Gore takes turn as poet

In his latest offering, Our Choice, Nobel Peace Prize laureate and Academy Award winner AL Gore has broadened and remade himself, this time reaching truly Renaissance heights as he applies his various talents to the art of poetry:

One thin September soon
A floating continent disappears
In midnight sun

As if his wooden, verbal presentations were not enough, AL has seen fit to soar to new heights in his ongoing assault of our senses:

Vapors rise as
Fever settles on an acid sea

The only fever being experienced here is in AL's fetid brain. Continents are not going to disappear AL. And my driving into work will not make them disappear. It is amazing what we as a people have come to accept from this piker. The reviewers over at Vanity Fair found it curious that previous reviews of AL's new book have concentrated on his prose and photographic images, yet made no mention of AL's gifted poetry:

"It’s odd that none of the reviews of Our Choice have mentioned this poem. Even my old friend Bill McKibben, the dean of America’s climate journalists, didn’t see fit to mention it, though Bill himself wrote a column a couple of years ago pleading for poets, musicians, and other artists to bring their talents to bear in the climate fight."

Perhaps that is because old Bill was thinking a tad differently as to his conception of artists.

Snow glides from the mountain
Ice fathers floods for a season
A hard rain comes quickly

"Ice fathers floods for a season." That's remarkably awkward. Well done, AL. It reminds one of Dan Akyroid's turn as opera critic on the SNL skit, A Night with Bad Opera. Horrible. Dreadful. Bravo, AL!

"The result is a surprisingly accomplished, nuanced piece of writing."

Yes, how very nuanced. Nuance is all the rage on the left. They ascribe it to individuals for whom they want to grant superiority. John Kerry was purported to be nuanced. Barrack Obama is nuanced, or so we are told. Now, it appears big AL is also the possessor of nuance. Very good. Sadly, it does not actually translate into compelling poetry.

Then dirt is parched
Kindling is placed in the forest
For the lightning’s celebration

In other words, AL anticipates forest fires. Never before did the world experience forest fires, I presume, but now that Ice has fathered floods it is time for the world to burn.

"The images Gore conjures in his (untitled) poem turn a neat trick: they are visually specific and emotionally arresting even as they are scientifically accurate."

The shepherd cries
The hour of choosing has arrived

I'm crying right with him. Please, let us choose to turn the page.