by Julia Griffin

“Regarding the recent news released on the official website of the WTA, the content has not been
confirmed or verified by myself and it was released without my consent. The news in that release,
including the allegation of sexual assault, is not true. I’m not missing, nor I am unsafe. I’ve just been
resting at home and everything is fine. Thank you again for caring about me.”
—Email from the account of the Chinese tennis player Peng Shuai

Regarding recent news, let no one chafe:
I am not missing, nor I am unsafe;
I’ve just been too fatigued to step outside
Because of claims I have not verified,
Including one of sexual assault
Which is in fact untrue and no one’s fault.
No content’s been released with my consent.
I’m resting in my home. That’s where I went.
Thank you for caring. Everything is fine.
The words that you are reading here are mine.

by Steve Bremner

“Stephen K. Bannon, the former Trump White House adviser who was indicted last week for defying a congressional subpoena, surrendered to federal authorities Monday morning…”
—The Washington Post

He was “Steve Bannon” yesterday,
And now today he’s “Stephen K.”
Next stop, that awful badge of shame—
Congress incants full Middle Name?
Recall how, when that trial was on,
The orange one was “Donald John.”

by Clyde Always

“‘QAnon Shaman’ Jacob Chansley sentenced to 41 months in prison for role in US Capitol riot …
[In court] Chansley… described wanting to live his life like Jesus Christ and Gandhi.”
—CNN

How fearsome you looked in your horns & your fur
& your mug all encrusted in paint…
So, maybe a talented LARPer you are—
a messiah you certainly ain’t.

by Alex Steelsmith

“Russia’s COVID-19 deaths set daily record… while the the total number of coronavirus infections
…in the country has topped 9 million.”
—Associated Press

“Ukraine says Russia has nearly 100,000 troops near its border.”
—Reuters

Doubledy troubledy
Eastern Ukrainians,
fearing what Putin is
likely to do,

scramble to bolster their
armamentaria
and, while they’re at it, their
armaments too.

by Julia Griffin

A long way after Tennyson

My discontent is off the scale,
As even I’m aware;
I doubt I’d see the Holy Grail,
And less I could not care.

I cannot sleep, I hate to work—
A feeling, I might add,
That might have wiped the righteous smirk
Off good Sir Galahad.

Without a charger (sad to state),
I’m stranded, once again,
With essays bound to aggravate
Far worse than Agravaine,

So brandishing my good red pen,
I slash and underscore!
I’m stroppy as a dampened hen,
Because my arm is sore.

by Mike Mesterton-Gibbons

“Police will not investigate cash-for-peerages allegations against Tories”
—Independent

Cough up ten grand, back in Lloyd George’s day,
And you’d be “Sir”—’twas fifty grand for “Lord.”
Shell thirty grand out, and your “Sir” would stay
Hereditary for your son’s reward …
Fast-forward to the present day: new laws
On honours now forbid their sale, and yet
Rich donors to the Tory party cause
Have confidence three million pounds will net
One peerage. Though it sounds a bit like graft,
No cop can prove it’s not a legal kind
Of practice in the politician’s craft,
UK-style … So historians will find
Reform has failed to change how “Lord” is sold—
Save now the price has risen sixtyfold!

by Ruth S. Baker

“China: Man banned from all-you-can-eat BBQ for eating too much
Mr Kang said the restaurant is ‘discriminatory’ against people who can eat a lot.
‘I can eat a lot—is that a fault?’ he said, adding that he didn’t waste any of the food.
But the restaurant owner told the same reporter that Mr Kang was putting him out of pocket. …
‘Even when he drinks soy milk, he can drink 20 or 30 bottles. When he eats the pork trotters,
he consumes the whole tray of them. And for prawns, usually people use tongs to pick them up,
he uses a tray to take them all.'”
—BBC News

