by Jerome Betts

In the Tiverton and Honiton parliamentary by-election on June 23, the Liberal Democrats overturned
a huge Tory majority. The election was held after the resignation of the constituency’s Conservative MP
who began searching his smartphone in the House of Commons for information about tractors, but
strayed into more stimulating country matters.

In the chamber whose benches are green
Avoid watching porn on your screen.
Its public detection
May cause an . . . election
So a Lib Dem then sits where you’ve been.

by Mike Mesterton-Gibbons

“Lucky rabbit survives 40-mile ride in car grille”
—BBC News

A rabbit on a grassy highway plans
Grand feasts—not being severed from its ma,
Released with just a carrot in some man’s
Idea of a wooded Shangri-La
Long after jamming through his grille and hence
Left bloody-nosed within a distant strange
Environment. So when this man sees sense,
Decides the rabbit needs its old home range,
Retrieves a box—like one some poachers use—
And tries recapture, there is no surprise:
Believing it is destined to make stews,
Before the man can pounce, the rabbit flies …
If you got grilled but didn’t cook your goose,
Then you don’t trust the griller—you vamoose!

by Bruce Bennett

“Amazon plans to let people turn their dead loved ones’ voices into digital assistants,
with the company promising the ability to ‘make the memories last’.”
—The Guardian

I know you’re dead, but tell me, Dear,
that you are glad I called you here.
I’m needing—craving!—the sensation
that we’re still having conversation.

It’s wonderful to know that we
can talk and talk incessantly,
but that I can, should that get rough,
just state, “Alexa, that’s enough!”

by Ruth S. Baker

“‘Fluffy’ crab that wears a sponge as a hat discovered in Western Australia
Family found a Lamarckdromia beagle specimen washed up on the beach in Denmark
in southern [Western Australia]”
—The Guardian

No crab with any chic still wears a helmet,
Enjammed upon its headpiece like a pelmet:
Those dungenesses—let them all go dunge!
Wear a sponge.

Don’t squat inside a rockpool like a hermit;
In horsehair (or whatever you may term it);
Discard those fashion blunders—just expunge!
Wear a sponge.

A horseshoe’s not aesthetically lucky;
A shelly head is really rather yucky;
Those barnacles went out with last year’s grunge!
Wear a sponge.

This summer’s look’s not blue or snow or spider;
It’s soft and downy—wrap your eyes in eider!
Go feminine this season—take the plunge!
Wear a sponge.

by Alexander Pepple

“FDA bans Juul’s vapes, pods citing ‘conflicting’ data on potentially harmful chemicals”
—USA Today

Out for a mega payday was Juul
as diehard smokers got to vape,
loving the vapor-cloud escape . . .
till the FDA chose to duel
because of newfound cloudy data—
which caused production lines to choke
on all the government’s ultimata.
Now that payday’s up in smoke.

by Alex Steelsmith

“[The] exhibit opened as a pop-up on the National Mall.”
“Judges block pop-up beach parties in 2 Jersey Shore towns.”
“Black business owners celebrate Juneteenth with pop-up event in Roseland”
“Pop-up driver licensing offices coming to Kentucky Counties.”
“…Festival hosts pop-up church service.”
—Recent headlines

Jiggery-poppery,
pop-up phenomena
all of a sudden are
everywhere. Yup,

just when you wish you were
finished with pop-ups they
phraseologically
keep popping up.

by Alex Steelsmith

“Putin’s bodyguards collect his poop when he travels abroad… [An agent] places his excrement
in a specialized packet… [On a trip to France there were] six suited men in Putin’s entourage
accompanying him into a bathroom. … The tactic appears to be an effort to reduce the risk of foreign
powers discovering information about Putin’s health… There are at least two examples of poop
interception being used as an intelligence technique… Stalin tried to spy on China’s Chairman Mao
and other top officials by analyzing their excrement.”
—Business Insider

Hurrying, scurrying,
Vladimir’s bodyguards
carry a poop-bag and
scoop to the loo;

six of them (minimum)
overattentively
congregate, waiting for
Putin to poo.

Spyingly, pryingly,
excrement analysts
threaten his travels to
places far-flung;

after all, Stalinist
counterintelligence
analyzed secrets once
found in Zedung.

by Julia Griffin

“People are accusing Kim Kardashian of damaging Marilyn Monroe’s gown
after wearing it to the Met Gala”
—NBC News

by Clyde Always

“25 employees suffer burns after hot coal team-building event in Switzerland”
—New York Post

To break the ice, sometimes the Swiss
walk barefoot over steaming coals.
The argument for doing this,
presumably, is full of holes.

by Chris O’Carroll

“We will… hear testimony that President Trump rejected the advice
of his campaign experts on election night and instead followed the course
recommended by an apparently inebriated Rudy Giuliani
to just claim he won…”
—Congresswoman Liz Cheney (R-Wyo)

His sober team brings news he hates to hear.
He can’t admit he lost. He’d rather die.
Defeated, weak, and prey to primal fear,
He needs to party with the other guy,
So Reeling Rudy plies him with good cheer,
Uncorking bottles of Chateau Big Lie.

by Mike Mesterton-Gibbons

“Geidt resignation letter reveals frustrations of working with [Boris] Johnson”
—The Guardian

I‘m disappointed your account was not
Made fuller, and affronted that you would
Deliberately breach the Code. And what
Is more, that “miscommunication” should
Suggest I somehow was to blame that you
Avoided learning my concerns in full,
Prime Minister, is something that I rue …
Permit me to translate: You’re full of bull,
Old bean, I’m at my tether’s end. You’re just
Impossible. You’re so mendacious, sly,
Nefarious, corrupt and void of trust
That I was dumb to be your ethics guy.
Exasperated, I resign—and can
Delight that I’m a dis-appointed man!

by Steven Urquhart Bell

“Health and productivity—the four-day week debate”
—Scotland on Sunday

That isn’t why I’m getting in a stew:
The thought of doing five days’ work in four.
It’s really only two days’ work I do.
I stretch it out to five by moving slower.

My extra day will leave me feeling lower.
I should be out and knocking back a brew,
Instead of gearing up to meet the chore
Of squeezing three days’ shirking into two.

by Steve Bremner

“Man Sold Marijuana Edibles To Children Across Montgomery Co…
‘This defendant was targeting children as young as 11 years old to sell his drugs to,
embedding drugs in cereals and snack products that appeal to children. … [His] business supplying
drugs to children and encouraging children to be drug dealers is an egregious case.”
—Philadelphia news item

What, “edibles” in middle school?
And dealers too? Oh brother,
These kids are barely off one pot
Before they’re on another.

by Jerome Betts

“Factory farming is turning this beautiful British river into an open sewer”
—Opinion piece in The Guardian

Can this be Wordsworth’s “sylvan Wye,”
The one that wandered through the woods?
With chicken-prisons too close by
Gone, gone, that line of poetry goods.

R. Gibbings, one of smaller fry
Who loved canoe trips’ starts and stoppings,
How sad your Coming Down The Wye
Would now describe a stream of droppings.

by Steven Kent

“Britney Spears’ ex-husband crashes her wedding”
—CNN

How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.
I love, though I be poor while thou art rich.
My soul and thine, united three short days,
Yet ever in mine heart It’s Britney, bitch!