/can-wal-mart-make-us-healthier?

"Does College Make You Smarter?"
January 24, 2011
http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2011/01/24/does-college-make-you-smarter?

"Sons of Divorce Fare Worse Than Daughters"
by Roni Caryn Rabin
January 25, 2011
http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/01/25/sons-of-divorce-fare-worse-than-daughters

"Can India Leapfrog China?"
by Katrin Bennhold
January 26 2011
http://dealbook.nytimes.com/2011/01/26/can-india-leapfrog-china/

"Tussling Over Jesus"
by Nicholas D. Kristof
January 27, 2011
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/27/opinion/27kristof.html

"Writing the Play His Curiosity Led Him To"
by Felicia R. Lee
January 28, 2011
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/28/theater/28lopez.html

"I Was a Tiger Daughter"
by Verna Yu
January 29, 2011
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/29/opinion/29iht-edyu29.html

"The Search: A Sign of Hope for More Hiring"
by Phyllis Korkki 
January 30, 2011
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/30/jobs/30search.html

"Teacher, My Dad Lost His Job. Do We Have to Move?"
by Michael Winerip 
January 31, 2011
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/31/education/31winerip.html

THE POEM:
our history

you weren't a firm

commitment to casual

it wasn't one of those
open sesame firestorms
it was the opposite in

white and rice and 

flowers and firsts

 

we will have questions like

did your horoscope predict this
and where do we go from here

 

they took the n-word

out of Huck Finn

 

we will wonder if

changing one word

can change everything

 

when I do becomes don't

will the way we have always told

our history substitute its
own words for ones with
shorter syllables

 

they say

the happy marriage is

the me marriage

that

sustainable love

is some part selfish

 

this isn't some
career shift that makes
bodies standing ups go downs and drop

lines like questions like
what is our your new address and

the signs of hope for hiring are

out-of-state meant for greener pastures

in other zip codes where

a postal code is a post-us abode

 

you know sons

do worse than daughters

when these things happen

 

we'd rather tussle over Jesus

than over the two of you

 

come or stay and

let's play leapfrog--

you be China I'll be India

you can teach me things

from The Economist

and I'll keep you young

 

we both know self-knowledge is

only the beginning and I'm

too young to know

getting someone to psychiatric treatment

can be difficult and

inconclusive

 

is that why

in sickness

wasn't in

parentheses

 

I will go to a school

in the Bronx

surrounded by prostitutes

 

they will cut our recess short

 

across the ocean

China is modernizing its military

to bear fruit

 

Iran is snubbing us

on a nuclear tour

 

Africans are

transforming themselves

through higher education

 

here we sit in the

not-aborted mess

we made a point
to create

 

I will be lonely

 

I will find a penpal

from prison

 

he will write to me

and to Maxim every week

 

we will keep the art of letter-writing

alive

 

one day I will get myself arrested

just to get you in the same room

 

kindness is not boundless

it is bound by

a perimeter of

its own chemical make-up

 

divorce is an unraveling of hormones,

we will learn

 

I will go to college

your name will help me

as we always knew it would

 

she will change her name back

the process will take a year

 

bureaucracy doesn't allow a woman

to just
move on

 

even Rosie

would have taken time

to detach
(all those rivets)

 

will college make me smarter?

probably as much as

Wal Mart can

make me healthier

 

I will get older

and study your wife

as a woman

instead of a mother

 

I will understand why

she dances in Utah

but not in Hollywood

why she called herself

a tiger daughter

 

curiosity will make us write

writing will make us remember

remembering will make us wish

wishing will make us dead

 

the public death of children

will make you scared

to lose me

all over again

 

I will believe you love me

as much as I don't believe

vaccines cause autism

 

I will form the opinion that

the opposite of fraud

is faith

 

I will not be a racy teenager

I will save my crises

for my twenties

when it will be

my own problem

 

the world will become very big

as it becomes very small

 

we will become closer

as we grow further apart

 

I will never choose between you

by learning to choose myself

 

I will tell our history

a new way each time

Isabelle

THE ARTICLE:

“Isabelle Caro, Anorexic Model, Dies at 28”

by William Grimes

December 31, 2010

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/31/world/europe/31caro.html

THE POEM:

Isabelle

elle etait une fille tres mince

elle avait 28 ans et elle vivait sans un prince

(parce que)

quand on a une probleme comme ca tres grande

et un coeur tres faible comme le lui

l’amour ne peut pas endurer longtemps

2010

THE ARTICLE:

