These are the bread of life:
green as oak leaves,
black as lust.

You can taste the desire
almost from smell,

the stuffed ones with pimientos
offer Christmas year-round.

I can see why the dead
might not like them:

too luscious
for the after-life,

earth
on a platter

that keeps
living and living

like schoolgirls
on a starry night.

In a recent posting on his New York Times blog fivethirtyeight, Nate Silver differentiates between “swing states,” which conventional wisdom has described North Carolina as being, and “elastic states,” which Silver believes is a better descriptor.

A measure to compensate victims of North Carolina's forced sterilization program has been approved by the State House. It would pay $50,000 to each living victim and carries an initial price tag of $10 million.

The overwhelming sentiment on the compensation bill was summed up by Democratic Representative Patsy Keever.

"We can't make this right, we know that," said Keever during debate on the House floor yesterday. "But we can say we're sorry and put our money where our mouth is. I urge you to vote for this."

A controversial bill that would allow hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, in North Carolina passed an important legislative committee Tuesday. Fracking uses horizontal drilling methods to access trapped pockets of natural gas. The bill's sponsors say it will bring much-needed money and jobs into the state, but opponents of the measure say there aren't enough safeguards.

Two 13-year-old boys face charges and a long-term suspension after authorities say a handgun and a loaded ammunition clip were found on one student at a Rowan County Middle School on Monday.
The Rowan County Sheriff's Office says the gun was found on a male student at Charles C. Erwin Middle School, near the town of Granite Quarry in the eastern part of the county.
Deputies say that, based on conversations with the parents, one of the students found a hidden lockbox key Sunday night at his home and used the key to open the box and take the gun.