TWENTY-FIVE YEARS AGO THE TOWERS FELL

by Al Ortolani

September 11, 2001 by Ann Telnaes

In twenty-five years

I lost two sets of parents. All four

of my children married happily. My wife

& I traveled to the Blue Mosque, faced Mecca,

Watched the whirling dervishes.

                                  The alignment of planets.

In Athens we took a selfie outside Socrates’s cell.

I retired from caving & mountain climbing,

made peace with the Catholic Church,

almost became a Buddhist like Thomas Merton

almost became a Buddhist. Gave my kayak

                                    to a duck hunter.

Kept my paddle in case I was ever up a creek.

My daughter taught English in Chinatown.

When the Towers collapsed, the school filled

with dust & debris. The children crawled

along the hallway wall to the gymnasium.

My daughter, moving back to Kansas in 2000,

called & called the school on her cellphone,

prayed for the parents rescuing their kids

                                     under the basketball goal.

Since that day we’ve had six grandchildren

added to our family. Two cats have died

& I’ve buried them under the Japanese maple.

                                     I own the same Toyota.

We rescued a dog at the beginning of Covid.

He has grown & been loved & is living

what people call his best life. He has visited

the mountains & the desert & the ocean.

He’s been kicked out of poetry readings

for whining at poorly written lines.

                                      I was told in Spain

that we had an idiot for a president. America,

once the shining light of democracy is an

embarrassment to me. Stupidity in red & white

& blue. NATO rotting. We’ve threatened

Greenland with invasion. Canadians flip us the finger.

Our president renamed the Gulf of Mexico &

Lake Ontario for America & the Kennedy Center

for himself,

                   and & and & and, each American

promised five thousand dollars if his sycophants

were elected in November. The Towers fell

twenty-five years ago, since then we’ve attacked

Iraq & Afghanistan & Venezuela & Iran,

                   our migrants in the streets.

We honor our dead with more dead. Our tears

with Taps. War begets war for generation upon

generation.

                    Someone smart said this.

Saint Peter in his cell. Gandhi making salt.

Mother Teresa in her slums. Chief Joseph

who today will fight no more forever.

Ukraine & Gaza & The National Parks.

There is no god, but God. No death, but Death.

No poem in the streets, but the Rant.

Two of my grandchildren are eligible for service

in the military. I consider a house for them

in Canada near my cousin Tony who fled Nixon

across Lake America in seventy-one. Today,           

                    I tipped the kid on the trash truck

twenty bucks to haul off my dead television

for his supper.

Al Ortolani is a poetry editor for the Chiron Review. His poems have appeared recently in Rattle, One Art, Pithead Chapel, and Muleskinner Journal.  New York Quarterly Books plans to release his poetry collection, American Watercolor, in early 2027.  

OUTBOUND MESSAGE

by Lynne Barnes

Today is National Suicide Prevention Day
and I have spent it oblivious 
to the day’s significance.
Me, of all people.

Today was a long stream of stressful things to tame,
hacked computer—my fault—sheesh,
followed by little things going awry all day—

triangulating with roofers and unhappy neighbors,
treating a caffeine-withdrawal migraine,
scanning the people garden
to make sure I’ve not neglected any roses
in this rainstorm of prosaics.

Now it is evening and I am trying 
to stop reviewing and complaining.

Now I am breathing in that 
medicinal feeling of gratitude.
I am here, not back in my past.
I am overwhelmed 
but I care deeply about life.

Swimming through any rough waters
in my life jacket of gratitude,

I pause now at the end of my 
bumps-in-the-road day, me, a vet,
calling out to you who might be
slipping under the waves—
I love you, I feel you, please

Call 988!

Author’s note: The poem was written on September 10, National Suicide Prevention Day.

Lynne Barnes is a retired psychiatric nurse and librarian from Georgia who has lived in San Francisco since 1969. Her poetry memoir Falling into Flowers (Blue Light Press, 2017) won the 2017 Goodreads Rainbow Award for Best Gay and Lesbian Poetry and was a finalist for the 2018 Eric Hoffer Book Award. One of her ongoing gratitudes is occasionally being an accepted contributor to James Penha’s The New Verse News.

