by Alex Steelsmith
“Leader of Belarus gifts Putin a tractor for 70th birthday…
Tractors have been the pride of Belarusian industry since Soviet times.”
—AP
Factory tractory,
Putin’s new vehicle
quite unexpectedly
lends him some charm;
though his endeavors are
non-agricultural,
one can now picture him
buying the farm.
by Steven Kent
“Woman who said Herschel Walker paid for abortion also has child with him…”
—The Guardian
Such slander—I shall not repeat
These lies that dog me every day!
What’s that? She kept the damn receipt?
Well, this is awkward, as they say.
by Philip Kitcher
“King Charles greets Liz Truss with: ‘Back again? Dear, oh dear.’”
—The Guardian
“No. 10 dismisses rumours of Liz Truss U-turn on tax cuts.”
—The Guardian
The monarch muttered, “Dear, oh dear,”
the second time we met.
His whole demeanor made it clear
I’m not his PM yet.
It seems that every Tory peer
will have a hissy fit.
I must amend my plans, I fear,
and do the opposite.
But hark! A voice from yesteryear,
when Tory virtue shone,
sings songs of triumph in my ear,
to buck me up, and bring me cheer—
it’s Maggie! “Carry on!”
by Dan Campion
“Lab-grown brain cells play video game Pong”
—BBC News
A dish of brain cells playing Pong?
I can’t help thinking something’s wrong.
I’d let those neurons thrill to Bach,
Or Jake and Elwood’s “Jailhouse Rock.”
Who’d you respond to, bathed in broth,
Virginia Woolf, or Philip Roth?
There’s no disputing taste, I guess—
But still, why not a game of chess?
by Alex Steelsmith
“Two Russians flee to Alaska by small boat and ask for asylum…
more than 60 miles from mainland Russia…”
—NBC
Riskily Russkily,
Two Russian nationals
jump in a dinghy with
no time to wait;
wanting no part in the
Russo-Ukrainian
war, they aim eastward and
keep Bering Strait.
by Chris O’Carroll
“President Biden on Thursday pardoned all individuals convicted on federal charges
of simple marijuana possession, a move that the White House estimated would affect
more than 6,500 people nationwide.”
—Los Angeles Times
Joe Biden’s not the kind of guy
With whom one thinks of getting high.
He’s not a member of the tribe
Who radiate that Woodstock vibe.
He hardly ever rolls a joint
While mulling judges to appoint,
And in the Situation Room,
Will seldom nibble on a ’shroom.
Yet justice gives this cat a buzz,
As we can now discern, because
He pardons at a single stroke
Six thousand busted for a toke.
He didn’t have to hit the bong
To understand the law’s been wrong.
So hip-hooray for unhip Joe
Who knows what freedom needs to know.
by Philip Kitcher
“Yankees star Aaron Judge surpasses Roger Maris with 62nd homer,
logging greatest MLB power season since steroid era”
—Yahoo!sports
For decades, fans lament: “Tsk! Tsk!
That record is a fudge.”
Now he’s expunged one asterisk.
Kudos to Aaron Judge.
by Mia Henry
“Tom Brady and Gisele Bündchen Have Reportedly Hired Divorce Lawyers. …
The [New York] Post has been tracking perceived discord in the marriage
in recent months, with many speculating that Ms. Bündchen and Mr. Brady
had fought over his decision to unretire from his football career…”
—The New York Times
(To the tune of “Hang Down Your Head, Tom Dooley”)
Hang down your head, Tom Brady
Better get lawyered up
Hang down your head, Tom Brady
You are one sorry pup
You should have cleaned out your locker
Just like you said you would
You don’t need a supermodel
To tell that your plan’s no good
You might make a good announcer
FOX thinks that you’ll do fine
But you crave thousands cheering
And love your offensive line
So order yourself a smoothie
Your chef knows the recipe
Too bad it doesn’t call for
A shot of humility
by Dan Campion
“Fresh Exciting Images Reveal 10,000-Kilometre-Long Destruction Trail
Left Behind from NASA’s DART Mission”
—The Weather Channel
Thanks, NASA, for that blazing trail
Left by your project DART,
A comet tail, at global scale,
Of avant-gardist art.
by Julia Griffin
For Tam
“‘Singing’ goat causes giggling fits at Worcester Cathedral service”
—BBC News
Oh praise ye the Lord!
The cocks, how they crew!
The lions all roared;
The lambs did so too.
All things that give sound
Joined in with a will:
Giraffes stamped the ground;
The larks trilled their fill;
Each jubilant chord
Was chattered and cooed,
And snorted and snored:
The cows’ mooey mood
Re-echoed around.
The goat then, unfloored,
Made humans give sound.
Oh praise ye the Lord!
by Steven Urquhart Bell
“‘Best way to eat a Big Mac’: McDonald’s menu hacks claims to have discovered ‘elite’ trick”
—Daily Express
It’s best to eat your junk food on the way home from the pub,
’Cos if you really must indulge in such unhealthy grub,
It’s better if you do it on a bellyful of beers,
So nothing does you too much harm before it reappears.
by Alex Steelsmith
“[O]ne diner at a restaurant in southwest China… noticed something unusual imprinted in the stone floor…
dinosaur footprints aging more than 100 million years back. Expert paleontologists visited the restaurant
to analyze the scene…”
—Ripley’s.com
Biggily-wiggily
paleontologists
might have been doubtful at
first, but have since
come to agree that it’s
incontrovertibly
true that a diner saw
dinersaw prints.
by Katherine Barrett Swett
“At N.Y.U., Students Were Failing Organic Chemistry. …
Maitland Jones Jr., a respected professor, defended his standards.
But students started a petition, and the university dismissed him.”
—The New York Times
When premeds in organic chemistry
Did not get grades that top med schools required—
They needed A’s and not these C’s and D’s—
They hit the roof and Admin said, “He’s fired!”
When Mom and Dad had paid a hefty sum
To educate the darling they had sired
And this cruel teacher called their children dumb,
They told the kid, “It’s time that jerk was fired.”
When twenty years from now our doctors are
These kids who always got what they desired,
We may well wish there’d been a higher bar—
That someone, once, had said to them, “You’re fired!”
by Alex Steelsmith
Monday, October 10, marks the 50th anniversary of the Woodward and Bernstein report
that the FBI had made connections between Nixon aides and the Watergate break-in.
Trickery Dickery
Nixon the president
ordered a theft and his
kismet was fixed.
Now on this curious
semicentennial
people remember how
Nixon got nixed.
by Steven Kent
“Better than Bulgaria but not as nice as Cuba: how did the United States
become such an awful place to live?”
—The Guardian
My foreign friend, how dare you cast
Aspersions on this nation?
We top the list from first to last
In every situation,
Especially when we measure stuff
Like poverty and shootings
And child mortality (that’s rough),
Mass murders, riots, lootings,
And pill-fed deaths of deep despair
And crushing healthcare fails—
This train has run (despite the fare)
Completely off the rails.
It’s not that bad, some might retort;
Why so much dark foreboding?
Democracy’s on life support,
Autocracy’s exploding.
Things didn’t have to go this way,
But can they be undone?
Tomorrow let us hope and pray
We slip from Number One.