THE FEARED GENERATION

by Colin Dardis

Plans to tackle misogyny in schools could take up to 20 years to have an impact on society, the safeguarding minister, Jess Phillips, has said as she outlined measures to protect women and girls. Phillips spoke the day after the National Police Chiefs’ Council (NPCC) estimated that 2 million women were victims of violence perpetrated by men each year in an epidemic so serious it amounts to a “national emergency.” —The Guardian, July 25, 2024

Fear for a lost generation,

already losing itself

inside a national emergency,

the beartrap of masculinity 

lying in wait

on every fresh field.

But who needs teeth

or blade or object

when a fist is enough?

Hands closed by culture,

clenched by mistruth,

the lie of servitude.

Pray we can reform

the expectations

of millions:

divorce boy from incel,

girl from object,

violence from sex.

Colin Dardis is the author of ten poetry collections, most recently with the lakes (above/ground press, 2023) and What We Look Like in the Future (Red Wolf Editions, 2023). A neurodivergent poet, editor, and sound artist, his work has been published widely throughout Ireland, the UK and USA.

SPINNING THE CYLINDER

by Akua Lezli Hope

Sonya Massey (above) ducked and apologized to an Illinois sheriff’s deputy seconds before he shot the Black woman three times in her home, with one fatal blow to the head, as seen in body camera video released Monday. An Illinois grand jury indicted former Sangamon County Sheriff’s Deputy Sean Grayson, 30, who is white, last week. He has pleaded not guilty to charges of first-degree murder, aggravated battery with a firearm and official misconduct. —AP, July 23, 2024

Because I am disabled, black and female in an under-resourced part of the world
Because I have called for help in the past and got harm
Because in a recent need for assistance I wept to 911 confessing my fear
Because Sonya Massey said on meeting the cop at her front door, “Don’t Hurt Me”
Because I saw her neat yard, glimpsed flowers, the vacuum cleaner in her kitchen, her robe over t-shirt and pj pants, her slippers, her neatly wrapped head
Because someone prowled around her white house, like mine, and cops found 
a black SUV with busted out windows next door
Because she was right to call and wronged
Because I saw her shot to death in her kitchen after apologizing, “I’m Sorry” on PBS
Because I couldn’t weep again and again and again but I haven’t slept for days
Because some of you will see this as anomalous, I testify that it is not
Because I am not dead from my bad encounters, only wounded and afraid 
Because my friends rescued me 
Because I live in a small town and don’t know how those chosen to police were chosen
Because there were all these red flags
Because, for those like me, asking for help is playing Russian Roulette
Because I never know if there’s a bullet in the chamber and if it’s pointed at my head


Akua Lezli Hope is a creator and wisdom seeker who uses sound, words, fiber, glass, metal, and wire to create poems, patterns, stories, music, sculpture, and peace. A paraplegic, third-generation New Yorker, her honors include the NEA, two NYFAs, NYSCA, SFPA, Elgin, & Best of the Net, Rhysling & Pushcart Prize nominations. Editor of NOMBONO, the first BIPOC speculative poetry anthology, she seeks work for a new anthology of disability themed speculative poetry at disabilitypoetics.com.

WE WANT A PRESIDENT

a wish list

by Bonnie Proudfoot in collaboration with Betsy Mars

We want a president who moves in down the street, 
spends a week or two. Even if we live in Flint, NOLA,
Hindman, Gallop, Butte, or the Bronx.
 
Who stands at the feet of a chalk line 
around victims of gun violence and weeps 
with families, friends, neighbors of the slain.
 
Who Faces the Nation and Meets the Press, 
This Week and other weeks as well.
 
Who flies Southwest economy class, 
rides the F train, buys local, birdwatches,
who saves the spotted owl, the monarch butterfly
the spotted salamander and the gopher frog. 
 
Who celebrates the 4th of July with poetry.
 
Who protects women who want to bring babies
Into the world and defends women who don't,
stands up for anyone facing gender-based rage,
who nurtures babies and spends time with children, 
not to teach them how to grow up faster 
but to teach herself how to imagine more.
 
Who pays taxes, declares gifts, keeps promises,
learns other languages, uses them. 
 
Who opens the White House doors to heads of
non-profits and legal aid groups, to teachers, 
911 dispatchers, brain surgeons, rocket scientists, 
actors, musicians, dancers, artists, farmworkers, 
bridge builders, smoke jumpers, border guards, 
police, soldiers, not just to donors or glitterati
 
Who recycles the plastic she picks up 
on shorelines and riverbeds. Who puts
solar panels on the roof of the White House and
charges her EV fleet. Who walks or bikes.
 
