Subverse Aphrodesia

California's new poet laureate -- Berkeley writer and jazz performer , Al Young -- was appointed in May by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger despite his considerably "liberal" POV.

"Young aims to bring poetry back to a place of common discourse, which he admits could be a tall order in a society that technology — from the Internet to iPods — has atomized. The more isolated individuals become, the less they can see themselves in others, he believes...
This, Young said, is his role as poet laureate: to use the distilled purity of poetry to breach walls of isolation."

Poetry is the antidote, the dissipater of fog.

See Scott Martell's full article in the L.A. Times.