RESTING ON A ROCK AT 8000 FEET WHEN IT SHOULDN’T HAVE BEEN SO HOT IN MARCH

an abecedarian

by Malinda Miller

The record-breaking heatwave scorching the US west [in March] would have been “virtually impossible” if not for the climate crisis... caused primarily by the burning of fossil fuels. —The Guardian, March 20, 2026

Above the steep riverbank, no snow or ice in sight,

 

below a craggy granite face, I’m

 

cracked open by 

 

determination to understand 

 

evolution. Not 

 

from where, how, why —

 

grand theories

 

honed in academic halls, no — more

 

incipient answers to questions I’m afraid to ask.

 

Junipers surround me, trunks gnarled, twisted,

 

knobby—able to survive relentless heat, intense winds, scarcity of water. 

 

Lichen, among the oldest of living things on Earth, 

 

mossy green, burnt orange and yellow on barren rock 

 

near my dusty backpack and boots, colonized here long before us. 

 

Other foliage and organisms are not so hardy—nor am I—left 

 

parched from a winter of too much wind and too little moisture;

 

questioning, can damage causing climate change be

 

reversed? What’s next? Can we adapt?

 

Should we expect a 

 

tumultuous future full of

 

unforeseen consequences?

 

Verdant seasons may become rare. This we must accept.

 

We’re not as resilient as juniper or lichen. With limited water, only 

 

xeric organisms will survive. Of this planet’s 4.5 billion years, in

 

yardsticks of time, humans are a blip. If, when, will we become 

 

zero, zip, zilch?

 

Malinda Miller is a writer, teacher and editor who is most at home on Weston Pass in Colorado or in the Nevada desert where her family had a ranch just off Highway 50, aka the Loneliest Highway in America. Her poetry and personal essays have appeared in A Poetic Inventory of Rocky Mountain National Park, Ecotone, Think, the Mountain Gazette, the Colorado Sun, the Coloradan, and others. At Lighthouse Writer’s Workshop, she teaches youth classes and community outreach workshops. She has a MFA in creative writing from Western State Colorado University and a MA in journalism from CU Boulder.

THE MOMENT OF CLOSEST APPROACH

by Theta Pavis

Using an inflatable Moon globe, [the Artemis II crew] practiced seeing how the angle of the sun changed the colors and textures of the lunar surface, honing their observation and note-taking skills for the big moment. —France 24, April 4, 2026. Above: An inflatable moon ball for sale at ebay.

Before the Artemis II Crew blasted off,
they had to practice looking at the moon.
Back on Earth, researchers would want to know
what each astronaut saw out there, in-between
the greys and dusty browns. What craters and colors,
what rocks and rockets. To prepare the voyagers,
the Science Flight Operations Lead hung a giant
inflatable moon globe from a crane and packed
the four fragile humans into a mock capsule.
She told them all to rehearse looking at the moon.
Funny no one thought to hire a poet to help with this part.

 

Theta Pavis is poet and editor. A former reporter, she spent years teaching journalism to first-generation college students. Her writing has appeared in The Journal of New Jersey Poets, Lilith magazine, The Red Wheelbarrow, Mom Egg Review and others. She’s received residencies from Bethany Arts Center and Arts By the People. Her chapbook The Red Strobe was published in 2025 by Finishing Line Press.

DEEPWATER PORTFOLIO

by Zumwalt

 

 

Endangered Rice's whales live their entire lives in the gulf, where they're vulnerable to vessel strikes, noise pollution, oil spills and climate change—all of which could increase with more drilling, scientists said. Other animals, including threatened manatees and endangered sea turtles, also could be put at risk, experts said. As the Iran war pushes energy prices sharply higher, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth invoked national security in seeking an exemption from endangered species laws, which make it illegal to harm or kill species on a protected list. The seldom-used Endangered Species Committee granted that request on Tuesday. Rice’s whale is the only whale species that lives year-round in the Gulf of Mexico, where there are fewer than 100—and possibly fewer than 50—left, scientists said. —PBS, March 30, 2026

The subsea map is neatly partitioned

into optimized lease zones;

seismic airguns fracture the water column 

with monetized concussions.

Audit sediment for trapped hydrocarbons;
seamlessly filter out the pathetic,
low-frequency protests of a dwindling pod:
fifty surviving Rice’s whales, biological oddities,
drowning in our modern energy paradigm.

Stupidly stubborn, incredibly spoiled,
they insist on quiet currents
and fatty silver-rag driftfish delicacies,
never exerting effort to adapt
to the tides of quarterly dividends.

Let the regulatory committees squawk about their grievances:
the diamond-tipped drill bit demands results.

Flood aquatic corridors with commercial logistics:

it's an obvious course of action.

