In Which My Forehead Turns Bright Red, But Not From Alcohol, Tomato Splatter Or Exertion

Tomatoes were to be today's subject,
Since I just bought a ton. They're cooking down.
Meanwhile, I thought, it's time that I Tweetdecked
And what I learned there brought forth a big frown.
My Tweeps at NPR have just disclosed
A set of facts that made me slap my head:
Chris Dodd and our Obama, both exposed,
As having both spent time curled up in bed
With AIG! They're numbers one and two
Among the pols who gladly took a bribe --
I mean a contribution, of course, to
Their campaign funds. It's painful to describe.
Dodd made the loophole AIG then used
To pay its bonuses. I feel abused.

Did I Really Just Hear That?

It happens to me ev'ry now and then -
I half-hear some mad thing on NPR,
And have to ask myself, once, twice, again,
If, really, what I heard was true. Bizarre,
Diverting news sometimes has this effect,
Like Mager's odd conch-shell Sinatra, but
More often it's a sidebar I reject:
Today a Georgia governor's the nut,
If what I think I heard is what is true:
That in reaction to Obama's move
Restoring normal fed'ral funding to
Researching embryonic stem cells, you've
Got this Perdue guy stamping his two feet
And saying Georgia's stem cells are elite?

Kleenpocalypse - Or How it's NICE to Cry For Once

I think today on other times I've cried
The way I did when he held up his hand
And promised he would do his best to guide
Our progress t'ward the future of this land.
There were some, yes, but rarely tears of joy
Welled up this way. Through my much younger eyes
I saw a spaceship, like some ill-made toy
Explode and streak in pieces through the skies.
And 9/11, of course brought forth my tears,
As did the storm that swallowed New Orleans.
These pains, at least, have faded o'er the years.
There will be more, but for now what this means
Is that I'm happy, proud to see this day
But sad to know the feeling cannot stay.

Majority Rules When Someone Else has Control of the TV

This is a great, big day for football fans
(Confession time: I am not one of those),
A day on which a world of bets and plans
Have centered. I should not turn up my nose.
But honestly, were I to get to choose
Just what I'd get updates on from afar,
Today I'd call and clamor for the news
Which focuses on quite another star.
Inauguration Day is two days hence,
But already the parties have begun.
Today in Washington at great expense
A concert's on that's like no other one.
I can't be there, or watch, or even lurk,
But I can watch the Steelers play at work.

I Cannot Help it; I'm Going to Miss Him A Little

It's a sad day, but I've a strategy
To cope a bit with what I needs must mourn.
I write today a sort of elegy
To this we've lost, that's been a kind of porn.
Our president today gave us his last
Press conference as our great C-in-C.
I often find that not till things are past
Do I indeed see what they've meant to me.
"Oh, hey, Brazil, you have black people too..."
"When I talk war, I'm really talking peace..."
(I paraphrase to keep my sonnet true)
Yes, all too soon, these Bushisms will cease.
But when it comes to laughter versus hope,
I'll take an earnest man over a dope.