KENNEDY CENTER CLOSING SALE

by Martin Dickinson

i want the music stand

that leonard bernstein used

remembering becketts play i saw

recast the seats from the opera house

set them up in a park in maryland

o maryland my maryland my safe

blue state and we will sing and dance

and to hell with your golden columns

i want oak trees and maples

to surround us instead of plaster

falling from the ceiling as today

the little red italian mice run rampant

i want stravinsky wynton marsalis

itzhak perlman renee fleming

all to myself and placido domingo

on the hillside overlooking great falls

nessun dorma or carmens habanera

or how about alvin ailey dancers

in a park where everyone 

who wants will come for free 

unscrew the doors empty the

parking lots give away all

the snacks from the snack bars

free drinks and for security guards

lifetime pensions send all volunteers

to the royal albert hall and lets

dance on the beach in rehoboth

barefoot and laugh out loud because

everyone in this fair land deserves it

Martin Dickinson has published four collections of poetry. His forthcoming book is in texas, a live oak. He lives in Silver Spring, Maryland.

YOU GOTTA LOVE

by Joey Whitton

after Bob Dylan’s “Gotta Serve Somebody”

BBC, September 14, 2026

Here you are handing out PTSD like candy

What parts of you were left in the dog crate that

you stuffed Immigrants in

Who speak only english, have all American children,

Who don't know english, have no one,

Maybe a shopkeeper, a mechanic, a computer whiz

Maybe a housekeeper, a dog sitter, a nursing aide

Maybe a fast food worker, a grocery clerk, a good friend

Maybe a Christian, a Muslim, an atheist, a Jew

Maybe a teacher, a paramedic, a soldier, a leader

Maybe a mother, a father, a brother, a sister

Maybe a child

You gotta learn,

You gotta ask,

You gotta pray,

You gotta love.

Joey Whitton was born on the East Coast, raised on the West Coast, and now lives in the Deep South. Hardcore punk has inspired him for decades. His poetry is forthcoming in Heavy Feather Review, Neologism Poetry Journal, and Double Dutch Magazine and has appeared in Flipside Magazine, Misfit Magazine, Sky Island Journal, Poetry Pacific, The Broken Teacup, Trashlight Press, and BlazeVOX Journal.

JUST LINES

by Billy Easton

The UN General Assembly has voted to replace the traditional world map with one that more accurately reflects the size of Africa… The US was the only nation to vote against it—while there were six abstentions. —BBC, September 5, 2026

My teacher would pull down the whole world—

a big map at the front of the room.

Greenland, at the top, jumped out

as big as Africa.

 

But it’s not. 14 Greenlands fit inside Africa. 

 

So now, one hundred sixty-four of the United Nations voted 

to set the lines right. 

Only one voted NO. 

Because, they said, changing the map 

was superfluous, cognitive justice, 

they want to focus on genuine problems,

take the Gulf of Mexico or Lake Ontario. 

Take Greenland. Take it. 

 

That one country of NO stood to lose 45 percent of their landmass—

on paper.  And Greenland, no longer so huge,

the size of a single African nation—not as desirable 

for groping hands, engorged ego. 

 

So much surface ceded to Africa—in pen and ink.

No reparations checks, just a reality check. 

Imaginations, cognitions unchecked.                                                 

Just lines on a page.

Just                  lines.

 Just. 

Billy Easton took up poetry after retiring to Portugal following decades of organizing for social justice in the USA. He’s published in: Made from Midnight: A Requiem, The Dissident Voice and, forthcoming, Writers Resist.

WASHINGTON COLOSSUS

by Christopher Uhl

AI-generated graphic by NightCafé for The New Verse News.

Now that the Smithsonian is compliant,

Trump has decreed construction of a giant—

A statue of George Washington shall loom above the Mall,

A Washington colossus that will stand three stories tall.

Be careful what you wish for, Trump,

Think of the risk you've taken.

What if that statue, seeing what you've wrought,

Should now awaken?

The president who proudly said, “I cannot tell a lie,”

What would he think as he looked down upon you from the sky?

Those cold stone eyes turn colder still

As they survey your work,

That massive marble foot steps off

Its pedestal with a jerk.

What you’ve done to Washington would fill him with disgust.

He'd travel down the Mall and stomp your ballroom into dust.

After a life-changing amputation, Christopher Uhl discovered that humor is the best prosthetic. His work is forthcoming in Lighten Up Online. 

INCIDENTAL CAPTURE

by Celeste DeSario

Cartoon by Nick Anderson

 

META DATA

Timestamp: 2026-08-28 2:15 EST

Geographical Coordinates: 40.8458° N, 72.8972° W

Direction of Travel: Northbound

Vehicle Make: Ford Escape

Primary Color: American Flag Blue?

