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John Burnside was born in 1955 and became a published poet almost by accident. For a while, he worked as software engineer. After long days—or in the midst of—crunching numbers and signs, he would write poems to allay the ennui. He sent a poem to a friend in publishing, who then asked to see a book—and published it without telling John. Since then, he has published over a dozen books of poetry, as well as seven novels, three volumes of memoir, and two collections of short stories. There’s a pagan sensibility, playful and heretical, to Burnside’s work—the poems have been, from the beginning, full of equinoxes, solstices, and the rituals of living, and a sign of the environmental concerns which are both the bedrock and the backdrop of his spirit. He’s written meditations on Bible verses, and also meditations on how LSD unlocks the psyche. But beneath all of these themes, carrying them, there is ever a hankering for music. If a poem isn’t musical, it doesn’t interest Burnside, who now teaches the art at St. Andrews in Scotland, the third oldest university in the English-speaking world.

Sultan Al Jaber, CEO of the UAE’s national oil company, secured the COP28 presidency despite questions over his green credentials.

The post Inside the Campaign That Put an Oil Boss in Charge of a Climate Summit appeared first on The Intercept.

I love this time of year, when leaves change color and die right in front of me. Nothing prettier than a deceased leaf hanging from a tree in its final few moments on earth. It makes me want to wrap an oversized scarf around my neck and take a walk through the carnage. Stunning.

What I like most in this season of decay is how cozy I feel in a sweater. The air is crisp, the sun is bright, and the death rattle of falling leaves reminds me that there’s a season for everything. And this one is for dying and being dead. Makes me feel like going to an orchard and murdering some apples for pie.

Do you hear the wind gently rustling the trees? That’s the sound of a million leaves meeting their maker. Soon, I’ll rake their shriveled, broken husks, then let them rot and mold on the lawn while repeatedly saying, “I should really bag up those leaves.” What a magical time of year, when the world gives up and dies.

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Yousef Munayyer joins Jeremy Scahill and Murtaza Hussain to discuss how the political and regional implications of the war in Palestine extend far beyond its borders.

The post Death Toll in Gaza Now Exceeds 5,000 appeared first on The Intercept.