Trade the flawed architecture of God's creations
for the unquestionable superiority of the combustion engine,
the freedom to wage war against any nation,
and the right to consume without restraint.

 

 

Zumwalt's poetry feeds on alienation, shifting reality, and forced adaptation. Zumwalt, a proud repeat contributor to The New Verse News, has recently been published in The Society of Classical Poets.  

DROP THE MIC

by Steven Kent

 

 

 

"U.S. defense spending would rise $445B under Trump budget plan, with steep cuts elsewhere." —The Guardian, April 3, 2026

A budget written by a nutter
Favors guns instead of butter.
Starve the people, stoke the power?
No, said Mr. Eisenhower.

 

 

Steven Kent is the poetic alter ego of writer and musician Kent Burnside. His work appears in 251, Asses of Parnassus, The Dirigible Balloon, Light, Lighten Up Online, The Lyric, New Verse News, The Orchards Poetry Journal, Philosophy Now, The Pierian, Pulsebeat Poetry Journal, The Road Not Taken: A Journal of Formal Poetry, Snakeskin, and Well Read. His collections I Tried (And Other Poems, Too) (2023) and Home at Last (2025) are published by Kelsay Books. 

ON FINDING JESUS TOTE BAGS AT BRANDY MELVILLE

by Lisa Seidenberg 

The Jesus totes were hung

from a bare nail in the store

among the tables of baby tees 

and short shorts seen 

by tweens who pause purposefully

at the offerings of each station

Not a full body Jesus 

Not a loving Jesus—

It was only the head

tilted slightly—quizzically even—

sporting the brambled crown 

of thorns he wore 

with signature aplomb

An odd sight, nevertheless

as Brandy Melville is a brand

for the body-con set

with its “one-size-fits-most" 

if you are young and female 

with a bikini-ready silhouette.

With doleful eyes cast downward, 

the tote bag Jesus regards 

the teetering mountains of

drawstring sweatpants

In soporific shades

of gray and blue and sand

A fitting attire for the desert breeze 

of Bethlehem 

or the Sea of Galilee

One wonders what thoughts 

might cross his mind, aware 

that Brandy M permits no returns 

of any kind? 

Lisa Seidenberg is writer and filmmaker and a Pushcart nominee (2025). Her writing has been published in Rattle, Asymptote Journal, Gyroscope Review, Rain Taxi, Third Wednesday Magazine,  Anti-Heroin Chic, Atticus Review, The New Verse News, One Art: A Journal of Poetry, Delta Poetry Review, and New England Review;  she is also a poetry reviewer for the Whale Road Review. Her documentaries and experimental films screened at international film festivals inc. Sundance, Berlin, Athens and London. 

NARCISSIGNATURE

by James Penha

"Donald Trump should be focused on lowering costs, but instead he’s busy trying to put his name on your money. How does this help working families already drowning in this economy? Senator Jeff Merkley and I are pressing for answers.” —Senator Elizabeth Warren, April 4, 2026

It is not illegal to casually mark

with a name or small doodles

US paper currency as they do not

make the bill unusable. That’s why

you can find on e-bay greenbacks

for sale with the sharpied autograph

of Donald Trump across Washington’s

face. So when the bills with Trump’s

official signature come across your

palm, America, unleash blue sharpies

to caption his name with “pedophile”

or “POS” or “grifter” or just cross it out.

James Penha edits The New Verse News. His latest book is Queer As Folk Tales.

COCOONED

by Marjan Sabouri 

Underground shelters

with the smell of sweat and fear
in musty air—

These are my first feelings of war,
as I was a little child.
A dark cocoon

that surrounded my childhood.

Now, in my forties,
I experienced the second touch of war.
Israel attacked Iran,
while I was far from my homeland.
 

Darkness ravished me again.

Not as musty shelters,
but of total net blackout.
For days,
I had no news
from my loved ones.
 
All those fears and scents
came down on me.
 
The silkworm

that was ready to emerge

got cocooned again,
in the dark. 

Not long after,
a massacre of many Iranians

who fought for basic rights
occurred in only two days.
Unbelievably heartbreaking.

 
Memories run through my head,
a track of caterpillars;
 

The faces of those youths
beautiful and filled with hope

covered in body bags.
 
The voice of “Sepehr e baba, kojaei?” 

—the desperate father that called for his dead son among many dead bodies.

 
The ecstatic voice of the little child
when she saw her father’s face in TV

and screamed out of joy: “Babaei! Babaei!”—it’s dad—
without knowing
it was a list of the deceased.

 
The ululating and grief-dancing
of bereaved mothers

at the funerals of their beloved children—

As the cocoon
was getting thicker,
I made another memory of war.
America and Israel attacked Iran.
 
Broken and helpless,
people who live in enduring emptiness

—in mind and in pockets—

pray for the foreign attackers

to save their lives.