Pork trotters on the menu? Yes!
I’ll have—three kilograms, I guess.
Prawns? Excellent! Let’s take a tray
And load it up. Saves time that way:
Why fuss with little tongs when you
Have half a tank to bulldoze through?
Ooh, soy milk bottles!—I’ll have twenty.
I do appreciate this plenty,
So why on earth have I been banned?
I do not waste, nor understand:
Why should this miser whine and cringe
To see me on my merry binge?
I eat a lot—is that a fault?
Discrimination! Pass the salt.

by Stephen Gold

“Claim: U.S. President Joe Biden farted while meeting with the Duchess
of Cornwall [at COP26 in Glasgow].
Rating: Unproven”
—Snopes

(with apologies to Bob Dylan)

How many farts must a POTUS suppress,
Before he can let one fly free?
How many toots? Can you hazard a guess?
Is it one, is it two, is it three?
And how do we know that it flew out of Joe,
As he squawked, “Who did that? Wasn’t me!”
The answer my friend, is blowing in the wind,
The answer is blowing in the wind.

by Geoffrey Basking

“Steve Scalise, the Republican whip in the House of Representatives, said last week that …
‘carbon emissions have been around from when before man walked the Earth …
the idea that hurricanes or wildfires were caused in just the last few years is just fallacy.'”
—The Guardian

“This scam,” said Scalise, “is a scandal:
A hurricane’s easy to handle!
What’s carbon emission?
A normal condition
Since man first stepped out with a candle.”

by Dan Campion

“The U.S. and China announce surprise climate agreement at COP26 summit”
—NPR

Friends, let’s surprise the climate!
Let’s show we really care,
Although we tend to slime it
And foul both sea and air.

The world’s expression’s priceless
As we exclaim, “Surprise!”
Though icecaps tip toward iceless
And ocean levels rise.

The climate, far more gracious,
Won’t stand outside the door
But enter in and thank us,
While hinting we do more.

by Julia Griffin

“Rare ‘cotton candy lobster’ … rescue[d] by Maine fisherman”
—The Guardian

My Candy-Colored Lobster,
Pursued by every mobster
And bounty-hunting robster:
What obstacles she’s faced:

No soup-and-salad jobster
Or boil-upon-the-hobster
Is she, my heart’s own throbster,
So exquisite of taste!

I am no snoozy slobster,
No unambitious blobster:
I’ll lobby for my Lobster
All decapods above,

Because she is my lodestar,
My indigo-and-woad-star,
My worthy-of-an-ode-star,
My lustrous Lobster Love!

by Chris O’Carroll

Again she’s been fined for not wearing a mask.
She’s Marjorie Greene, of course. Why would you ask?
Fine after fine, she continues rebating
The money we pay her for not legislating.
Where Trump dodges taxes, she takes up the slack.
A few more offenses, we’ll be in the black.

by Ruth S. Baker

“Girl, 6, With ‘Heavy Menstrual Bleeding’ After COVID Vaccine Was Actually 41”
—Newsweek

A menstruating girl of six
Is proof of Fauci’s sneaky tricks:
Just see what vaccination’s done!
But now it seems she’s forty-one.
It’s moot how much these numbers mean:
I’m rather gray for seventeen;
By contrast, as it seems to me,
I’m learnèd for the age of three.
My health and wellness correlate
With what you’d hope at sixty-eight;
For eighty-four I’m looking fine!
(Admittedly, I’m fifty-nine).

by Steven Kent

“N.F.L. Fines Aaron Rodgers, Packers for Covid-19 Protocol Violations”
—The New York Times

Vaccinate, schmaccinate,
A. Rodgers, quarterback
Faked on a vax play—he’s
Nobody’s mensch.

N.F.L. defense then
Unsympathetically
Shut down his offense with
Fines and the bench.

by Pat D’Amico

An old lady seeks out a booster
Cause the CDC constantly goosed her,
So she calls up the regional spots
In charge of dispensing the shots.

They all say that’s perfectly fine,
But first you must journey online.
She enters the hideous web
Where reason can trickle and ebb.

Then she’s pointing and clicking away,
Which swallows the bulk of the day.
Appointments, she finds, always tend
To result in a woeful dead end.