The Neo-Con Poets Society

“You went into jail in the summer. It is fall now. You will have stories to cover – Iraqi elections and suicide bombers, biological threats and the Iranian nuclear program. Out West, where you vacation, the aspens will already be turning. They turn in clusters, because their roots connect them. Come back to work – and life. Until then, you will remain in my thoughts and prayers.”
From Vice Presidential Chief of Staff Scooter Libby to Judith Miller releasing her from her pledge of confidentiality.

A lot of people out there are assuming that Scooter Libby wrote this to send the Neo-Con Times reporter some kind of coded message because it pairs WMD references to nature.  This is unfortunate and is typical of the way we have come to misunderstand the current administration as heartless-corporatist profiteers who only pretend to faith.  
For the last several months I have had the privilege of helping my friend Karl Rove by facilitating a poetry workshop in what used to be the White House bowling alley.  Mr. Rove recently released me from my pledge of confidentiality about the workshops through a recent phone call.

“Dude, this is so cool.”

There was a plunking sound over the phone that sounded like a running shoe slapped against bone.

“What was that?”

“That was my head.”  

“Karl Spicoli, shouldn’t you be out making up cool rules for the Gulf reconstruction?”

“I wish Dude.  That Mr. Hand wannabe Patrick Fitzgerald has been making me like a regular with his grand jury.”

“Karl, I told you that having a pizza delivered mid-session that first time wasn’t a good idea.  This special prosecutor isn’t like the last one, he doesn’t like having the people’s time wasted.”

I may be the only person  who knows that the Deputy Chief of Staff is a huge fan of Fast Times at Ridgemont High, though now I guess I’m one of two.

“Guess, who I’m with here, Dude?”

“Karl, I have no idea.”

“Come on, guess.”

“Harold Pinter?”

“No, no, really.”

“Farah Fawcett, Jenna and Barbara, Anne Richards….who?”

“I’m here with Dr. D himself.”

“The rapper?”

“No, no, Dr. James Dobson, talk show host, psychologist, reverend, the conscience of millions of evangelical Americans.”

“Wow, are we on speaker phone? No way.”

“Yes, way.”

“Go ahead Dr. D.  you can tell CL.”

“Karl’s convinced me that Harriet Miers walks with the Lord.”

“And that qualifies her for the Supreme Court?”

“The Lord did write the constitution so one must know his original intent for that holy document.”

“CL, this is Spicoli again.”

One would think that Karl Rove would hate anything that had to do with Sean Penn, but it just goes to show how open-minded the president’s brain really is.  

“Scooter may need your help.”

“I know, that poem was pretty lame.  It didn’t really have the resonance of traditional haiku.  It almost read like a threat of some kind.”

“No, no. people just need to know that it wasn’t some kind of code.  I’d like you to let people know where it came from.”

“Can’t you just do that by playing phone games with Bob Novak again?”

“You’re way too funny there CL.  I want four hundred words in forty eight hours.  You got that.  Otherwise your wife and kids will be fair game.”

“Got it. Mr. Rove. Say bye to Dr. Dobson for me.”

I have assumed that this phone conversation with Karl Rove has released me from my obligation never to discuss the Neo-Con Poets society in public. So here goes.  The first time, I honestly didn’t know what to expect.  One of my friends had taught poetry workshops in a prison a long time ago and she told me that it was an amazing experience.  Anyway, after I got through security, signing my name just below Jeff Gannon who had apparently spent the last six weeks in Karl Rove’s office, they led me into the old bowling alley.  There in front of me were the most powerful people in the entire world sitting cross-legged in a circle. The vice-president had already started.  He was wearing a red white and blue kaftan  and held a set of bongo drums on his lap that he would play on as he recited.

No Bid
America is not for sale
It is not some unrecused duck hunt
My daughter Mary missing from the stage
Of the Republican convention’s family values
Freedom is not free
It has a price
And I have all the options
Vote for me and I will keep you free
But someone has to get the contracts.

The next reader was a slender woman who seemed to a little preoccupied.

My favorite shoes cost twelve hundred dollars
The straps are on the back
And there is a bow on the front just where the toe
Comes to a closed point.
Ferragamos
A few people die
And suddenly no one can see the value of
Shiny black leather
On stately feet
As progress

“Don’t mind me, I’m just here to facilitate,” I said, as I took a seat in the circle between Donald Rumsfeld and Paul Wolfowitz.

I am as qualified as anyone
To preside over another disaster
Some day
I will ride an Arabian horse
Along Canal St.
On the last night of Mardi Gras
The people will throw beads at me
Thanking me for blaming the real culprits
As we head towards the convention center
Of course, I know where it is.
This night, it’ll be filled with gumbo and wine served in hurricane glasses.


Not all the poetry was of the same high quality.  Some in the circle appear to have been distracted.

Harriet Miers Bush
He’s so brilliant
Everybody said he was going to ask Priscilla
Or maybe even that weird Janice just because
She’s from California and they’d been judges before
Laura might be Mrs. W
But, I’m the one he nominated for the prom
See, sometimes you can be friends for years
And he’ll see something deeper in you.

But for every one of those, there were at least two like this one from the Senate Majority leader.

My vision is so clear
I can see evidence of consciousness
On videotape
So why does it surprise anyone
That I can still see through blind trust
My judgment on health matters
Is clean
I don’t need an investigation
My actions were surgically precise
Never quite cutting into that artery
Of insider trading
This is how surgeons make the big bucks.

Tom Delay never did quite get the hang of it.

Ronnie Earle is a scumbag.
I’m going golfing at St. Andrews
When I come back I’ll still be the Hammer.

Ken Mehlman also wrote a wonderful poem about how he built a log cabin and forgot to leave room for a closet, but he declined to share it with the full group.  Still, the level of trust in the circle was very high.  I was especially impressed by the way the members of the group were already supportive of one another’s poems always taking care to start with positive comments and avoiding personal attacks.  As John Ashcroft put it, “The Mainstream Media is never constructive and nurturing.  All they want are scandals.  I wish the world could be like this poetry circle then better people would get into public life.”
The circle was so moved by this, that we wound up in a five minute group hug.  

It was that atmosphere that I think made the following possible.

Fair Game
I don’t care if the public hates me
But I’m the one who navigates them from crisis to mandate
Spinning like Penelope  holding off her suitors
They trust me to spread any rumor
To be vicious, to smear, to lie
Because I alone have faith-based initiative
This is what real fathers do
To protect their families
If only my mother had lived to see the day
When even liberals would have to admit that
“I’m their Daddy now.”

I do hope that Scooter does come back to the group so that we can workshop his poem further. I did enjoy having Judith Miller join us for two of the sessions and I have certainly understood her reluctance to discuss this poetry group, but I think when people see this other side of the "inner circle", they'll actually react quite positively.