by Bruce Bennett
“Trump says he doesn’t care if he mispronounces Kamala Harris’s name”
—The Independent
“I like mispronouncing her name.
With me, it is always the same.
I do as I please
With people like these.
For me, it’s all part of the game.
But wait. What is this? Something’s wrong.
There’s yelling and cheering. A throng
Is laughing. How rude!
It’s I who am booed
And mocked, and they’re playing along!
by Nora Jay
(After Lorca, via Leonard Cohen)
Though the Dems have umpteen childless women,
Lots of shoulders where cats come to cry;
Though there’s cash pouring in through the windows,
There’s a stump where campaigns quickly die;
So a cunning old Donkey gave warning:
“If you want to be sure of applause:
Ay, ay, ay, ay
Take this Walz, take this Walz,
Take this Walz with the clean-shaven jaws!
Oh we want him, we want him, we want him,
On a chair with a dad’s magazine,
Saying: “Son, want a ride to Home Depot?”
Or unblocking some pesky machine;
He’ll have corndogs at six for his dinner,
Where he’ll wink at his wife: “Ain’t life grand?”
Ay, ay, ay, ay
Take this Walz, take this Walz:
He likes tuna so long as it’s canned;
Ay, ay, ay, ay
If it’s broken, he’s got it in hand.”
by Felicia Nimue Ackerman
“‘The Bright Sword’ Review: Arthurian Fantasy Sans Arthur”
—The Wall Street Journal
Arthuriana sans the king?
That has a quite disloyal ring.
A new addition to the gallery?
I think I’d rather stick with Malory.
by Dan Campion
“Musket Balls Found in Massachusetts Recall ‘Shot Heard Round the World’”
—The New York Times
Thoreau, and others, missed a few
Spent rounds that had lain by
The old North Bridge? What else is new?
So many bullets fly
Throughout this country, where our guns
Are sacrosanct, lead shot
Turned up in Concord scarcely stuns.
We’d wonder had it not.
by Steven Kent
“JD Vance calls Trump ‘morally reprehensible’ in resurfaced emails”
—The Guardian
Of clear positions I might take,
There’s one I own appears opaque:
He’s Hitler—no, the people’s voice—
He’s heroin—our perfect choice.
I’ve been this way since back at Yale,
Before my soul was up for sale:
I hedge my bets in every race
And try to cover every base.
I loathe this most immoral man,
Yet call myself his biggest fan;
I wasn’t sure, but now I’m surer—
Goodness gracious, what a fuehrer!
by Nora Jay
“Mr. Trump… insisted on Friday that Ms. Harris wanted a federal law ‘for abortion to rip
the baby out of the woman in the eighth, ninth month and even after birth’…”
—The New York Times
Macduff was from his mother’s womb
Untimely ripped, near fatally;
But even he was spared the doom
Of being ripped post-natally.
by Dan Campion
“‘My jaw just dropped’: 500 million-year-old larva fossil found with brain preserved”
—LiveScience
Half a billion years ago
Some process not yet thought
Apparently began to show
Some hope of being taught.
You’d think by now brains might have learned
A thing or two, or three.
But, seeing wisdom daily spurned,
It seems they’re still at sea.
by Steven Urquhart Bell
“Monaghan farmer plays matchmaker with ‘lonely hearts’ snails”
—The Independent
It’s hard for snails to write a dating profile
That makes them seem a gastropod worth knowing,
’Cos owns own home is pretty much a given,
And so are likes nights out and easy-going.
by Marshall Begel
“[D]ozens of garden snails… gathered [in Congham, England] to compete in the World Snail Racing Championships…”
—The New York Times
Congratulations, gastropod!
You won in record time—
With wing-ed foot of Roman god
And shining trail of slime.
Although you’ve bested mighty teams,
As rated by our panel,
We recommend Olympic dreams
Stay this side of the Channel.
Because of certain French cuisine
(We’re too polite to utter),
The only gold their snails have seen
Is melted garlic butter.
by Steven Urquhart Bell
“Corpse shortage due to rise in Scottish medical students…”
—BBC
The news report revived an old ambition:
I’ve often thought of taking up a trade,
And all I’d need are garbarge bags, a headtorch,
Some VapoRub, a barrow and a spade.
by Alex Steelsmith
“[T]he ‘Forever Marilyn’ statue will be moved from its perch in front of the Palm Springs Art Museum
to a city park… Many critics did not object to the [26-foot-tall figure] itself, merely its placement…
However, some have said the statue is hyper-sexualized and misogynist, given that it shows Marylin
Monroe’s underwear… The statue recreates a famous scene [where a breeze] blows up the skirt
of Monroe’s character.”
—The Desert Sun
Fittingly, wittingly,
local authorities
plan to move Marilyn.
Nevertheless,
some might accuse them of
unconscientiously
skirting an issue they
ought to redress.
by Philip Kitcher
This nation yearns for leaders who are young,
And I am keen to swear that solemn oath.
The practiced master of the double tongue,
I’m on one ticket. Why not run on both?
The model of a modern demagogue,
For any cause I choose, I tune my voice.
Debate? A schizophrenic dialogue,
From which I’ll exit as the people’s choice.
I change opinions as I change my socks.
My guiding maxim: Principles are cheap.
I seize each opportunity that knocks.
Cat-lady Ddear Kamala, I’d love to be your Veep.
by Julia Griffin
“Trump urges Christians to vote: “You won’t have to do it anymore”
—CNN
And I shall wipe away
The tears from faithful eyes,
While nasty people pay
In fire that never dies.
And I’ll make all things new
And fix what came before;
Vote one last time! Then you
Won’t have to anymore.
by Ruth S. Baker
“A divided Ohio Supreme Court ruled Thursday that consumers should not expect boneless wings to be free of bones.”
—Fox News
Are shepherds sheepless now? Are monarchs throneless?
Writers are speechless. I am, now I know
That boneless wings may sometimes be non-boneless.
Tell me at least they’re still real buffalo.
by Kaitlyn Spees
“Whenever stress at work builds, Chinese tech executive Sun Kai turns to his mother for support.
Or rather, he talks with her digital avatar on a tablet device, rendered from the shoulders up by artificial
intelligence to look and sound just like his flesh-and-blood mother, who died in 2018.”
—NPR
(with apologies to Emily Dickinson)
The scramble on the ‘Net,
Once techies’ mothers Croak,
Creates from social media
An Avatar, bespoke,
To speak in her Scraped Language
And look like her Scrubbed Pics—
Put up your broom, E. Dickinson—
Eternity—is this?