“The 110 Things New Yorkers Talked About in 2010”

by Stuart Emmrich

December 30, 2010

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/30/fashion/30Year.html

THE POEM:

2010

this year royalwe bedbugged at every hour of the night as

love wikileaked all over bodies dressed in (more)meat learning

new words like defriend or detag (that picture of us kissing)
on our way to pre-hab where doctors

told us you’re not handicapped like the people swinging from roofs

on Broadway’s slipperyspidery web of casualties

and the kids are not alright no matter what it says in print

this year royalthey said they’d say foreverandever one day
while we kept treading water in a gardened state living

it’s hard to move on when nothing is changing

except for everything around you

there’s no lump in my breast yet is it just

a matter of time the women in my family

lose their skin one surgery at a time and

each other one fightonfight at a time

sometimes they stick sometimes they grow

with time and my ex boyfriend told me

blood doesn’t much matter as we catch up

over Christmas and I again think what a shame

we aren’t it because he’s so lovely

the rent has always been too damn high for

young kids working for tips in rooms

full of immigrants whose lives are

much harder than mine and I wish I

spoke the same language because it’s lonely not

to understand what’s going on around you

twelve hours of the day

my body has changed

this year has weathered it

but men still tell me it’s

quite the slab

but then again

anyone will say anything

when there’s an eager tongue

near a hard dick

but then again

I’ve gotten better at

choosing what I want

while I’ve gotten worse at

getting it

my first thought of January 1 will be

I don’t want to meet this year

downstairs in Brooklyn with my

former partnerinnewyears passed out

post-way too high and my best friends

upstairs singing slow jams

until the break of fast they’ll exit

diner-bound

in the morning

the rest of us will get coffee and bagels

and take the train

back to the problems

we’ll learn to solve

in warmer weather

my friend will tell me that night

my face looks sunken in

I will know I weigh less and look worse

this year has weathered my body

it has stress lines in new places

it has the same scars in old places

down there where I’ve thought about lying

and saying it’s a C-section scar to

get sympathy from men who

don’t know the stories of my frame

just yet like a crazy person or adolescent

who thinks pain reels anyone in because

it usually makes them run and

this year has weathered my mind

along with my body

they tell me I have a

biological pre-

disposition to

thisstuff and I

am relieved it’s

not just me it’s

all of history

all of atoms colliding with atoms

except not in the rightest of ways

and the nature nurture debate is a silly one

sometimes it’s more one than the other

but it’s always both

yes

THE ARTICLE:

“Is It Rape? It Depends on Who Is Asking”

by Katrin Benhold

December 29, 2010

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/29/world/europe/29iht-letter29.html

THE POEM:

yes

it is a shame for some things

to be tricky like love and sex

or sex without love love without sex

sex without a well formed yes

to kick things off

too many of my friends

have woken up

in pools of blood

too many of my friends

have been entered

at gun point

too many of my friends

have not dealt in

ambiguity

there has been no line

dressed in fog or

miscommunication

no question of
one yes turning
into two

there is a game we play

in the theater

it involves a circle of people

who trade places based on

eye contact and the word yes

it builds trust

it takes time
and rhythm

it is a shame for some things

to be tricky like love and sex

and the words in between

or far away

N.B.A. in India

THE ARTICLE:

“N.B.A. in India, in Search of Fans and Players”

by Jeremy Kahn

December 28, 2010

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/28/sports/basketball/28india.html

THE POEM:

N.B.A. in India

crickets chirping on bats and balls

in Bombay beds of grass

give way to balls of

the spalding variety held in

oversized black and white

mostly black hands as big

in ratio as their bodies’

heights that make tall shadows

next to short brown ones

in this cross-global endeavor

that reeks of capitalism

and sweat

it happened in China

it happened in Spain

their tallest men came to America

and jumped for a living

now our men will go to Bangalor

and Balasore and jump for

their men their women their money

Monogamous Drunkards

THE ARTICLE:

“Do We Drink Because We’re Monogamous, or Are We Monogamous Because We Drink?”

by Stephen J. Dubner

December 27, 2010

http://freakonomics.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/12/27/do-we-drink-because-were-monogamous-or-are-we-monogamous-because-we-drink/

THE POEM:

Monogamous Drunkards

have fun exploring

the alcoholic abyss

we call monogamy

cause the more times

you come home to the

same man the more

shots you down of

Captain Morgan or is it

the more beer

guzzling in your throat

the less energy you have

to devote to the chase of

multiple sex friends so this

journey ends in the

same bed night after

nightfall so call us all

monogamous drunkards

cause we stay hunkered down

between the sheets our breath

smelling of booze as we

lose ourselves between

the same pair of legs

get to know the creaks of

the same beds and it’s

progressive this way

that we live devoted

to one another until

we drop dead  

a hundred and fifty

THE ARTICLE:

