] But we should all be listening. Rumsfeld's poetry is
] paradoxical: It uses playful language to address the most
] somber subjects: war, terrorism, mortality. Much of it is
] about indirection and evasion: He never faces his
] subjects head on but weaves away, letting inversions and
] repetitions confuse and beguile. His work, with its
] dedication to the fractured rhythms of the plainspoken
] vernacular, is reminiscent of William Carlos Williams'.
] Some readers may find that Rumsfeld's gift for offhand,
] quotidian pronouncements is as entrancing as Frank
] O'Hara's.
]
] And so Slate has compiled a collection of Rumsfeld's
] poems, bringing them to a wider public for the first
] time. The poems that follow are the exact words of the
] defense secretary, as taken from the official transcripts
] on the Defense Department Web site.

Selected poems: The Unknown, Glass Box, A Confession, Happenings, The Digital Revolution, The Situation, and Clarity.

The Poetry of D.H. Rumsfeld - Recent works by the secretary of defense.