A NEW BEGINNING

by Ron Shapiro

Step back from lies, greed

and corruption if only for

an afternoon in Chicago

for the opening of Obama’s

center on the south side.

Feast your eyes 

on an alternate

amerikan reality

where character,

kindness, community,

and truth matter. 

 

Listen to diverse voices

speak of the amerikan promise:

life, liberty, pursuit of happiness.

 

Hear words and songs

that elevate our country.

 

No need for a violent spectacle

on the lawn of the people’s

house. No need to reshape

and destroy this nation’s

original sins of slavery

and indigenous genocide.

No need to hide your gender,

skin color or faith. 

 

You are welcome in this place.

 

Come bring your children to

learn of the struggles for

equality, justice, and freedom.

 

Join hands with a stranger,

dance in the moonlight,

sing of hope and change,

believe in this country again. 

Ron Shapiro, an award-winning teacher, has published over 20 poems in publications including Nova Bards 24 & 25, Virginia Writers Project, The New Verse News, Poetry X Hunger, Minute Musings, Backchannels, Gezer Kibbutz Gallery, All Your Poems, Paper Cranes Literary Magazine, Zest of the Lemon and two chapbooks: Sacred Spaces, Wonderings and Understory, a collection of nature poetry.  

I, SYCOPHANT

by Pepper Trail

Cartoon by JD Crowe

You ask “How can you?”

You ask “Have you no pride?”

 

That just shows your ignorance, and you don’t even know it.

The first rule, of course, is never to ask a question.

 

The name and face of Our President deserves to be on every government building and document.

 

A Mixed Martial Arts cage fight on the White House lawn is a beautiful celebration of America.

 

A gilded triumphal arch is the perfect expression of our nation’s democratic ideals.

 

President Trump is the greatest peacemaker this nation has ever known.

 

There are those, maybe, who say these things but don’t believe them.

They are beneath contempt.

 

I do believe. Every day, more.  

Every day, I forget more that embarassment, my former self.

 

I was never the best.

Now, in His eyes, I am.  Or, I can be.

 

No one but President Trump could have saved us from the invasion of immigrant rapists.

                                                                                             from transgender girls playing sports.

                                                                            from electric cars.

                                                                         from Iran.

 

The perfection we see everywhere around us is all due to You and your wise leadership.

Everything I say is just a way of saying, God bless you, Mr. President.

Without You, I am only what I was before.  

Nothing.

Pepper Trail is a poet and naturalist based in Ashland, Oregon. His poetry has appeared in Rattle, Atlanta Review, Spillway, Kyoto Journal, Cascadia Review, and other publications, and has been nominated for Pushcart and Best of the Net awards. His collection Cascade-Siskiyou was a finalist for the 2016 Oregon Book Award in Poetry.

HEADLINES JUNE 2026

by Margaret Gannon

PAY-PER-VIEW CAGE FIGHT 

ON WHITE HOUSE LAWN  

 

(Israelis are still killing Palestinians in Gaza) 

 

ICE RAIDS THREATENED 

DURING WORLD CUP FINALS 

 

(Israelis are still killing Palestinians in Gaza) 

 

SAN FRANCISCO D.A. DEMANDS 

15 YEARS JAIL FOR PROTESTERS 

 

(Israelis are still killing Palestinians in Gaza) 

 

SECRETARY OF DEFENSE DECLARES 

MORMONS ARE NOT CHRISTIANS 

 

(Israelis are still killing Palestinians in Gaza) 

 

TRILLIONAIRE’S IPO TITILLATES 

RETIREMENT ACCOUNT OWNERS 

 

(Israelis are still killing Palestinians in Gaza) 

 

STRAIT OF HORMUZ BLOCKED; 

WORLD ECONOMY THREATENED  

 

(Israelis are still killing Palestinians in Gaza) 

 

AMERICAN DEMOCRACY STAGGERS 

TOWARD TWO AND A HALF CENTURIES 

 

(Israelis are still killing Palestinians in Gaza) 

 

 

Margaret Gannon is a retired attorney in San Francisco, CA.

DELANEY DEFINES “PROVOCATIVE”

by Michelle DeRose

At not-yet one, he cannot toddle

but his baby thighs can yet befuddle.

At four, all crayon plots require shredding

and no legs may be revealed by leggings.

A woman’s toes? Oh, mercy me!

Two rows of cleavage, can’t you see?

A human knee, oh hold me back—

a frontal, bulbous, sexual attack!

They get desperate when we enforce the code

that won’t let decency erode.

Professor Emerita of English, Michelle DeRose has published over a hundred poems in various journals, including multiple times in The New Verse News.

…BUT ‘TWAS A FAMOUS VICTORY

by Philip Kitcher

Cartoon by Nick Anderson

"Our excursion delivered a world-changing win!"—

will it also uncover the limits of spin,

as the faithful besotted are forced to conclude

they've been conned for too long, and their emperor's nude?

Philip Kitcher has written too many books about philosophy, a subject which he taught at Columbia for many years. His new book The Rich and the Poor (Polity Press) is all about the costs of abandoning morality in politics and public life. His poems have appeared online in Light, Lighten Up Online, Politics/Letters, Snakeskin, and The Dirigible Balloon; and in print in the Hudson Review.

