When I was at home this summer I was so bored in Iowa I began to read the letter "i" encyclopedia, I think from 1978.  Anyway I came across two things I felt I was suppose find.  I'll tell you one because the election is nearing, due to my constant critique and sometimes cynical view of the world around me, Ibn Khaldun caught my eye as being the writer of a "Universal History" which has been a term used for a lot of different writings including the bible.  He died in 1406 in North Africa but he wrote of timeless things and one of his main points was of a great nation and how once it becomes great the peak is over and it cannot sustain itself any longer.  Sometimes with all this pettiness and more and more shit talking done by people who want to lead this country, it seems like fear, like we all ready know the story. 

Universal Herstory

Supersweet seeds

seared its style

upon my bitter eye

lid lens flicker

on the cyclone's

streaking circle

beside the silo

set West to

store our hearts

locked inside

the Milky Way

down to tiny

finger prints

spiral ten micro

galaxies warp

wrap around

twist the shape

children draw

with intentions

adults scrawl

in daydream

doodles over and

under slick minds

we suffer

the slip and slide

truths

wondered and

wet drip dip

back float calm

dream with

little ice cream

islands with

heads fed

foam from

liquid falls

and trees

breath

green popped

eyes and drop

jawed crack

back to repeat

when holding

your own hand

brushed lashes

of corn

stalk after stalk

green on green

beans stretch

in slow motion

spin no dancer's

tu-tu could test

turning with

time to untwist

the horn in

tune to sing

Fibonacci's smile

behind our

foot that

pedals the

cycle at

space pace

I vote Earth and Obama.

Lyndsay A. Nissen