Who calls out sulfur leaching through creeks, 
fish floating belly up in lakes and rivers, 
the scraped-off mountaintops of Appalachia 
and all abominations to earth in the name of profit
 
Whose compassion breaks us open. 
Whose gravity weighs on us. Whose hope
holds us steady. Who laughs her ample laugh
shakes her womanly hips, hoists her groceries 
in an NPR tote bag, asks too many questions, 
dreams bigger than we ever could.
 
Who sits with Native American elders, 
holds an ear to the earth 
and listens.
 
 
Betsy Mars is a prize-winning poet, a photographer, and assistant editor at Gyroscope Review. whose poems can be found in numerous online journals and print anthologies. She has two books, Alinea, and In the Muddle of the Night, co-written with Alan Walowitz. Betsy is currently and sporadically working on a full-length manuscript titled Rue Obscure.

 
Bonnie Proudfoot writes fiction, poetry, reviews, and essays. Her novel, Goshen Road (OU/ Swallow Press) received WCONA’s Book of the Year and was Longlisted for the 2021 PEN/ Hemingway. Her 2022 poetry chapbook, Household Gods, can be found on Sheila-Na-Gig editions, along with a forthcoming book of short stories, Camp Probable. Bonnie resides in Athens, Ohio.

DANGEROUS STORIES IN THE AMERICAN PSYCHE

by Marilyn Letts

When I was a child                 in the 1970s

            I lived in Calgary

            I heard Jesus died for me at Calvary

I spoke as a child                     “Are they the same?”

            People laughed, showed me a globe

            Israel on the other side 

I felt as a child               when in the Bible, God said

            Don’t touch my chosen people!

            He meant me and Israel

I thought as a child                 Israel

            in the book of Exodus & the Calgary Herald

            fought their enemies, yet again

When I became a woman  the texts (and the news)

            read genocide  

I put away childish things   and grieve

Note: Italicized phrases in the poem reference 1 Corinthians 13:11, 1 Chronicles 16:22.

Marilyn Letts is a poet and writer who loves to experiment. Her poetry publications include FreeFall Magazine, Feathertale Review, and Other Voices. She lives on the traditional territories of the peoples of the Treaty 7 region and the Métis Nation of Alberta, Districts 5 & 6.

ENDORSEMENT

by Judy Rowe Michaels

The end for US President Joe Biden's election hopes was quick and unfolded in almost total secrecy—but Vice President Kamala Harris was ready… Harris "took time to arrange both lunch and dinner for the assembled aides," the source said… "The menu was salad and sandwiches for lunch, and pizza and salad for dinner. The Vice President's pizza came with anchovies, her go-to topping." —AFP, July 23, 2024

My late husband loved

anchovies. I do not.

But Kamala orders anchovies on her

pizza. Good enough for me,

though their salty, abominably

fishy slime does war with my

basic food groups—oatmeal,

Caesar wrap, lox with

schmeer. I have not tried

anchovy as finger food

for my Maine Coon cat,

but Larkin, long-time Democat,

will doubtless rise to

the occasion on his long hind legs

and prance. The smell alone

should do it. No need

to tell him they're endorsed

by the President-Elect.

Judy Rowe Michaels is, clearly, an optimist. A six-time cancer survivor, she speaks about ovarian cancer to medical school classes as part of the national organization Survivors Teaching Students. A retired English teacher and poet in residence, and a poet for the Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation, she has published four poetry collections, most recently This Morning the Mountain, and three books on teaching poetry and creative writing. She has received residencies from Hedgebrook, MacDowell, and the Banff Centre for the Arts. For over twenty years, Michaels has been a member of Cool Women, a monthly critique group that gives readings and publishes group anthologies.

ALL IN THE FAMILY

by David Southward

Rocky, who declined to provide his last name because he works downtown, was calling out to delegates and others leaving the RNC on Wednesday night, asking them about their views on LGBT issues. "You crashed our website!" he said, referring to news that Grindr was experiencing outages in Milwaukee during the RNC due to high traffic.—USA Today Network, July 19, 2024

While red-blooded men in Milwaukee
went ape on a gay walkie-talkie—
their fists pumped at Trump
while trolling for rump—
this fairy stayed home making gnocchi.


