Free Republic

Psalm in Time of War The way we lower our heads at what rises from the horrible pit. Hard wind roars now over the parapets, through the garden, boiling dust rushing toward us. Now behind our thoughts we see fires grinning on the merciless plain, enraged horses stamping. We scatter for doorways across our accustomed plazas in towns that were once our home, handing urgent poems through dark cafes where old shadows rustle like theologians’ crumpled papers. Just yesterday I knelt in fountains, sighing to the evening breezes high in the basilicas, walking with entablature kings, interpreting in that high ...

TRB FROM WASHINGTON Only Human In one of the creepiest scenarios in Steven Spielberg and Stanley Kubrick's new movie A.I., there is something called a Flesh Fair. In this sci-fi fantasy, human beings have developed technology so refined that they can create mechanical humans that appear almost as real as organic ones. These "mechas" are essentially a slave class: They perform chores, replace lost children, even have their body parts distributed for various uses. At Flesh Fairs, mechas are displayed and killed for amusement, their body parts sometimes traded and reused. They are humans entirely as means--not ends. And, ...

ONE day in the dead of winter, I looked out my back window and saw a chicken. It was jet black with a crimson wattle, and it seemed unaware that it was in New York City. In classic barnyard fashion, it was scratching and pecking and clucking. I looked closer, blinked a few times and shrugged off the apparition. Birds come and go. Usually they're pigeons, not chickens, but like other birds, this one had wings and would probably use them. Or so I thought. Two months later it's still there. Not only is it still there, but I'm also ...