by Steven Urquhart Bell

“Would you have sex with a robot?”
—The Telegraph

I’ve never treated sex as just a lark,
So only if I felt there was a spark.

by Kaitlyn Spees

“Starting in late fall each year, migrating newts have to cross a public road that divides their forested hillside
habitat from their spawning ground in a nearby [lake] … Now about 80 volunteers strong, the grassroots group
[Chileno Valley Newt Brigade] has for six years rescued more than 22,300 Pacific newts…”
—NPR

(With apologies to the King James Bible)

The Brigade’s my shepherd; I shan’t be squashed.

They arrest me in the beams of their flashlights; they ferry me across the asphalt.

They commission habitat studies; they dream of building tunnels underneath the road for me.

Yea, though cars may claim my tail or leg, a Brigade volunteer still scoops what remains of me off the pavement, comforted by my regenerative power.

The volunteer deposits me back where I was born; its waters embrace me; my spawn drop lakewards.

Why do these strange diurnal creatures follow me every migration of my life? They still believe in those grand old virtues of mercy and kindness, through selfless acts made new(t).

by Steven Kent

“Navajo alarmed by reports of Indigenous people caught up in Trump immigration raids”
—The Guardian

Attention, all you non-White folk:
Today you’re headed back
To where you came from. Not a joke—
Go grab your stuff and pack.

Invasion’s over, understand?
It ends right now, right here;
You’re gone, you’re out, you’re barred, you’re banned—
The Boss’s order’s clear.

Don’t care if you’re a Navajo
Or Cherokee or Sioux;
We took this land some time ago,
So you’re just passing through.

You’d best believe we’ll do our worst
If you’re in sight tonight.
Why should we care you lived here first?
We’re White, so might makes right.

by Bruce Bennett

“Researchers say there’s a 1.3 percent chance that the space rock 2024 YR4
could strike our planet—but not until December 2032.”
—The New York Times

We’ve got till 2032.
Till then there’s nothing we need do.

And meanwhile, it’s not even clear
that anything will still be here.

by Mike Mesterton-Gibbons

“My criticism of Trump was wrong, says [Peter] Mandelson…
[t]he UK’s choice for the next ambassador to the US”
—BBC

Perhaps I didn’t mean to say the prez
Endangers Earth by spouting reckless views—
There must be more to what this bully says,
Endearing him to viewers of Fox News.
Remarks made then are wrong now, and ill-judged:
My duty is to grovel on the floor,
Announcing he’s fair-minded, he’s begrudged
No more, and even consequential for
Diplomacy between our countries. His
Extraordinary mandate means I must
Learn fresh respect for MAGA-friendly biz,
Suck up to him on-air, and earn his trust
On everything … till, in my memoirs, I
Need not deny that Trump’s a nutjob guy!

by Iris Herriot

“Long-lost anti-fascist mural from 1930s restored and back on show in Mexico”
—The Guardian

While Mexico prepares to show an anti-fascist mural,
We self-administer a kind of civic epidural:
Why march? Why join? The news is so fatiguing we’re near fainting;
So let’s instead admire this monumental, distant painting.

by Julia Griffin

“The official portrait of First Lady Melania Trump was captured on January 21, 2025,
in the Yellow Oval Room of the residence by esteemed photographer Régine Mahaux.”
—whitehouse.gov

Her hair is loose. Her skin is tight.
This FLOTUS is our most soignée.
She sees the world in black and white:
It’s all more elegant this way.

This FLOTUS is our most soignée.
The light is sharp. The lines are clean.
It’s all more elegant this way:
Half CEO, half Disney Queen.

The light is sharp. The lines are clean.
She’s guarded by an obelisk:
Half CEO, half Disney Queen.
You’re welcome, if you take the risk;

She’s guarded by an obelisk,
Remote and cool against the sky.
You’re welcome, if you take the risk:
Come, look her in the narrowed eye.