 
Wishing for freedom in war.
Wishing for happiness in ruin.
Wishing for life in death.
 
Will there be a hope

to tear away the cocoon
under the crash

and release the butterfly?


Marjan Sabouri, a 44-year-old Iranian woman, has a Master’s Degree in Illustration. She has completed many art works in Illustration and Design and has served as a University Lecturer for almost 12 years. Mostly, she writes her poems in Farsi, her mother tongue. However, since living abroad the last two years, she has started to translate her poems (by herself) to be shared with a bigger community of people in order to spread the message of Humanity, Peace, and Love worldwide. She wishes to be a voice protesting injustice and human rights violations, especially now, in Iran and in the Middle East.

FLIPPING BACK AND FORTH

Between the Artemis II Launch Live Stream and the Live Stream of the Supreme Court Hearing Arguments Regarding Birthright Citizenship

by Liz Ahl

 

Someday, humans may be born on the moon.

Whose moon may or may not be in dispute

in that future I imagine, as I flip from laptop tab

to tab on April Fool’s Day, feeling a little foolish

with the thrill-flutter summoned by the fully-fueled

rocket; feeling also a little edgy with my Gen X

rocket-gone-wrong memory. But thrill wins out

and I don’t look away as the biggest rocket

we’ve sent up since I was a toddler burns skyward,

moonward. As the nation burns deathward—

a rocket-spitting machine both fueled

and made rickety by insatiable greed, a sadistic

hybrid of automation and a deeply human cruelty.

I was born in the wing of a Naval hospital

that’s torn down now; the people who

conceived me in the moon-foolish summer

of 1969 and parented me for decades

are dead, and I’m feeling a little adrift,

a little nationless. A little unsure of my name,

my place. As if I’d been born on the moon.

Liz Ahl is the author of A Case for Solace (2022), winner of the 2023 New Hampshire Literary Award for Poetry. Her other collections include Beating the Bounds (2017) and a number of chapbooks, the most recent of which is A Stanza is a Place to Stand, published by Seven Kitchens Press in 2023. Poems have appeared recently in Rogue Agent, Cherry Tree, and River Heron Review. She lives in New Hampshire.

HARRY HINES BLVD, DALLAS, TX, 0647 AM

by Kay White Drew

Taillights stream by like corpuscles thru blood vessels, branches
off the aortic arch (there’s a mnemonic for that I’ve forgotten),
blurred and softened by the translucent window shade.
Traffic lights turn from green to brief yellow to long red,
downtown skyline hulking in predawn distance, the stark ovoid 
tower of the Renaissance Hotel lording it over the rest.

A mile down the road, my brother sleeps in an isolation room,
his embattled bone marrow doing what it can to recover
from the chemical onslaught it’s been subjected to
in the name of healing, even as the drivers of these cars
whizzing by my 3rd floor hotel window go about their business—
driving to work, worrying about their bills and their kids
and their ailing parents, listening to some false prophet
on the radio telling them it’s all the fault of the immigrants
and the trans people rather than the demented tyrant in the White House.

How many miles from here to the nearest of the concentration camps
(and how many are there in this state?) where the people detained
would give anything to be driving to work, worrying
about an overdue mortgage payment or a wayward teenage son.
These hulking urban clusters, the fruit of oil/blood money,
can’t help but draw my contempt, even my hatred…

Yes, I hate you, Dallas, not just because my brother’s dying here,
but because our country is, too.

 

Kay White Drew is a retired physician whose poems appear in various anthologies and internet outlets including The Intima, Gargoyle, Second Coming, and New Verse News. She’s also published short stories and several essays, one of which was nominated for a Pushcart Prize, and a memoir, Stress Test, about medical school in the 1970s. She lives in Rockville, MD with her husband. Reading and spending time in nature keep her sane(ish) in these difficult times.

LUNA MAGNIFICA

by Anne Gruner

 

Your radiant gaze
belies your violent birth—
a cataclysmic collision
delivering you from the bowels
of Mother Earth into
her synchronous embrace.
 
As asteroids pummeled your baby face,
lava cracked open your eyes—
Imbrium and Serenitatis—and forced
the smile of Nubium and Cognitum.
 
Your mother found you precious.
You shielded her from solar winds
and nurtured her atmosphere,
tugging her primordial soup
back and forth to salt life
upon her terra firma.
 
Now, as you age and find yourself
somewhat more distant,
you still stabilize her Goldilocks tilt,
regulate her ebbs and flows,
and calm her mood swings
as maturity and abuse take their toll
on her temperate temperament.
 
And at long last, you reveal
your greatest secret—
water ice at your poles,
holding out the promise
you will help her denizens,
the dwellers of graying Earth,
reach for the stars.

NASA’s Artemis II rocket lifts off for an historic moon mission. Cartoon by James Mellor.

