POETRY

Poetry has been an important ingredient in my life and i write it
as well as read it. There aren't many rhymesters around these
days, maybe because it's hard to rhyme and sound natural at the
same time. On the other hand, have you tried memorizing some
non-rhyming poetry? It just doesn't come as easily. Perhaps
the days of memorizing poetry are over.

Here is one of my favorite poems, short and eloquent:


AH! SUN-FLOWER
William Blake

Ah, Sun-flower! weary of time,
Who countest the steps of the Sun;
Seeking after that sweet golden clime
Where the traveller's journey is done;

Where the youth pined away with desire,
And the pale Virgin shrouded in snow,
Arise from their graves, and aspire
Where my Sun-flower wishes to go.


Isn't that beautiful? Uncomplex in rhyme or meter yet still
full of mystery, with archetypal images abounding.

LITTLE KNOWN FACTS ABOUT WELL KNOWN PEOPLE

Donald Rumsfeld......Liberal?

Who'd a thunk it? Donald Rumsfeld was elected to Congress in
1962 at age 30 and immediately became a reformer. He fought
for civil rights legislation and sponsored the Freedom of Infor-
mation Act. He was so anti-Vietnam that Henry Kissinger used
to sarcastically flash him the peace sign. While he was chief of
the Pentagon he refused to meet with defense-industry exec-
utives on ethical grounds. His biographer says he was 'deeply
moral'.
--From a book review of Bradley Graham's biography of
Rumsfeld called By His Own Rules.

So what happened? How did a hero become such a villain? We
would prefer our heroes to be pure and our villains to be, well,
villainish, without any mitigating factors. But human beings con-
tinue to be human beings is spite of our wishes, and within every
human psyche is the potentiality for everything a human being
can do, the worst evil as well as the greatest good. Not so? Wit-
ness our present example. It would be fascinating to know about
the moment(s) Rumsfeld wandered from one side of the line to
the other.