License Plate reads: TRACK THIS

 

Driving to Walmart

for a two-dollar pack of sticky notes.

Placing them over the T’s or the K on the plate—

My best defense.

 

And just like that,

The million-dollar system fails.

And I vanish.

 

Or better yet,

I take an alternative route

where no Flocks have yet taken root.

The safer option to being watched,

Photographed.

 

Can I duck a camera

while walking to grab a burger and root beer?

Maybe.

 

If the shutter clicks

and I’m in the background,

I’m an unwilling celebrity,

now in the database

Filed Under:

“Incidental Capture.”

 

You’re not their target

unless you’re an exclusive story.

 

Undocumented.

Dark-skinned.

A headline—

 

 If you’re from Norway.

Or Sweden.

Relax.

 But every tabloid needs an editor.

Who is that sitting at the stationhouse keyboard?

Scrolling, scrolling, scrolling through the candid shots?

A chorus of Troopers.

 

Officer Pacheco in Massachusetts,

typing a plate number into the void.

Tracking her

ex-girlfriend.

 

Officer Zahir in Kentucky,

searching for those unposed shots—

The ones that let us glimpse behind the curtain.

Running her fingers through her hair before

turning onto a street

whose name he doesn’t recognize.

 

Officer Klein in Texas

 looking for that Money Shot—

The one where she leans in for a kiss,

The one where she opens his front door with her own key.

       

Click.

Main Street.

 

Click.

Medical Center.

 

Click.

The new lover’s driveway.

 

Do the Troopers have his plate, as well?

 

Or are they tracking Hector?

Our undocumented farm worker?

The one who helps me pick out ripe melons,

carries my bags to my car,

asks about my day.

 

Pinpointing where he lives.

Where he works.

Where he can be apprehended.

Intercepted.

Arrested.

 

Those apples aren’t going to pick themselves, you know.

 

Remember the days

when we could go out into the world

and no one wanted to film us?

 Now Flock is the 21st-century paparazzi,

always watching

Recording

Cataloguing.

 

Once you step outside your door,

Your movements are saved to a hard drive.

A web woven tightly—

no escaping the fingerprint

the timeline of your movement—

one you never asked for and yet…

 

Uploading…

 

           That quick drive to the store—

           A sighting. A hit.

           That walk down the block—

           A capture.

 

            Flock.

      Eliminating crime

      In your neighborhood.

      In your life.

 

     The right to move unhampered,

     the right to exist undetected?

     No longer a given.

     For any of us.

     For all of us.

   Achievement Unlocked: Full Equality

Celeste DeSario writes poetry to process and make sense of life’s events. Her work is featured in The New Verse News, The SportsScribe, The Changing Times, The Ekphrastic Review, The Dissident Voice, and Three-Line Poetry. She lives in Shoreham Village, NY—a town where no Flock cameras have been sighted… yet.

HEIDEGGER'S STOPWATCH

by Zumwalt

AI-generated video created by Nightcafé for The New Verse News

The chief executive of Anthropic, the company behind the Claude chatbot, called for a global slowdown of artificial intelligence development in a 3,800-word essay on Saturday, just days after one of the company’s employees quit over concerns about the safety of the technology. —The New York Times, September 12, 2026 Sunday dinner in Billings, Montana—
Mr. Smith set fire to four generations
just one day after a quintuple homicide bonfire
in Forest Grove, Oregon
incinerated three generations
and a few terrified pets.

No AI assistance required.

In Lebanon, under de-escalation,
27 dead, 69 wounded in 70 hours.
In Iran, an errant missile
crashed a wedding,
wiping out two children,
destroying and injuring many more.

No AI assistance required.

Iranians compiled open-source data
to create effective targeting handbooks
against American naval positions
while Yemen-based Houthi cells
developed software for
ballistic missiles and guided rockets.

AI assistance required
and provided effectively by Claude AI.

We do our best to teach little Lucas
right and wrong, and how to cross the street.
We put in the hours at jobs that
fray our nerves, and when we feel like
arguing, one of us takes a walk outside
to ensure Lucas never hears us fight.

No AI assistance required.

I read that Jacob Coxon
(previously employed by competitor OpenAI)
left Anthropic and upcoming IPO riches
to tell us that he and colleagues
believe that AI could kill us all
by the end of the decade.

I asked Grok, this Saturday morning,
to fill me in: it tried to reassure me,
telling me such rumors have circulated for years.
"No AI system has wiped out
(or is currently wiping out) humanity."
My shoulders and neck tensed and shuddered.