Anne Gruner is a two-time Pushcart nominee whose poetry has appeared in numerous print and on-line publications including Amsterdam Quarterly Review, Beltway Poetry Quarterly, Wayfarer Magazine, The New Verse News, Humans of the World, Spillwords, and Written Tales. A former career CIA analyst and lawyer, Anne lives in McLean, Virginia with her husband and two golden retrievers.

THE NEW NORMAL

by Lawrence J. Krips 

This morning I tossed an empty toothpaste tube

into the toilet bowl instead of the basket.

 

Later, the just simmered Marinara sauce

went from the stove into the everything drawer.

 

You see, the system I relied upon, 

has taken an unapproved vacation.

 

My friends insist dictators will save the world

and that being independent is an unnecessary burden.

 

My children are beginning to wonder not at the barking 

but by the preternatural scratching with my left foot.

By overwhelming minority opinion, The Supreme Court

declared the United States null and void.

 

The stairs took me up to the basement, while 

the dump sink in the attic overflowed to the roof.

 

The President has ordered all new maps 

eponymously rename the Western Hemisphere.

 

Who knew vaccinations cause fleas or 

cameras can substitute as hearing aids?

 

From now on, men’s votes are the only ones counted

in all the elections we will no longer have.

 

For as a woman seweth so does a man reapeth,

the oceans tideth and space-time discontinueth.

 

Nothing does lead to something 

and a stitch in mine is yours in time.

 

I no longer need to study all those tedious details for elections,

the decisions have been and will be made for us.

 

Do not fear this upheaval.  The old normal 

is just the new normal calling a time out.

Lawrence J. Krips is an evolution coach  and poet.  A founding member of Ocean State Poets and contributor to the Origami Poetry Project, Larry's poetry has appeared in such publications as Tifferet, Writers' Circle, Rhode Island Writers' Circle Anthology, The Open Door, 50 Haikus, New Verse News, The Best of Kindness II Anthology and Under the 13th Star Anthology.  His poem, Yahrzeit, received a Pushcart Prize nomination.  Mr. Krips' first book, A Soul's Way . . . Soulspeak, was published by Hallowed Abyss and is also available as a cd.

VAINGLORIOUS

by Melanie Choukas-Bradley

 

 

 

 

In a word

 

Melanie Choukas-Bradley is a naturalist and author living in metropolitan Washington, DC. Her books include City of Trees, A Year in Rock Creek Park, and Wild Walking—A Guide to Forest Bathing Through the Seasons. Many of her poems have appeared in The New Verse News and Writing in a Woman’s Voice.

THE MOUNTAIN LION OUTSIDE MY BEDROOM WINDOW

by Dick Altman

Utah’s new study aims to kill ‘as many cougars as possible’ —High Country News, March 24, 2026

Reclusive Monty,

as I like,

in kinship,

to call you,

visits in deepest night,

not to hunt,

as one might expect,

our abundant deer,

but to slack your thirst

at the water-filled grotto

lying just beyond

where I rest my head.

 

We each,

in our way,

share

the same story,

breathing life

here at seven thousand feet.

where our ridge overlooks

the Rio Grande Valley.

ancestral home to Puebloans,

who worship you

as “the beast god”,

revered beyond

any other animal,

including the bear,

for your lithe beauty

and stealth.

 

I see you

as a high desert

panther,

royalty of solitude.

Your prints

in the snow,

broad as my hand

wide,

leave me breathless,

in their suggestion

of power unbridled,

eager

to pounce.

 

Recent sightings

in the neighborhood,

remind how closely

our lives touch.

Though an Anglo

living in Indian Country,

it would crush me

to see your mythical

presence eradicated.

 

Another gift

of your species,

the smaller,

but far less shy,

Bobby the bobcat, loves

to roll around

on the welcome mat,

outside our glass-paneled

front door.

as he taunts ravens,

into a squall

of angry screams

and fly-bys.

 

I find it impossible

not to feel

an intense connection

with you creatures

of the wild,

 

Hunters,

yes,

you will

always be,

but much more,

as even Puebloans’

ageless reverence

for Bobby shows.

 

Which begs

the question:

should rampant

cravings

for hooved

trophies,

outweigh

sustenance

for one’s

innermost

bearings,

linking us

to nature?

 

Dick Altman writes in the thin, magical air of Old West’s high desert plains, where, at 7,000 feet, reality and imagination often blur. He is published in the American Journal of Poetry, Santa Fe Literary Review, Fredericksburg Literary Review, Foliate Oak, Landing Zone, Cathexis Northwest Press, Humana Obscura, Haunted Waters Press, and others here and abroad.  Pushcart Prize nominee and poetry winner of Santa Fe New Mexican’s annual literary competition, he has authored some 300 poems, published on four continents.