The Yellow Fog: 7 November 2017
by Sri Wele Cebuda

Chief Minister of Delhi, Arvind Kejriwal, today,
called Dehli a “gas chamber” that will not go soon away.
Arvind Kumar compared the air to smoking cigarettes,
as if one puffed four dozen fags beneath gray aerojets.
The smog has caused a public health emergency uptick,
some 700 micrograms per cubic metre thick.

The yellow fog that rubs its back upon the window panes,
and licks its tongue into the corners of the day, remains.
And in the city, rickshaw autos and the taxis drive
in droves around the littered roads where millions plod alive;
yet murdering the myriads, the muttering retreats,
will there be time to save them from the smoke along the streets?

Sri Wele Cebuda is a poet of India. The HEI (Health Effects Institute), a Boston-based nonprofit organization, in “State of Global Air, 2017,” reported that Paris Agreement participants, India and China, face the World’s deadliest air pollution.

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China’s Patriotic Crackdown
by Lu “Reed ABCs” Wei

For disrespecting China’s anthem punishment has grown
from fifteen days of jail time to three years on one’s own.
If one dare kneel in dissent when China’s flag’s displayed,
then one must be placed into prison; criminals must pay.
That means that people in Hong Kong dare not speak out in jeers
against the nation’s glorious “March of the Volunteers.”
Free speech is not a right in China; one must tow the line;
and the Great Fire Wall will keep out all the whiny swine.
And now this week the gold-haired Tweety Bird is on his way.
I tawt I taw a Putty Tat: “Ta-ra-ra-boom-de-ay.”

Lu “Reed ABCs” Wei is a poet of China. Though President Donald Trump may freely tweet when he is in China, Communist Xi Jinping’s single tweet has been expunged, and Chinese citizens may not freely tweet in China.

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Questions Remain
by Cawb Delius Ree

The CMA reversed its ban on asking questions by
reporters on the Vegas deaths. Why did so many die?
There are so many questions still. What can the answers be?
Why did the gunman target Country Music devotees?

Why did the ISIS murderers claim him one of their own?
Why did he have such hatred for those souls he did not know?
What was the timeline? Did somebody help the murderer?
What was he doing with a car of bomb materials?

Why did J. Campos leave the country after the attack?
Why were so many of the exits of the concert blocked?
Were any kinds of drugs involved? What did one woman say
three-quarters of an hour before the horrible display?

Cawb Delius Ree is a poet of Nevada. He noted that Massachusetts was the first state to ban pump stocks, since the deadly shooting at the Vegas music festival.

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This Land: On the Crushing of Kurdistan
by Curdise Belawe
“These Carducians…dwelt up among the mountains…”
Xenophon, Anabasis, book 3, Chapter 5, Section 16

Their temples were destroyed, the fires killed their just,
the greatest of the sirs was hided in his herds.
The cruel Arabs had destroyed their villages,
and conquered people all the way to Sharezur.
Females were enslaved, brave men dived in their blood;
the Zoroastrians lost many followers.
Ahuramazda felt no pity in that flood;
those words of truth—who will remember—Hurmizgan?
The centuries go by; they pass through Hezar Mêrd
in Sulaimani, in Iraqi Kurdistan;
and yet despite the murdering, the pillages,
this land won’t be destroyed until the earth is gone.

 

Curdise Belawe is a poet of the Kurds. On September 25, 2017, the Iraqi Kurds voted for independence, but since, have been punished by Iraq, with overt support from Iran, Turkey, and Syria. Hurmizgan is an ancient Kurdish poem.

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Media Feeding Frenzy at the Koi Pond Photo Op
by “Lice Brews” Ueda

After a few scoops,
after Abe tossed his box,
Trump dumped his box too;
and then the two of them left
to a lunch far from the zoo.

 

“Lice Brews” Ueda is a poet fond of Japan, and things Japanese, like the five-lined tanka.

It Is So Nice
by Cu Ebide Aswerl

It is so nice when nearly everything is working well,
the lights, the stove, refrigerator, toilets, doors and bell,
clothes washer, dryer, and dish washer, television, fans,
computer, septic, cars and water, heaters, stickless pans,
garage-door opener, and coffee maker, toaster too,
all phones, electric sockets, counters, floors and hot-tub brew,
foundations, walls, the roof and ceilings, microwave and deck,
the driveway, sidewalk, garden, lawn, and everything high-tech.
When things run smooth and swell, like after an eructioning;
it is so nice when nearly everything is functioning.

 

Cu Ebide Aswerl is a poet of well being.

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Six Pieces For an Orchestra by Anton Webern
by Ewald E. Eisbruc

Six Pieces For an Orchestra by Anton Webern are
unprecedented in their scantily-clad, filmy stars,
like spider webs found flickering within a little breeze,
the thinness of fine gossamers, light, delicate, flims-ease.
Six Pieces For an Orchestra by Anton Webern are
like milliseconds flickering, celesta, strings and harp,
like whispers on bassoons, trombones, low bells and piccolos,
timpani, bass drum, cymbals, oboes, snare drum, tam-tam flows.
Six Pieces For an Orchestra by Anton Webern are
gone, on the wing before their quiverings have reached the air,
like clarinets and flutes around the clinking glockenspiel,
or tuba ostinato, oom-pah-pah, triangle lean.

 

Ewald E. Eisbruc is a German music critic. Here he focuses on the politically incorret composer who was out of favour with the Classicists, the Romantics, the Fascists, the Nazis, the Socialists, and the Communists. His concise, rigourous attention to the twelve-tone technique means that his music has never been popular.