“You’ve Got to Have (150) Friends”

by Robin Dunbar

December 26, 2010

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/26/opinion/26dunbar.html

THE POEM:

a hundred and fifty

a thousand miles between

pores is four hands worth

to handle

long distance

loveships require

substitutions for

facetoface

love ups since

it’s hard to make

oxytocin production

produceup itself

in the absence of

real eye contact

and the things flesh

can say that

cellphones don’t

translate

love will decrease by

fifteen percent a year

without skin to skin

hereiam

a hundred and fifty

names and stories

is all I can handle

there are two

stories I

couldn’t handle

these days

we click on the faces

we don’t get to touch

and touch the ones

just a train ride away

Jackie Robinson

THE ARTICLE:

“Archive Shows Robinson As Moderator on Morality”

by Alison Leigh Cowan

December 25, 2010

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/25/sports/baseball/25robinson.html

THE GIST:
Jackie Robinson is famous for becoming the first black American to play in the Major Leagues as a Brooklyn Dodger in 1947.  Robinson endured extreme prejudice when he entered the MLB, including players on his own team threatening to sit out, constant racial slurs from opposing teams, and physical attacks like opponents purposefully gashing him with their cleats.  Less known is that in 1958, Robinson hosted an episode of "Talk Back," a Methodist television program on which panelists debated moral issues such as business ethics, treatment of the disabled, and race relations.  In this episode, Robinson moderated a panel discussing a fictional scenario in which a man wants to let a lower-level employee take the fall for his own mistake.   After retiring from baseball, Robinson served as Vice President for Personnel at Chock Full o' Nuts, where he dealt with hiring and firing.  In the conversation, Robinson said, "I know that sometimes we get into problems because I will not fire for one mistake.  But I think you have to live with yourself.  You must give a person opportunity."  As the man who endured extreme prejudice as he single handedly integrated baseball, Robinson was a fitting choice to moderate a discussion on morality and ethics.

Jackie Robinson as Brooklyn Dodger  #42

Jackie Robinson as Vice President of Chock Full o' Nuts in Connecticut

An excerpt from Jackie Robinson hosting "Talk Back"

THE POEM:

Jackie Robinson

he knows
this blood diamond
isn't conflict free as
a small soul's cleats
dig into his soles
approaching first

they threatened to strike

he knows
this square
is symmetrical
in its slurs
as they chant nigger
in a four/four
time signature

they said go back to the cotton fields

he knows
Dodgers in the dug out
are digging themselves in
to the ground and
they'd bleach it white
if they could

they aimed for his head

but there's no crying in baseball
so he crafts a new back
out of rubber
off which
words and balls can bounce
until gravity
will do them in

Colored/White

THE ARTICLE:

“A Tug of War, With Strings of Lights”

by Cara Buckley

December 24, 2010

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/24/nyregion/24lights.html

THE POEM:
Colored/White

 

Someone had a dream

that one day this nation

would rise up and

live out the true

meaning of its creed

in laundry baskets

and on Christmas trees

I balance my

preference for white lights

with preferring

black men

a deaf haiku

THE ARTICLE:

“Deaf Player at Cal State Northridge Has a Real Feel for the Game”

by Karen Crouse

December 23, 2010

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/23/sports/ncaabasketball/23northridge.html

a deaf haiku

ears that cannot hear

so eyes make contact with the

bodies on the court

All Time Low

THE ARTICLE:

“Teenage Birth Rate Falls 6 Percent”

by the AP

December 22, 2010

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/22/health/22brfs-TEENAGEBIRTH_BRF.html

THE POEM:

All Time Low

Teenage girls are getting better

at getting the pill

behind their mothers’ backs

Teenage boys are getting better at

putting condoms on bananas

Some kids are getting pregnant on purpose

to be on reality TV

They want to be on magazine covers and

make hundreds of thousands of dollars a year

off the fights and formula

But most of them, 9610 out of a thousand,

are getting smarter about zippers and buttons,

at keeping things on or knowing what to do

when they take them off

Maybe it’s the economy

Maybe it’s their health teachers

Maybe it’s liberal girls who

don’t can’t or won’t use tampons but

have unprotected sex and

starred Planned Parenthood

in the phone book

Maybe it’s religion

We play God all the time

Women take hormones to stop the things

their bodies were programmed to do

We sign up for surgery

to correct things

that have gone wrong

We think we can control everything

if we just find out how

It is the heart of this

all time low

Full Nest Syndrome

THE ARTICLE:

“Full Nest Syndrome”

December 21, 2010

http://schott.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/12/21/full-nest-syndrome/?scp=1&sq=full%20nest%20syndrome&st=cse

THE POEM:

Full Nest Syndrome

There is a term for

the way we live:

they call it

Full Nest Syndrome

Like it’s a disease

that belongs in the DSM

Like it’s something that needs to be

explained because it’s

got layers and pieces that

fit together in a weird sort of way

My mother says

there are many ways to be an adult

When she was my age she was

married with children

She and my father bought

Shop Rite Brand everything

I take my paychecks to the bar

She turned hers into diapers

She didn’t ask where I slept the other night

when I didn’t come home

She wasn’t involved when I bought

a one-way ticket across the country

Sometimes we go days without seeing each other

I work nights

She works days

It’s weird, the way we live

A collection of symptoms

A collection of people

Some learning to grow old

Some trying to grow up

Solstice

THE ARTICLE:

“There Goes the Sun”

by Richard Cohen

December 20, 2010

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/20/opinion/20cohen.html

THE POEM:

Solstice

he tells me to look at the moon

it’s disappearing as we speak

he didn’t meet a woman

while gazing at the sky

the way I didn’t meet a man

when I dropped all my change

I haven’t yet explored all the

layers of his life

Haven’t yet learned about the half siblings he doesn’t know

Haven’t yet told him I’m estranged from my brother

Tonight he says he thinks the cracks make things more interesting

after I say cinematic moments are great but sometimes the real stuff,

the unedited, awkward cadence of our lives,

can be better

Later we will explore the

details of each other’s bodies

It will be difficult to kiss while standing up

It will involve my tiptoes

and a deep curve of his spine

We are both artists and it is hard to love us

There is a play we both like that says

to love an artist is to love someone who is

always going away from you,

that inside our heads there is always

something more beautiful

It is hard to disagree with beautiful words

but I do

In Latin solstice means the sun is standing still

People who are not yet in love

are scared to stand still with one another

even though it is harder
to start moving

than to stop

The inertia of our bodies

is a complicated business

Later we will lie with the stillness of the sun

that the shades of his bedroom windows

will keep out

I will not be sure if we are in motion

or if we have moved

Repeal

THE ARTICLE:

“Senate Repeals Ban Against Openly Gay Military Personnel”

by Carl Hulse

December 19, 2010

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/19/us/politics/19cong.html

A collaboration with guest poet Michael Brienza

THE POEM:

Repeal

Are you gay?

It’s ok!

Shoot some bad guys

and tone your thighs

Ask!

Tell!

Converse!

Are you a guy who likes men?

Is your name Matt and his name Ben?

No more rules to hide your love

We don’t care who you dream of

Ask!

Tell!

Converse!

Some will say it’s still a sin

But this is the change we believed in

This is the new American pie

Men who love men willing to die

Ask!

Tell!

Converse!

It’s ok

It’s alright

Fuck a guy

and then go fight!

crinkle

THE ARTICLE:

“Tests Detect Alzheimer’s Risks, But Should Patients Be Told?”

by Gina Kolata

December 18, 2010

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/18/health/18moral.html

THE POEM:

crinkle

I try to memorize the lines on my husband’s face

They will grow deeper and more permanent

as my grasp of them leaves crease by fold

I tell him I will forget his name, our anniversary

But I will not forget this love—how can you forget a feeling?

He says it doesn’t work like that

This will be harder on him

I tell him send me away

I don’t want to be a burden

He says no matter how hollow I become

I will never be a stranger

In our twenty years together

we have always traded off who is strong and who is weak—

a rhythm of falling into one another

Soon I will always be the weak one

and he will have to be the strong one

I try to memorize the shape of our shadows on the wall as we make love

Afterwards, I wonder if this sickness will make my dreams as anonymous as my life

Maybe my dreams can hold onto the details of us

Like the way he takes his coffee in the morning

the births of our children

the lines of his favorite plays

We will develop a new rhythm

A system of lists and notes

of routine and safety

Will the expressions on my face become hollow?

He kisses the crinkles around my eyes when I laugh

He says that’s where you look to see if someone is

honest to God happy

I try to memorize the way my faces feels in those moments

I hope my bones will arrange themselves in that way on my face as I fall into him

A thousand memories per crinkle

for him to kiss on his new hollow wife

Can Congress Force You to Be Healthy?

