Save Me from the Duck Calls

The dome of the Capitol with the black Indian princess
(Liberty or symbolic of the Amerindian's extermination?)
is perfectly framed between George Washington's oaks.

I shelter in the barrel vaulted arcade of Union Station's
facade; a family disgorges from a D.C. Duck, quacking
their pesky yellow quackers; Dad gives his two toddlers

their quackers--please don't do that! Fine: they march
off into the station's inner sanctum. Water cascades
from the eastern fountain in shimmering sheets; a black-

and-white pigeon lands momentarily for a drink, sails off
over the Duck docked in the circle; its driver, Aye aye, Cap'n,
sits on a windowsill, reads James Ellroy's Black Dahlia,
idly twisting kiss curls in his remaining snow white hair.

Christopher T. George





Brave Ulysses

It's egg-fry-on-the-sidewalk weather in D.C.,
tourists in shorts mob round the U.S. Capitol,
take turns snapping pics with their digicams.

Ulysses S. Grant still sits huge and green
on his horse, brim of his slouch hat pulled down
to keep out the rain; either side of him slog

his troops, a cavalry charge, artillery, so wet,
so muddy, but it's dry here in D.C., visitors gasp
for an ice cold water or an ice cream, please.

Christopher T. George

The Danger of Abbreviations

"Tiny PCs goes into administration. . ."
Headline, BBC Business News, July 27, 2005

Tiny police constables in giant bobby's helmets swarm
over the London Underground! Must be a strategy

to get 'em to crawl under passenger seats,
bite the legs of terrorists as they get ready

to blow up their backpacks, their midget
incisors specially sharpened for the job.

Christopher T. George

Yet More Worrying Developments Out of London

On Saturday, the Metropolitan Police admitted that the man who was shot on the tube train was not part of the bomb plots and he appears to have been a completely innocent man. The police now say that Brazilian Jean Charles de Menezes, 27, who was killed in error by police at Stockwell Tube station on Friday after they suspected he was a suicide bomber, had been in Britain on an out-of-date student visa. This means that the police have a major problem on their hands in addition to the effort to track down the bombers and their accomplices which they have indicated has already stretched their resources to the limits. The dead man's cousin, Alex Pereira, stated: "They killed my cousin, they could kill anyone." (See link through title above.)

More Worrying Developments in London

I am monitoring the news about the man shot dead this morning at Stockwell Station. The man is said by the police to be not one of the would-be bombers from yesterday but nonetheless somehow connected to the bomb plots.

Considering that the fellows were apparently making the explosives in their bathtub(s) using fertilizer, it does appear they are not the most sophisticated crew. It could be either that yesterday's bombs were either not properly primed, or else as I believe I heard one expert say, the bomb mixture might have deteriorated with time. Still, worrying times in Britain right now!!!

I sent an e-mail to MSNBC last night. I travel every day through Washington D.C.'s Union Station and on the D.C. Metro but I see no evidence that bomb-sniffing dogs are being used as they are, I understand, on the transit system in London. The railway tickets of people boarding trains were checked for two days only after the July 7 London bombings but not since. Civil liberties people are protesting a plan in New York to randomly search commuters baggage. That would seem to me to be a small price to pay for any law-abiding citizen.

Detonated

Another series of bomb incidents on the transit in London
only this time the bombs don't blow, only the detonators
go Pop! on three tube trains and a double-decker bus.

A bomber lands splat on his back, the bathtub explosive
failing to go kaboom, blinks to not find himself enjoying Paradise

having his way with the promised 72 virgins. Tough, Ali.

Christopher T. George

Floral Tribute at King's Cross*

White chrysanthemums and orange-tinged yellow roses
in cellophane with turquoise prayer beads
photographed with the words of Issa:

in this world
we walk on the roof of hell
gazing at flowers

Christopher T. George

* Follow the link in the title to see Ashe's tribute using these words of Issa's:

Hatred

Hatred
blindfolds, justice
denied, blinded victims,
insurgents blindfolded, Prud'hon's
Fortune.

Lives of July 7

From the viewpoint of an ex-pat Liverpudlian
I learn of the losses of fellow Scousers

--the John Lennon Airport executive who lost his legs
after the tube train at Aldgate Station exploded;

and on the number 30 bus in Tavistock Square,
the girlfriend of the Walton chap talking to him by phone

about his birthday, their plans for that evening--

--the explosion set off by the nice quiet teenager

fiddling with backpack, chap whose dad runs a chippie.

Christopher T. George



The Dogs of War

Joining the undercover operatives, the Smart Bombs,
the closed circuit videocams, wet noses at the ready,

sniff sniff sniff, a beagle seeks out a cache of Semtex
or the torso-wrap of high-grade plastic explosives

masquerading as spare tire or tourist's money belt, to nose
out the "clean skins" or young radicals, innocent

of any crime, with murderous fire in their bellies.

