Michele Bachmann wasn’t alone Tuesday in probing unlikely links between politics and poetry. Two Minnesota bloggers also used poetry to illuminate the political landscape, adapting familiar lines by the late New Hampshire poet Robert Frost to Gov. Pawlenty’s trip to New Hampshire today.
Bluestem Prairie’s Sally Jo Sorensen, with help from Robin Marty of The Power Liberal, calls the rejiggered work “Stopping by New Hampshire on a Snowy Evening“:
Whose state this is I think I know
He’s going to New Hampshire, though
He will not see me struggling here
Or clear his roads now packed with snowThe GOP must find it queer
To act without a leader near
Between the Range and frozen lakes
The darkest forecast of the year.Bloggers give his handlers a shake
To ask if there is some mistake.
The only other sound’s the steep
Decline in what our families make.The pothole’s looming, dark and deep
And Tim has promises to keep,
And miles to go until he’s Veep
And miles to go until he’s Veep.
Now that the barrier between politics and poetry has been breached, MnIndy offers this take on one of William Carlos Williams‘ better-known works:
This Is Just To Say (to the DFL)
by Rukavina Thomas RukavinaI have noticed
the funds
that were in
the bank accountand which
you were probably
saving
for MargaretForgive me
they were outrageous
so sweet
and so bold













2 Comments »
Comment posted December 16, 2009 @ 7:54 pm
At the end of the last session, I wrote my own. Apologies to Longfellow.
The Song of Higher Office
By Bill Beyer
On the shores of insolvency
By the shining legislature
Stood the office of Pawlenty
T-Paw, Chief of Minnesota
Revenue in diminution
Chopping cost his sole solution
Don’t fix up no taxing loophole
Don’t clean up no corporate poophole
No adjustment to the budget
That could make a liberal hug it
Sell no bond for building maintenance
Cost of debt too high for patience
But, by magic of Pawlenty
Borrow mega-bucks aplenty
Pay more interest to the rich few
Presto, change-o, debt is revenue
Take those bucks from big tobacco,
Securitize, and don’t look back, Oh
Can you see how he looks tougher
As the least among us suffer?
Make it work with one-time shifting
Magic acts that leave us drifting
Don’t address no nitty-gritties
Kick the can down to our kiddies
Gotta live within our meanies
Thus spake all the tax-hawk weenies
Waste no time by grinding axes
Bottom line is no new taxes
Don’t ask no more taxing question
Don’t expect no special session
Don’t do no negotiation
As goes T-Paw goes the nation
Just one cure for tax-besotment
Give a hand to unallotment!
Stamping vetoes by line item
Making cuts, ad infinitum
Looking tougher, striking poses
Practicing his thumbing noses
Lest we were too dense to notice
T-Paw wants to be the POTUS
Campaign ‘12 already starting
MN attention span departing
Focus now on national wooing
Campaign slogans for reviewing:
“T-paw, T-paw he’s our hero!
Unallot us down to zero!”
“Private perfect, public too lax,
Only good tax is a dead tax!”
“Help our rich protect their riches
Shove our poorest in the ditches!”
On the shores of insolvency
By the tarnished legislature
Thus departed Chief Pawlenty
Turned around and waved a finger
Launched his birch canoe for sailin’
Off to battle Sarah Palin
“And the people from the margin
Watched him floating, rising, sinking,”
And they said farewell forever
Said good riddance, Chief Pawlenty.
Comment posted December 17, 2009 @ 10:43 pm
No taxes is his battle cry
As he glares with beady eye
I’ll fix the budget up you’ll see.
By forcing a new tax levy
And if that doesn’t do the trick
I’ll raise your local taxes quick
And if borrowing is not the key
I’ll not call it taxes, but a fee
Now of to New Hampshire, I am sent
To do the same as President
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