by Marshall Begel

“Simple chance decided a seat on the Madison City Council on Wednesday,
with a name selected at random handing Isadore Knox Jr. a victory…”
—Wisconsin State Journal

All votes are decisive! All voices do matter!
Forget the statistics. Ignore all the chatter.

The people decide, not some slick bureaucrat.
Now wish your guy luck as I draw from this hat!

by Nora Jay

“FBI arrests guardsman who applied for job on RentAHitman.com …
Garcia told agents after his arrest that he had not intended to go through with the contract killing.
He said he just received a job offer at a Nashville medical center that he intended to take instead.”
—The Guardian

I’m thinking what my best career would be:
A murderer, or just a plain MD?
Information I’m amassin’:
Nurse assistant, mass assassin?
To grab a latex glove or Glock Gen 3?

In either case, my work is clean and plain;
I’ve never yet been called a scatterbrain;
My vascular incisions
Will require no revisions:
I guarantee that no one will complain.

by Steven Urquhart Bell

“Gardeners urged to protect bats as numbers drop”
—PA Media

I feed the birds and foxes in my garden,
And now I want to do my bit for bats.
I’m leaving all the windfalls and the insects,
And buying some repellent for the cats.

But what if some are really nosferatu,
And someone in the block invites them in,
Believing they’re delivering a package,
Or flogging bootleg cigarettes and gin?

I’d have to be bedecked in Christian symbols,
And maybe even shave them in my hair.
If eligible women think I’m crackers,
It’s just a cross I’m going to have to bear.

by Clyde Always

“Sea lions flee in panic after man backflips off pier to harass them…”
—The Sacramento Bee

If you are a curious human
(sans vessel, commander and crewmen),
don’t guzzle a beer
and then dive off the pier!
To see us up closer, just zoom in.

by Alex Steelsmith

“America’s Most Prolific Logger Recasts Itself as Environmental Do-Gooder…
Although [it] is cutting down as many trees as ever and plans to increase lumber production…”
—The Wall Street Journal

Readily, steadily,
timber productiveness
rises, and annual
profits have jumped;

born-again heroes of
biodiversity,
loggers look good and their
critics are stumped.

by James Higgins

“[A]nti-abortion groups are citing the ideas of a 19th-century ‘vice reformer'”
—NPR

The Comstock Act viewed as salacious and lewd
peoples’ mailing all tools of abortion,
meaning dilators, speculums, catheters, too…
and that’s but a minuscule portion.
Does all this entail I shall wind up in jail
if I’m caught buying coat hangers via the mail…?

by Steven Urquhart Bell

“End of care doctor reveals the things patients say in their last words”
—Daily Mail

I hope I greet the Reaper on my deathbed
With something witty, full of vim and sass,
Not standing at a stairhead and exclaiming,
“These varifocal lenses are fantas–”.

by Bruce Bennett

“[New York City Mayor Eric Adams has named] Kathleen Corradi as the city’s rat czar.
‘The rats are going to hate Kathy,’ said Adams.”
—The New York Times

The Rat Czar is ready to roll!
The City’s exerting control.
The rats can sense doom.
They feel their end loom.
Their numbers will soon pay the toll.

This isn’t just PR or hype.
The time is at last more than ripe.
Get ready. Get set.
Go on. Place your bet.
The Piper has picked up her pipe.

by Steven Kent

“For Ron DeSantis, Overflowing War Chest Obscures the Challenges Ahead”
—The New York Times

He’s got the looks, the wife and kids; he served.
His moves are bold; he’s never, ever swerved.
The faithful cheered him loudly when he spoke
Declaring culture war, attacking “woke.”
With coffers full, he’s ready in the main
To wage a winning ’24 campaign.
He sports a perfect MAGA pedigree;
Too bad nobody likes the SOB.

by Julia Griffin

“Florida teacher fired for asking students to pen [their own] obituaries for active shooter drill”
—The Guardian

Here we lie, Orlando’s young.
Outrage pours from every tongue,
While each politician shares
Prayers and thoughts and thoughts and prayers.

I was nearly seventeen,
Which is more than some have been.
Ask DeSantis, passer by,
How he thinks a child should die.

Mourn for me but don’t, for shame,
Think about assigning blame
Just because the GOP
Loved its firearms more than me.

Guards patrolled our school all day;
Shooter got us anyway.
Buy a better, bigger gun!
That is all that can be done.

These obituaries made
Legislators quite afraid.
Who imposed this? they inquired,
Found the teacher, charged, and fired.

Stranger, learn what killed Grade Six:
Bullets, pride, and politics.
Tell our rulers, when they cry:
We lie still while you still lie.

by Dan Campion

“Virginia Fifth Grader Is Celebrated for Spotting Textbook’s Error”
—The New York Times

A young phenomenologist
Perceived within his book
Two rock types mixed up. Holy schist!
He took a closer look.
Yep, there can’t be a speck of doubt.
His teacher lit some fires,
And now the wrinkle’s ironed out.
All praise to Liam Squires!

by Alex Steelsmith

“[A] Polish-American artist… is training a trio of robotic dogs to paint autonomously…
‘The project… is pushing the boundaries of my art practice’…”
—Artnet

Stippledy, drippledy
canine automatons
painting on canvases
seems like a stretch.

Should they be classified
neopostmodernist?
Will we be shocked by the
prices they fetch?

by Iris Herriot

“‘It’s called stealing’: new allegations of plagiarism against Roy Lichtenstein
Pop art founder made millions, but the comic book artists he copied struggled financially…
Lichtenstein himself said: ‘My work has been accused of looking like the things that I copy,
and it certainly does look like the things I copy… But it is that quality, whatever art is,
that transforms the work of art to be something different.”
—The Guardian

My work does look much like the things I copy,
So some who made those things are getting stroppy.

But it’s that quality, whatever art is,
That makes me different from those other parties.

What takes a 4-cent comic and transforms it,
Engages the artistic world and storms it?

That quality is hard to be precise on,
But fortunately not to put a price on.

by Martin F. Kohn

“We’re hosting our FIRST EVER poetry contest and inviting poets of all levels to participate.
The theme of the contest is plumbing…”
—A Facebook post from the Benjamin Franklin Plumbing Company, of Dallas

Odists, bards and troubadours,
Get to it, no more stalling.
Set aside your daily chores,
The pipes, the pipes are calling.

by Steven Kent

“The Abortion Ban Backlash Is Starting to Freak Out Republicans”
—The New York Times

We sought to win election fights
Through stripping women of their rights
And tried to build our voting bloc
By turning, turning back the clock,
But now I fear we’ve dropped the ball:
They don’t seem happy, not at all,
These modern women (Red and Blue).
Our vision isn’t theirs—who knew?