Christopher T. George

Anthem

Lay a new foundation stone,
raise the roof tree
toward the North Star,
lend a helping hand,
palms callused with work--
that's how to defeat evil,
everyone working together,
all our hearts in unison,
our hopes harnessed to defeat
the shadow men, the forces
that divide us, when the devil
seeps into our foundations,
threatens society at its taproot.

Christopher T. George

Condo Viewing

A to-die-for view of Johns Hopkins' leafy campus,
and toward the misty Baltimore harbor, the Bay,
the walls hung with Impressionist paintings,
a sliding glass door out to the rooftop pool.
The guys who own it are upping stakes for
Florida, and a high rise overlooking ocean.
If we only had a cool half a million to buy,
and fix up, and fill with big furniture, like
their heavy French provincial treasures.
Maybe my musical in Charlotte will bring
me riches -- but must I sink a few grand
into "Jack" to bring it all about? Turn
investor, or continue to just dream?

Christopher T. George

Yowza

Nervous enough with the bombings in London
I plough through Union Station for a paper,
blasted by a sodding downpour as I emerge
from L'Enfant Metro, crepe myrtles buffeted
by the storm, umbrella arm soaked, hop
over puddles. I felt relieved to see
the George W. Bush action figure at attention
beside Tony Blair as the P.M. spoke out--
George and Dick Cheney have assured
us Al Queda is on the ropes. Better order
more air strikes in Iraq and Afghanistan, make
some more little Jihadists to hit us again.

Christopher T. George

I got absolutely drenched coming into work from the Metro from the remains of Hurricane Cindy. No major problems with the trains. It looked as if the Secretary of Homeland Security was being interviewed for TV in Union Station as I arrived.

After Bad News

I gird
myself after
hearing devastating
tidings, sniff the gardenias,
go on.

Christopher T. George

I write this now in the aftermath of the bloody bombings of this morning in London tube stations and on board a double-decker bus that was sliced open as if by a can opener. London was just yesterday awarded the 2012 Olympics and yet human life on earth remains a five ring circus.

Words

Out them!
They come tumbling.
Words! You know what I mean.
I never sought them, but, yes, here
they are.

Christopher T. George

Earthworm Dampness

Earthworm Dampness

Late afternoon rain draws a musty smell
from the earth after another hot day,
a backhoe moves earth, uproots trees,
a mulcher whines; a hardhat feeds

limbs into the whirling blades.
They're clearing more land for more
graves at Arlington Cemetery, to add
to the quarter million that wave

already with stars and stripes
on the manicured lawns sloping
down to the muddy Potomac.

Christopher T. George

"Jack--The Musical" in Charlotte, North Carolina

Unfortunately due to circumstances beyond my control, the planned performance of my musical "Jack--The Musical" at the Booth Theatre in Charlotte on the weekend of September 16-18 will not now take place. It would have been nice. We are looking into possibilities of presenting the show in England and France. Stay tuned.

Chris George Interviewed

You can read an interview I did with editor Greg Young in the July 2005 issue of Majestic Oaks by following the link above.

Enjoy!

All my best

Chris

******************


Here is a new form that I am pioneering that grew directly out of the Wild Poetry Forum cinquain train see
http://www.wildpoetryforum.com/discus/messages/25324/30418.html
in Wild's community action section. The form comprises writing a number of linked cinquains, i.e., regularly structured cinquains of 2, 4, 6, 8, 2 syllables but that instead are patterned as 2, 4, 6, 8, 2, 4, 6, 8, 2, 4, 6, 8, 2, for as many links as you need, as follows--


Reunion

For Gary Blankenship

My heart,
re-examined
with each recollection
from my past: all of my past loves
and griefs
I revisit
every family
reunion; greet the living
and grieve
for those of us
now dead, relatives loved;
their bodies may be gone but souls
remain,
forever in
our lives. Here with us now,
they sit, visit with us at times
like this.

Christopher T. George

Tame the Ghosts

Erik has a new rockabilly CD out but the title track "Tame the Ghosts"
is not the one I wrote about past loves, Marjorie, Andrea, and Pat.

It's a more serious song by the Frenchman born of a Swedish lady teacher
and a Tunisian who died of heart disease and lies in a quiet French village:

camellia blossoms in a village graveyard; chime of a church clock.
Ghosts haunt us -- as I write these words, as I lift my coffee to drink,

past lives of friends and family touch us momentarily in the celestial arc
of our travels. I struggle to describe the ghosts that shadow me always.

Christopher T. George


July already and only half a day to work today ahead of the Independence Day weekend. I finished my deadline for the Gynecologic Oncology unit and am now moving onto Patient Management, logging in the manuscripts as they come in, sorting out formatting problems and bouncing items back to the authors if necessary. I have started editing the unit, then it will be a matter of working up to finalizing the editing at the beginning of September in order to mail the edited books out to the task force. I anticipate that my schedule will become more hectic as I finalize the book. Being an editor with constant deadlines is like being on a merry-go-round! You no sooner finish one deadline than you are working on another.