ODE TO JALEN BRUNSON

by Kirby Olson

Before a crowd of 10,000

we watched the fifth game at Pier 17.

 

The guy next to me was from Astoria.

He told me golf was his favorite

 

sport, because he loved the lawns.

A black kid said he wanted the upstate

 

residential college experience,

and his knees hurt from bball.

 

June 13th, we spent the day

looking for Swedish candy.

 

Everyone was wearing a Knicks jersey,

even in tiny parks such as Seward.

 

That night, Brunson took out Wemby

by using his size advantage.

 

He could get a quicker start

with Hezis; he could start and stop.

 

Wemby jerked around on baby giraffe legs.

Growing frustrated, he mushed Brunson.

 

The crowd began to hate the French giant.

FU, Wemby, was heard, as the giant got the whistle again.

 

Frustration grew, and the kid next to me said that

a Spurs teen had been put in a coma at the MSG location.

 

I tried to find that on my phone, but I couldn’t.

We hated the Goliath, but remembered he was 22,

 

So we loved the mature Brunson as he wove in and out,

and stopped the questionable flopping

 

of the previous year.

This year, he drove like a barracuda,

 

his head was sheathed like a woodpecker.

He had the strength of ten gorillas.

 

He went in like a kingfisher,

but more than all that he was human.

 

He married young and loved his child.

His wife was there for him.

 

We loved that he was an American

and had seemingly no hatred for the Spurs.

 

He said in many ways he preferred Texas

because the taxes in NY were so terrible.

 

His friendship with Kat and Anunobe,

his laughter with Bridges and Hart,

 

his wearing of the helmet to avoid

eye sting from champagne;

 

We loved it all, as orange and blue prevailed!

Kirby Olson is a poet who lives in the Catskills and who occasionally visits the city. He plays adult basketball and isn't very good. His most recent book of poetry is called Night Shift at the Utopian Turtletop Factory (Half-Inch, 2026).

AN ODE TO DAVID, GOLIATH, AND THE NEW YORK KNICKS

by H.G.

Jerry Seinfeld would call me a snob.

Me, a believer that truly brilliant writing
needs a deep understanding
of the wide spectrum of human emotions.

Him, co-creator of a show
about nothing,
yet wise enough to know:
even nothing is something.

And who dare argue
with the man who saved Snapple

and thinks he’s saving Israel
while larping
as the IDF
in 2018,
mock killing Palestinians
who are killed for real
a few miles away.

All to fly 5,677 miles
home
to his NY Knicks
and his courtside tickets.

Now,
2026: Mayor Mamdani’s NYC
the Knicks first championship win
since 1973.

Jerry,
and the whole stadium,

Mayor Mamdani,
and the whole city
at watch parties

electric
street filling joy
spreading
New York
to New Jersey:
an eruption
of celebration,

as one.

The stadium,
a stone’s throw
from Palestinian Brooklyn
intertwined
with Jewish Brooklyn
and Palestinian Patterson
adjacent 
Jewish Fair Lawn

where tensions must be buried
memories are long,
trauma, genetic

and walls
                unnecessary. 

Because
everyday
a better story
can be written
by better people
than Jerry Seinfeld
and me
as on the night of June 13, 2026
when every color and creed 
of New York and New Jersey
chanted

My mayor Muslim, 
my bagel Jewish
my Christian, Dior 
Knicks took it in five, not four*

*Italicised lines based on the viral rhyme created by MD Ahnaf Hossain prior to game 4.

H.G. is an American poet based in New York. She holds an MA in history and is working on her first verse novel. Her previous poems have appeared in The Inflectionist Review, The Amphibian, The New Verse News, Blue Minaret and is forthcoming in Neon & Smoke.

STAYIN’ ALIVE: NO KINGS

by Roderick Deacey

Cumulonimbus clouds jostle & dominate
the dark side of the sky.
             They have gathered in towering, glowering stacks,
as ominous grumbles of thunder announce
the storm is upon us.

             Of course we ignored the signs—
we have long learned to ignore warning signs
             here at the far end of democracy,
lest one of the regime’s masked rib-breaking squads
             single us out somehow,
& fling us to the ground & kick us until our ribs break.

              So, we simply accept,
that under the hard rain that’s gonna fall,
             we will, as usual, get soaking wet.

             How did we become so sad & beaten down?
Isn’t it true that, en masse, Americans are good people?

             Perhaps racist & prejudiced, but with good hearts?

             Maybe short on critical thinking, but mostly meaning well?

Whatever—this is still America—
                          supposedly no kings allowed.

            We can put on raincoats & resistance yellow hats.
            We can wear red knitted hats like WWII Norwegians.
            We can wear turquoise knitted hats, or teal—
& many of us will wear those bright rainbow hats—
            because that’s where we stand—
& some ladies among us will dig out their old pink pussy hats
            from back when
                       the country was another country.

What we seemingly can’t do
            is decide on a single unifying hat color—
                      not a good omen.


Roderick Deacey writes many poems and is rejected a lot. James is always very nice about it, though.