News and Music (2025)
I was listening to CBC’s The National the other day and was struck once again by the way some news segments are set to music. These expository reports are presented as longer pieces in a documentary style and draw on
The Devil’s Details (2025)
Angel on My Shoulder is a 1946 film directed by Archie Mayo. The movie starts with the gangster Eddie Kagle (Paul Muni) getting out of jail and being picked up by his partner in crime, Smiley Williams (Hardie Albright), who
Allusions (2025)
Original text in English (if you are reading it in another language, it is an automatic translation). The crisis of democracy, of inequality and race, and the crisis of truth and information gripping the US has no bottom. I know that
Entertainment is the General Theory of this World (2025)
After reading the article published in The Guardian on October 1: US comedians defend decision to play in Saudi Arabia: ‘They’re paying me enough to look the other way’, I felt disappointed. Once we start to look away, it’s hard
The Elephant Dung (2025)
I have heard comments about Carney's decision to drop retaliatory tariffs on the US. I am like Wab Kinew, the premier of Manitoba, who said, ‘I’m not a fan.’ On the August 23 broadcast of CBC’s The National, Goldy Hyder, CEO
Decision to Withdraw (2025)
After much thought and in light of the aggressive attitude of the American government toward the world, I have decided to withdraw my works (Laurels and The Wonders of the World) from this year’s REELpoetry/HoustonTX 2025. This decision is not
Numerology (2025)
53 It took 53 days for Hitler to disable and then dismantle his country's democratic structures. There is an excellent article in The Atlantic on that subject[1]. Ivana Trump told her lawyer in 1990 that Donald Trump kept Hitler’s speeches at
The Power of Silence (2025)
A while back, I wrote a poem called The Social Conscience of Actors. It was about their power as spokespeople. Now, I realize that they also have the power of silence. Why say anything even think anything when actors can say all of the
The Producers (2025)
I watched The Producers for a second time and found this 1967 film to be both shocking, and funny in caricaturing Jews, gays, lecherous heterosexuals, Nazis and everyone involved in creative industries. The movie follows the soft-spoken accountant (Gene Wilder) and