BERLUSCONI

As for Italy's Berlusconi,
Flirting has cost him his honey.
She's as mad as a hatter.
He says it's a private matter
But not that it's baloney.

Berlusconie's wife files for divorce

"Italian Premier Silvio Berlusconi's second wife is seeking a divorce after 19 years of marriage and three children, citing his reported flirtations with younger women."

"Former actress Veronica Lario confirmed she had retained a lawyer to begin separation and divorce proceedings agains the billionaire media mogul-turned-poitician, reported the ANSA news agency."

"Berlusconi issued a one-line statement, which said: 'It's a personal issue that pains me, that is in the private sphere, and which seems necessary not to speak about.'"

MINE THAT BIRD

I guess by now you've heard
What at The Derby has occurred.
Against odds of fifty to one,
The race by seven lengths was won
By a horse named Mine That Bird.

I'm sure it was a thrill
For jockey Calvin Borel.
I don't think he knew
What that horse could do,
Though he rode him well.

He seems a horse that was designed
With a home stretch sprint in mind.
It really was amazing
How he ran like crazy
And came up from far behind.

A win like this you can't assail.
Strange has been this colt's trail.
It really makes you wonder
If he'll prove a one-day wonder.
How'd he slip through on that rail?

PHILIP STREICH

A lad this smart is rarely seen --
Expert on nanotubes and graphene,
Musician, ace college scholar,
Entrepreneur, inventor,
Renaissance man, and just eighteen.

KAJURAHO ADDENDA

To monks no distraction
But for us an attraction
Are couples in orgasm.
And Kajuraho has 'em
Frozen in action.

It's hard to dismiss
A millennium of bliss.
And moving it is too
That as eternity they go through
They continue to kiss.

With these folks I have no quarrel.

To them, sex is moral.

And they have no inhibition

About its exhibition

Even when it's oral.

For in these illustrations

Of achievement of elation

A reasonable man supposes

That the models in these poses

Were members of the congregation.

WORKING FOR FREE

In today's economy,

Believing it has to be,

In special cases

To stay in good graces,

Some folks work for free.

Article in Business Section of USA Today indicates that in the present economy some entrepreneurs are doing work for free for special customers to stay in their good graces.

TWO GOOD MEN

Met two good men in a convenience store,

Veterans of the second world war. 

For sixty years they've been friends,

Though one is not Norwegian.

Right spry they are at eighty-four.

On my bike ride yesterday, I rolled into Mt. Horeb (pop ~6,600) tired and hungry.  I went into a very quiet little convenience store, bought a couple snacks, and ended up staying quite a long time and leaving refreshed.  The friendly, elderly proprietor bade me rest on a chair in his office, and he gave me a large mug of hot chocolate -- for free.  A friend of his came in, and they chatted, and I asked if they were brothers.  The proprietor said "He's not even a Norwegian."  (I guess that's unusual in Mt. Horeb.)  I chatted with both of them a long while and recited my poem about my ride.  They both seem to be in remarkable health at 84, and they hear better than I do.  Both are veterans of WWII, one a Marine, the other Army.  The Marine said he recently attended a reunion on Iwo Jima.  The other told of finding and making fast friends with previously unknown relatives in Germany.  The two men had been roommates when they first reentered the work force after the war.  I told them about our Friday noon support-the-troops vigils in Lynchburg and told them I'm a "cold war veteran."  I told them about Helen's family coming from the Philippines to San Francisco on a troop ship near the end of the war.  And I told them about my Norwegian and German ancestors.

RIDGE RIDE

Thought it would do no harm

To ride out through the farms.

While making good mileage,

I got whiffs of corn silage

And other farming charms.

'Twas as cold as a fridge

On that windy old ridge

As my lonely way I found

Past Mt. Horeb and Blue Mound

And beyond Verona just a smidge.

From Dodgeville to Barneveld,

Oh, the pain my bottom felt!

But I rode on a loner 

On into Verona,

A forty-miler underneath my belt.