I scrolled the news on my smartphone.
Anthropic's CEO published 3800 words,
one paragraph about AI curing disease,
the next several dozen paragraphs detailing
some of AI's destructive skills and the CEO's proposals—
steps to slow down AI and apply theoretical safeguards.

Some AI assistance may be required.
Assistance from corporations and world leaders required.

I prayed and remembered my grandmother's words

that God always answers prayers: "yes" or "no" or "maybe."

Sounded like this was a maybe.

Zumwalt’s poetry examines the intersection of identity, instability, and the mechanics of perception. Recent work has appeared or will appear in The New Verse News, Heavy Feather, San Diego Poetry Annual, Ink Sweat & Tears, The Society of Classical Poets, Light, and additional journals.

AT HIGH FALLS, MINNESOTA

by Maxine Susman

 

I look across the gorge to Ontario—

same wilderness on the other side.

The great Falls plunge, three separate chutes,

over the bowl of ragged basalt cliffs

into the river flowing to Lake Superior.

Pounding roar, wall of spray, impassible—

here the voyageurs, bearing on their backs

more than their weight in beaver pelts,

slung their birch canoes onto their shoulders

and made le grand portage.

 

Wilderness ranges along the gorge

farther than the eye can travel.

United States / Canada / Gichi Onigamiig,

The narrow bed of Pigeon River

now the border between nations

that share the same terrain:

Falls, thick forest, gray cliffs of diabase.

I could almost hurl a rock across—

it would reach another country,

shared bedrock of Laurentian Shield.

 

Wilderness joins both sides together.

My father / myself,

his native land / and mine,

his parents' native land / and his,

our family river flowing over borders

from Belarus to Montreal,

from Ontario to New York.

I won't cross through Customs this time,

I'm close enough to know my father's laugh

inside the space inside the water

same on both sides of the Falls

my father's homeland a stone's throw away.

Maxine Susman, Highland Park, NJ, has published six chapbooks and two full-length books of poetry, most recently Northern Swim (Ragged Sky Press, 2024). Her work concerns the environment and natural world, history, art, people and other creatures. She has been leading poetry workshops for many years and she teaches poetry-writing at the Osher Lifelong Learning Institute of Rutgers University, earning the Distinguished Teaching Award. A Ginsberg Award finalist and multiple Pushcart nominee, her work has appeared in dozens of publications including Paterson Literary Review, Fourth River, Canary, Blueline, Slant, Earth’s Daughters, and Crab Orchard Review.

A RESOUNDING SILENCE

by Valentina Gnup

For those who lost their lives in the Nepal flood of August, 2026.

The faithful believe Mount Kailash 

is the center of the world—
the most sacred peak, the ultimate abode of Lord Shiva.
 —Hindol Sengupta, religious historian


   Over rocky ground and icy rivers, believers walk 
to honor whichever God they trust to answer their prayers.

   We still don’t know how many of the faithful lost
their lives in flash floods on their final pilgrimage. 

   Some called them foolish, though don’t we all hope
for glimpses of wonder, a spare house key to heaven?

   Early this morning, I lay in bed listening to the rain 
ticking in the drainpipe and wondering if I’ll ever 

   kiss anyone again. No need to tell me, my spinster 
sorrow has no place in this elegy for the drowned.

   Sengupta said, Gods walk among men in these mountains,
but the pilgrims circling Mount Kailash are forbidden 

   to climb its sacred slopes. Perhaps God craves privacy, 
or maybe he’s as hungry for kisses as I am.

   Although these gray clouds look more like November,
it’s still August, the world on fire. I won’t lament

   our frightening climate, I won’t condemn pretend kings. 
I’ll ask you to consider the grass—it’s already greener 

   than it was last night. If I ever visit the holy mountain, 
I'll pray, God, let the world recover quickly as grass.

Valentina Gnup's poetry collection Ruined Music was published by Grayson Books in 2024. She has won the Tucson Festival of Books Literary Award for Poetry, the Lascaux Prize in Poetry, the Rattle Ekphrastic Challenge, the Rattle Reader’s Choice Award, and the Barbara Mandigo Kelly Peace Poetry Award from the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation. Her poems have appeared in many literary journals including Palette Poetry, December, Brooklyn Review, Nimrod, and The New Guard. She has chapbooks published by Mille Grazie Press and the North Carolina Writers' Network. She lives in Mill Valley, CA.