Inconsistency as a Virtue

Obama’s televised address
On aiding Libya’s revolt
Was apt to disappoint unless
One’s not an all-or-nothing dolt
And understands a need to act
Although a forecast‘s not exact.

No Smoking

The FDA’s considering
An end to menthol-flavored smokes.
Already, fruity flavoring
The Congress banned in hope to coax
The kids from thinking there’s less threat
If nicotine’s not all they get.

Wake Up, It's Dangerous Outside

Reagan National Airport’s tower,
Serving Washington, D.C.,
First reported, lost its power
After midnight. Could that be?
Not so fast. Read more and weep.
The lone controller fell sleep.

Sundown

National Velvet, my first movie,
Lit my pre-pubescent fire.
Velvet Brown was oh so groovy;
Taylor was my first desire.
Liz, I fantasized, requited
Love routinely reignited.

All the World's Not a Stage

The world’s most famous ditherer
Was Hamlet, who, to trap the king
(His father’s likely murderer)
Declared within the play’s the thing.
He’d show what Claudius had done
Upon a stage, though not for fun.

Do It for the Kids

It seems that every station break
She wants to drill more deep for oil.
And now Japan’s god-awful quake
Has made Americans recoil
From softening their adverse stance
About more nuclear power plants.

High-Flying Birds of a Feather

The TSA, which pats us down
While we try hard to make our plane
Thinks maybe we’re less apt to frown
If more security’s made sane
And thus suggests for those we trust
A special line, which might be just.

Rising Above It

How could the world look otherwise
Upon a pending massacre
Except through thoughtless monsters’ eyes
And risk Rawanda, as it were.
Not quite a million Tutus died
While we and others looked aside.

My Wilted Irish Rose

An Irish knee-jerk safeguard from distress
For centuries is a fatalistic guess
That only emigration can relieve
A desperate need at home to beg one’s leave.

A Gaijin's Love Affair

I started life by hating Japs,
Those leering bastards in cartoons.
When A-bombs forced the war’s collapse,
I felt it served them right, the goons.
At seven years of age, I thought,
The peeling skin is what they bought.

Accept Yahweh, Infidel!

My hopes have soared to such a height
That setbacks in North Africa
(For instance, rebels in their fight
To disencumber Libya
Of tyranny but now give ground)
Compel my urging schemes more sound.

The Next Witness, His Holiness . . .

House panel chairman Peter King
Suspects the nation’s Muslims breed
Fanatics who are threatening
Our safety. We’re not all agreed.
But yes or no, who’s he to say,
Once patron of the IRA?

Losing Our Sheen

What’s galling about Charlie Sheen
Is not the twit he likes to be.
It’s what his mockeries demean:
Recurrent meds and therapy,
As if his psychiatric health
Were passable because of wealth.

God Loves Fags

A Kansas congregation deems
That God Hates Fags, and so therefore,
A land that harbors them blasphemes
And thus deserves to field in war
Gay troops who didn’t ask or tell,
And who if killed went straight to hell.

Let's Carry On for Frank

Heaven hail you, Corporal Buckles,
World War I’s last U.S. soldier,
Bio of whom yields white knuckles,
Near-death times so tough to conjure:
Scarlet fever, German biplanes,
POW (World War II) strains.