David Southward teaches in the Honors College at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. He is the author of Apocrypha (Wipf & Stock 2018) and Bachelor's Buttons (Kelsay Books 2020).

CARCASS

by Melanie DuBose

World’s Rarest Whale Washes Up on New Zealand Beach, Scientists Say: Only six specimens of the spade-toothed whale have ever been identified. This carcass could be the first that scientists are able to dissect. —The New York Times, July 17, 2024

swimming by
he notices 
on the ocean floor 
something long  sleek  dead

they hang the body by its tail on the beach
some things never change

very small fins long beak
an endless loop on repeat in my brain

my brain with its depths I can not reach
but perhaps could synthesize and become a pop star
if I knew how to make thoughts into sound
outside the window the hills are outlined  in red
along the horizon

am I ashamed to be human?
the whale comes from mountains higher than any on earth
I get vertigo floating  

Ex means out  my brain circles the parking lot
Extinction Existence Depth
very small fins long beak 

proof of life in death hanging by its tail on the beach
another dead whale out of water hoisted not quite extinct 
it seems though rare

another summer of fires
I swim in the deepest water and wish for something
sleek and alive

Melanie DuBose lives in Los Angeles. Recent poems and prose have appeared or are forthcoming in the Los Angeles Press, Kelp, Gyroscope, and Drunk Monkeys among others. Her favorite award is from the National Weather Association for helping six-year-olds write about the value of wetland preservation. 

ANOTHER LION MEETS WINTER

by Jennifer M Phillips

Time to step back from your long labors, Joe,
and let the eager young ones try their hands.
You've kept the long watch safe all night, we know,
and spared the ship of state from bergs and sands.
Heed the prophet's words, predicting, at his finish,
"another will increase, and I must diminish."
 
Your whole career you've served the working jack,
walked the union picket-line, yanked foreign jobs home,
foreseen future industries, retooled the work,
and understood such tasks are never done.
How it pains the industrious will to step away
before well-laid plans arrive at light of day.
 
It goes against your conscientious grain
to leave unfinished what's urgently needed
for this time of tempestuous fire and intemperate rain,
but the ground is prepared and a good harvest seeded.
Trust our resilient future, its competent folk,
to find new pathways for new repairing work.
 
You've fought for justice, remedy, and franchise
on an uphill slope and seen strong weapons shattered,
and though, as always, demons and enemies rise,
you've braced to hold the line when it has mattered.
Now there is a rank of fresh supply behind.
Fall back with honor. Trust the guiding Mind.
 
Democracy feels a fragile edifice
that monks must sweep away when prayers are done
like a painting in sand that time and wind erase.
One God-breathed moment: hearts are not the same.
See: the fresh art commences, the template resurrects;
renewed hope finds voice, as the Spirit directs.
 
O world-sorrow always with us, wars that never end,
but flurry like grackle flocks from one tree to another;
Many losses borne; retirement's one more to mend.
Your back is strong, your loves close by, your  team calls you brother.
you've led us by your best lights, and now will lead in this.
Believe that a gallant soul is never purposeless.

Jennifer M Phillips is a bi-national immigrant, painter, Bonsai-grower, with two chapbooks: Sitting Safe In the Theatre of Electricity (Blurb, 2020) and A Song of Ascents (Orchard Street Press, 2022). Phillips' work has appeared in over 100 journals, and is currently twice-nominated for a Pushcart Poetry Prize.

SPINNING

by Shawn Aveningo-Sanders

The latest weather dome has uncovered us from its blanket of unrelenting heat. At last, I can walk the trails near my house and not need the inhaler in my pocket. I let the laundry pile up in order to save the grid for more important things—lamplight, fans, the refrigerator’s hum. I’m wearing a T-shirt I haven’t worn in almost ten years with its rainbowed Love is Love on soft heather gray and Legalize Gay on the back. I still remember crying that day the courts ruled in favor of my daughters’ future weddings. I imagine the celebration in the hearts of Black Americans when the Civil Rights Act was signed, a year before I was born. I was too young to understand the ruling in ’73 but have been grateful for rights afforded to our sisters, our mothers, our friends. Now the Ferris Wheel is spinning in reverse. I watch the unraveling of progress in the name of pseudo-freedom, mock patriotism and the so-called good ole days. And here we stand, hand in hand, left wondering which car will be stuck at the top, once this ride comes to an end.

carnival tickets 

scattered like wildflower seeds

we wait for the rain

Shawn Aveningo-Sanders’ poems have appeared worldwide in literary journals including Calyx, ONE ART, Eunoia Review, Blue Heron Review, Tule Review, Amsterdam Quarterly, About Place Journal, and Snapdragon, to name a few. She is the author of What She Was Wearing, a chapbook that reveals her #metoo secret after forty years. She’s co-founder of The Poetry Box press and managing editor of The Poeming Pigeon. Shawn is a proud mother of three amazing humans and Nana to one darling baby girl. She shares the creative life with her husband in Oregon.

