Friday, February 7, 2020

Holy men that ye know not of

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 Wherefore, I will that all men shall repent, for all are under sin, except those which I have reserved unto myself, holy men that ye know not of.
Doctrine & Covenants. 49:8


As I study holy scripture, 
I find wonders all throughout.
Some of them are clear and simple;
others take a deeper route.
When the Lord sees fit to open
all the doors he now keeps sealed
seraphim will be our tutors
as all ignorance is healed!




Thursday, February 6, 2020

And ye shall eat in plenty

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 And ye shall eat in plenty, and be satisfied, and praise the name of the Lord your God, that hath dealt wondrously with you: and my people shall never be ashamed.
Joel 2:26



Never shall I be ashamed
that the Lord of Hosts I named
in my prayers and daily talk,
in my thoughts and daily walk.
Plenteous my life has been,
saved from sorrow and from sin
by thy wondrous hand, O King --
thou who makes my heart to sing.
Tribute to thy name is sweet,
altogether just and meet.




Wednesday, February 5, 2020

Google now has mapped the world.





Google Maps, Apple Maps and Waze have done their share of shaping society since coming to smartphones in the early 2000s. In trying to help drivers get around faster, they’ve transformed once-quiet residential streets into bustling cut-through routes. They also may have made overall traffic worse, burdening some routes with congestion they weren’t built to support, some researchers say.
Brittany Shammas. Washington Post.
Google now has mapped the world;
there is no place to hide --
no matter if you're in Nepal
or on the River Clyde.
The satellites will spot you
and transmit locality;
the whole world then can track you
as you swig some cheap Chablis.
But I think I can fool 'em
and elude their broad dragnet 
by dressing up in spinach
with a little vinaigrette.
They'll think I am a salad
and ignore me like a shrub
(unless,of course, I'm spotted
by somebody like Grubhub!) 





China Prescribes Buffalo Horn for the Coronavirus.

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As it races to treat patients infected with the new coronavirus, the Chinese government is seeing potential in a cocktail of antiviral drugs. It is also recommending the Peaceful Palace Bovine Pill, a traditional Chinese medicine made with the gallstone of cattle, buffalo horn, jasmine and pearl.
Sui-Lee Wee. NYT. 

When you're feeling seedy and you don't know what to do,
take a little rhino horn to keep away the flu.
Over there in China all the doctors recommend
jello from a donkey hide infused with urine blend.
Penis tea (from deer, of course) with bits of ground up pearl
will make Coronavirus start to wither up and curl.
Cocklebur emulsion will soon have you in the pink;
along with ginkgo seedlings and perhaps the kitchen sink.
Take cinnabar for palsy, and for cramps and sneezing fits.
Try a bite of seahorse when your body's on the fritz.
Those Chinese doctors know their stuff, when fungus you require;
otherwise I'd have to say their treatments are too dire.

A better world is coming

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Wherefore, whoso believeth in God might with surety hope for a better world . . . 
Ether 12:4

A better world is coming, I can feel it in my bones.
Proclaimed by all of nature, even to the very stones.
Belief in God is spreading, though old Scratch still rages on.
A surer hope arises, like an effervescent dawn.
Strengthen my belief, O Lord, and help me when I stumble;
my world becomes a fitter place when I stay sharp yet humble.

Tuesday, February 4, 2020

The Iowa Caucus Gremlins.



. . . the Iowa precinct caucus system broke down . . .
Hours passed as the Iowa Democratic Party struggled to reconcile conflicting numbers from the nearly 1,700 precincts.
In the absence of results in real time, it was anybody's guess who was winning. By the time the results are reported, perhaps on Tuesday, they could be subject to challenge or questions from one or another of the campaigns . . .
by Dan Balz. Washington Post.

Out where all the corn turns green,
there was quite an awful scene.
Democrats toiled through the night
to make caucus numbers right.

But the more they toiled away,
farther off the numbers stray.
Till at last with sorrow deep
ev'ryone falls fast asleep.

Hackers did not cause this mess,
but if I might take a guess,
I would say that gremlins threw
 spanners into this miscue.

Somehow imps did infiltrate
all the meetings in the state.
Sabotaging bylaws with
claws that tore out all the pith.

Hopping up and down with glee
they caused great perplexity,
making folding chairs collapse
and defacing precinct maps.

Disenfranchising hush-hush,
they turned voter rolls to mush.
While the farmers all got in,
not so those with darker skin.

With the process in retreat,
Iowa must face defeat.
Never more will they stand tall
as candidates must come to call.

In the White House, with sly grins,
Trump proclaims that no one wins.
(And when it comes to gremlins -- look,
I am sure Trump wrote the book!)









Not Make-Believe

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“Satan, or Lucifer, or the father of lies—call him what you will—is real, the very personification of evil. His motives are in every case malicious, and he convulses at the appearance of redeeming light, at the very thought of truth. …"
Jeffrey R. Holland.

Seek the light and truth to hold,
otherwise that one of old,
lurking in a cold dead place,
all your joy will soon erase.
Know your heart and soul will crack
under his malign attack;
that is why each day I need
on my knees for help to plead!