[Erik Olson]

Thank you, Ann, and for kindly pointing out my typo, my tired eyes at the late hour of posting would probably not have noticed otherwise.
-Erik

[RCL]

Eric, a horror story! But some of us are bored by the bumbler.

Quick Impressions

Duh Bites

Fiorina was fierce
Trump a rump
Bush a bumbler
Kasich kick-ass
Rubio retro
Christie crusty
Cruz crazed
Huckabee weary
Paul peeved
Carson canny
Pataki plucky
Walker weirder
Santorum seedy
Jindal jumpy
Graham grim
Gilmore no more

[Erik Olson]

If he deserves the claim of not boring, however dubious, it is only because the indignation, concern and puzzlement he occasions prevents a total stolid boredom. I am not bored because the worst of reasons. I am less than thrilled that his circus forces my attention, whether I will or no; nor am I much pleased at his turning the presidential race into a bad episode of the Apprentice. I grant you though there will always be somebody in a crowd who's bored, however outrageous or diverting, good or ill the show before them.
-Erik

[Erik Olson]

Those are apt adjectives you list, RLC. The fricative sound suits fierce Fiorina's fight; the bumbling sound of Donald Trumpy who took a precipitous fall like Humpty Dumpty... So much for nursery rhyme. Here's an article accounting the face off of these two and a ditty to accompany it: http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-34275105

Fierce Fiorina first tests bumbling Trump;
She looks triumphant; others say, a frump.

-Erik

[RCL]

Head Lines

A ball bounced off my head when I was ten
and football helmets scrambled brains again
every fall for eight more playing years.
Some days, my words are tortured, rambling slurs,
but today I’m feeling proud as hell:
my brains are like a player’s in the NFL.

http://www.msn.com/en-us/sports/nfl/...gt5?li=BBgzzfc

[RCL]

Eric,

Thanks for the comment and link.

[Erik Olson]

http://www.theguardian.com/sport/201...e-sport-deadly
I found this article about the most extreme sport practitioners in the world: Squirrel-Suit/Base-Jump Divers. The subtitle captures the drift of it: "A succession of high-profile fatal jumps has focused attention on one of the most extreme pursuits going."

This got me thinking how far removed I am from their sportive disposition, having not once even para-sailed, hang-glided, rock-climbed, or bungee-jumped. I imagined this illegal and dangerous base-jumping however must be the zenith of the active life. So I wrote about this and the opposite folly, the sedentary life gone wild.

The Extreme Sportive Man; The Extreme Shut-in (and the dangers of both)

Leaping off cliffs, these live so much
They die young falling for the rush;
Yet there are some at twice the age,
Who never flew beyond their cage.


-Erik

[Ann Drysdale]

Erik - I know I'm an interfering old biddy so do feel free to ignore this, but I feel you're missing a trick here.

The link between the two is not so much sport itself as the desire to simulate flight - the more-than human freedom it implies, as you suggest in the last line.

However, since you've only got four lines to pursue two lines of thought, it seems a pity to complicate the last of them with a twist of syntax. What do you think about introducing the other f-word at that point: "Who never flew beyond their cage"?

[Erik Olson]

Fair enough Ann. Maybe this is more to the theme.


Some spurn inaction, itch to fly,
Jumping off cliffs to live, some die.
Some glacier-still, get twice the age,
Who never flew beyond their cage.

[RCL]

Erik,

I’m not sure who or what “twice the age” refers to. How about “some at every age” or some such? And “fly” in the last line?

Sorry about misspelling your name!