Remote and cool against the sky,
Her hair is loose, her skin is tight.
Come, look her in the narrowed eye:
She sees the world in black and white.

by Alex Steelsmith

“The legend of alligators inhabiting the sewer system of New York City is a widely circulated urban myth
… [T]hese alligators are often described as large and vicious… Alligator in the Sewer Day [is] celebrated
on February 9.”
—Wikipedia

Snappy, crappy
sewer gators
faze New Yorkers
not a bit;

some describe the
legendary
creature as a
croc of sh__.

by Clyde Always

“Bills season ends in AFC championship loss to Chiefs”
—Sports Illustrated

For my sister

Those rosy, faithful fools out in the snow,
whose football team’s forever blizzard-tossed:
more die-hard fans the game will never know.

Their zeal they showed, in 10-degrees-below,
by smashing plastic tables, stiff with frost—
those rosy, faithful fools out in the snow.

They swore, “Once Allen’s trounced Mahomes—our foe—
we’ll feast on wings and skate Lake Erie, sauced!”
More die-hard fans the game will never know.

This victory, they knew, would soothe the blow
dealt decades past: those four Big Games, all lost—
those rosy, faithful fools out in the snow.

Alas, their whoops gave way to wails of woe
when one last screaming spiral proved star-crossed.
More die-hard fans the game will never know.

Once more, they’ll yearn all year for Autumn’s glow
then don their well-worn sweaters, BILLS-embossed.
Those rosy, faithful fools out in the snow:
more die-hard fans the game will never know!

by Steven Urquhart Bell

“Moby Dick author Herman Melville’s London townhouse is for sale for £9 million”
—London Standard

It’s a townhouse in London where prices are high,
And it used to belong to an eminent guy,
And the fixtures and fittings are probably nice,
But I still think they’re asking a whale of a price.

by Neil Doherty

“Tiny mites seem capable of relying on the power of static cling to hop into hummingbird nostrils
and move between flowers.”
—The New York Times

We’re nibbling on the pollen and we’re sipping on the nectar,
The hummingbird is lingering in iridescent flight.
But the pollen’s always sweeter in another floral sector,
So we book a nasal passage, and it doesn’t cost a mite.

by Dan Campion

“Trump, Musk suggest sped-up return of NASA astronauts [Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams],
but details scarce”
—Reuters

“Move fast and break things.”
—Mark Zuckerberg

Are Don and Elon aping Zuck
And trusting breakage and good luck
To get those astronauts unstuck?
Dear Butch and Suni, please take care!
We all know haste makes vaporware.

by Alex Steelsmith

“After nine months stuck in the [moving Weddell Sea ice] pack… the ship slid down
to her frigid grave. No one ever expected to see the stout little ship again…
[Until 107 years later…] Out of the abysmal darkness, a century’s worth of wonder,
history, and legend filled the screen. The port side of the Endurance, still
resplendent… as if it sank yesterday, emerged from the gloom.”
—National Geographic

Shackleton’s vessel was moving, although
Nature compelled her to go with the floe,
Shackled in irons of north-drifting ice
Slowly becoming a merciless vise.

Thus, he would launch his historical trip
After the Weddell had swallowed his ship;
Fractured and scuttled, Endurance was doomed
Never again to be seen, he assumed.

More than a century later—behold!—
Deep in the fathomless darkness and cold,
Shackleton’s ship is impossibly found
Upright, her timbers astoundingly sound.

Cameras robotically panning the wreck
Capture the brittle stars manning her deck;
Life, to perennial hardship, inures.
Shackleton lives, and Endurance endures.

by Nora Jay

“President Donald Trump’s first actions in the Oval Office included rolling back healthcare
policies put forth by former President Joe Biden, including expansions to the Affordable Care Act…”
—Fox News

I voted for the MAGA King, Big Don:
He’s promised to reduce the price of eggs!
And that’s why I don’t care my healthcare’s gone,
And probably I’m going to lose my legs.

by Bruce Bennett

“Anders Vistisen, a Danish member of the European Parliament, told President Donald
Trump to ‘f*** off,’ in response to Trump touting the idea of buying Greenland.”
—CNN

Let’s hear it for the Danish.
Plain speaking’s for the Dane.
Greenland’s been theirs eight hundred years,
and theirs it will remain.

And here’s one Dane who says so,
Who speaks up for their land,
and uses words— a few at least—
that Trump can understand.