FROM NOW UNTIL NOVEMBER

by Thomas J. Erickson

“Towering Pine” by Alan Li

There are decades where nothing happens

and there are weeks where decades happen.

                                                    —Lenin

Out near the trout stream,

there is “the Pine Tree”

a towering white pine that somehow

escaped the blade of the lumberjack.

It was a signpost and a beacon

and we could see it from anywhere

while we walked across the plains to fish there

—me, Joe and Dad and Ed

until the dusk called us home for blueberry pie

and trout and potatoes fried in lard.

That was decades ago. Earlier this summer,

the tree started to fall. 

I was afraid it would be down

in a matter of weeks.

Today, though, the tree is still there. By November,

we might still be able to see it on the horizon.

Thomas J. Erickson is an attorney in Milwaukee where he is a member of the Hartford Avenue Poets. He likes to sit in court and write poetry before his cases are called.  His latest poetry book is Cutting the Dusk in Half (Bent Paddle Press, 2022).

BLADING

by Daniel Romo

Abdullah the Butcher

The politician wasn’t struck in the assassination attempt

and only his ear was grazed, but the trickle of his blood caused

          half the country to cry, Hero!

          and the other half to yell, Staged!

though no one can deny 

octogenarians are more brittle bones 

than bulletproof, and 

all’s fair in love and reward.

 

There are those who claim we never landed on the Moon 

and those who maintain the Earth is flat,

yet that doesn’t change the fact that 

           Abdullah the Butcher 

secretly sliced his forehead with a razorblade during matches 

in the days when wrestling was supposed to be 

                     considered real,

and his blood poured down onto his opponents 

like a christening for non-believers in the crowd 

at a baptism rooted in amusement      

and self-mutilation.

 

My dad didn’t initially recognize me as I visited

him and my mom this weekend

and blamed it on his cataracts.

And while that may be the cause,

I clearly see what’s to come 

for us all. 

 

When a platform is based upon pretending 

and failure to acknowledge that it’s not true sport 

but entertainment,

who could blame the public’s skepticism 

when a former president is clipped by a sniper 

and seconds later raises his fist to Heaven

as if not giving praise, but 

milking the most out of 

                                life’s misses?

 

I’m sure the candidate will still be able to hear 

from his right ear 

but never listen.

 

I’m sure my dad will continue to deny

the natural by-products of his age

 

because lies build like

scar tissue piled up upon skin,

like fresh dirt piled upon 

graves. 

Daniel Romo is half curve ball, half prose poem, half bodega. Proof at danieljromo.com.

HEAT-STROKE

by David Chorlton

There’s a picture postcard sunrise
back of the apartments
at 48^th and Warner
and a fire truck in the parking lot. Smoke on the second storey,
three bodies, no clues, this neighborhood is zoned
for stillness in the afternoon. Water
for the sparrows, suet for the doves, a whole sky for the hawk
who flew through the yard this morning.
A hummingbird drinks light,
the sun drinks desert
and the desert drinks a hundred years
of silence in a single gulp.
 
*
Dustbathing quail in a hollow; eight half-grown
and one adult, each
with a tremble in its throat. Two flickers
on the tallest palm, a hundred
degrees high and climbing. 
Night on its way, the rabbits are out
to listen for darkness. Sure enough, it’s crossing
the ridge now, leaving nothing
but the bones of light behind. 2:20 a.m. reports
of swimming pool shots,
monsoon clouds arguing again, no arrests
are made.
 
*
An evening when homicide
hangs between the trees
and stops halfway along the path
to where a hawk’s nest is woven into the wind
the sky turns suddenly electric.
All the stars are flashing.
City lights behind the mountain,
Heaven’s rain falling
and thunder wipes the darkness clean.

David Chorlton has long been at home in Phoenix. He has a forthcoming book from The Bitter Oleander Press, Dreams the Stones Have, dedicated to the desert.