THE ARTICLE:

“Can Congress Force You to Be Healthy?”

by Jason Mazzone

December 17, 2010

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/17/opinion/17mazzone.html

THE POEM:

Can Congress Force You to Be Healthy?

you can lead an obese man to the gym

but you cant make him lift

you can take a fat kid to the park

but you can’t make him fit

Great Leap Forward

THE ARTICLE:

“Mao’s Great Leap to Famine”

by Frank Dikotter

December 16, 2010

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/16/opinion/16iht-eddikotter16.html

THE GIST:

Rather than improving China, Mao's Great Leap Forward resulted in millions of deaths.  From about 1958 to 1961, the GLF aimed to transform China from an agrarian economy to an industrial one.  To do so, the Communist Party outlawed private farming and greatly restricted the lives of rural Chinese, leading ultimately to a devastating famine.  Frank Dikotter, author of "Mao's Great Famine," traveled to China and studied newly available records leading him to conclude that the GLF claimed about 45 million lives.  In his studies, Dikotter read horrific first-hand accounts of GLF policies: a man's ear chopped off for digging up a potato, a father forced to bury his son alive after the child stole a handful of grain, a brother killing and then eating his own brother, etc.  

THE POEM:

Great Leap Forward

knife chops down
after a potato is dug free
an ear is planted in the ground
to blossom as a warning tree

in the grainless earth
a father buries his breathing son
the anti-birth
a fate he can't outrun

a brother stabs his twin
in the bent spine
covers the face of his kin
while he eats him off the vine

starving mothers can barely weep
hungry bodies cannot leap

refer to the grass and mud

THE ARTICLE:

“Intelligence Reports Offer Dim View of Afghan war”

by Elisabeth Bumbiller

December 15, 2010

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/15/world/asia/15policy.html

THE POEM:

refer to the grass and mud

PACKman flavored crises taste like jaws full of bombs approaching in three two one

And this IS not a war we fight in columns and rows it’s fought on hills and if men can carry heavy things up them if men can shoot other men from on top of them if men can walk the miles between two hills staying alive

A body gets TAN out under an Afghan sun gets weathered in all its forms of weather gets tired on the days it doesn’t get to shoot gets frenzied on the days it does gets beaten down by a war that won’t end itself from the inside needs to think about the way space is divided between groups of people not just hills but whole countries and sometimes the lines we draw on maps that refer to the grass and mud between a country at war and its neighbor are the lines to tattoo on lesson plans for victory on the minds in charge not on the men marching in boots for them it is enough to just walk uphill and stay alive 

own December

THE ARTICLE:

“Atheist Ads on Buses Rattle Fort Worth

by James C. McKinley Jr.

December 14, 2010

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/14/us/14atheist.html

THE POEM:

own December

it’s the time of year when you’re supposed to believe in something or have someone to love because that’s the same thing but if you don’t then I still love you / -God via a van in Texas is here make you feel warmnfuzzy inside your soul

People in Texas sometimes forget about the atheists

They’re out there

They’re on the sides of buses spelling Millions are good without God because nobody owns December not even Jesus Christ (who wasn’t even born in December it’s an estimate, fools) in New York they’ve got it right don’t let you drive on in until you read it’s a myth so let’s celebrate reason this Christmas season

It’s can be lonely at Christmas time

Even the Jews have their traditions

Even the Asians on the block put up a tree (Buddha had a thing for trees)

It’s the time of year when you’re supposed to believe in something or have someone to love because that’s the same thing and I still love you / -God from a roadside van’s good side can feel tragically inadequate inside your soul

Imaginary Conversations

THE ARTICLE:

“Los Angeles Confronts Homelessness Reputation”

by Adam Nagourney

December 13, 2010

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/13/us/13homeless.html

THE POEM:

Imaginary Conversations

a homeless man shares

pages from his

gay porn with me

over lunch and says

I could be a model

if I had better skin

On days like these

he can blanket himself

with the sun

On nights like there will be tonight

he will blanket himself

with cardboard

In New York

people have to step over

people like him

Their heads lie in the gutters

on the corner of 10^th and 41^st

by the tunnel

They freeze to death

invisibly at first

and then in front page poses

at Grand Central

But here in California

people can drive by it

on their way

to

through

around and

back from

their four walled lives

In between big dicks

and muscled torsos

he tells me he used to be

in the Army

He has imaginary conversations

with his platoon leader

He doesn’t know

they’re imaginary