DEAR PREZ

by Barbara Loots

Yes, there are certain legends

   you aim to stand among:

Caligula and Nero,

    Hitler and Mao Tse Tung,

Attila and Genghis 

    and Stalin, for a few—

But the dumpster of world history 

    will pile some shit on you,

Until, like all things rotten,

    you sink into the slime,

Soon buried and forgotten 

    in the lightning speed of time .

From towers and casinos,

   your name will be erased,

Your merch and memes abandoned,        

   your gold decor replaced. 

Your “legend” will be murky 

   with cruelty and vice, 

And, as you’ve often put it, 

   that isn’t very nice. 

Barbara Loots is retired but not retiring in Kansas City, Missouri. In addition to appearances in literary magazines (eg. I-70 Review, Pulsebeat) and anthologies (eg. Love Affairs At the Villa Nelle) she serves as book review editor for Light Poetry Magazine online. Three collections can be found on Amazon. 

WWE

by Mickey J. Corrigan

Source: iStock; Composite: Angelo Jesus Canta via America Magazine.

One man's hero:
another man's tyrant.

China wanted a wrestler
to unite the barbarians
build global power:
Qin Shi Huang
killed scholars
burned books
while slaves
built his wall,
the immigrants
castrated.

The self-declared living god:
Caligula
loved his sisters
shared them
with his men
his horse
he made a priest.

Attila the Hun:
the scourge of God
raped and pillaged.
Genghis Khan:
killed the rich
using the poor
as human shields.

Tamerlane's tower:
built from living men
cemented and bricked,
their heads
made into minarets.

Ivan the Terrible
Grand Prince of Moscow;
Robespierre beheaded,
Lenin desecrated,
Stalin had gulags.

Il Duce and the Blackshirts
Hitler and the Nazis
slave labor and torture
concentration camps for all
not in the master race.

Chairman Mao and State control:
40 million dead.
Pol Pot: professionals
sent away
to reeducation farms,
special centers for people
who wore glasses, read books.

Idi Amin. Pinochet.
Assad. Kim Jong-un.
Mugabe of Zimbabwe,
Gaddafi, al-Bashir.
Vladmir Putin and
you-know-who.
The list goes on
the reigns of corruption
gripped tight
to this day

strongmen
still

just weak men
destroying to destroy
the enemy within
creating false worlds
building bone walls
burning the truth
in public bonfires
wrenching our history
away from us
in a soul crushing
illegal, amoral
stranglehold.

Originally from Boston, Mickey J. Corrigan writes Florida noir with a dark humor. Her books have been released by publishers in the US, UK, Canada, and Australia.  Project XX, a satirical crime novel, was released in 2017 by Salt Publishing in the UK. What I Did for Love was released by Bloodhound Books in October.

ROMAN VIRTUES

by Edmund Conti


Life was peaceful
on the Tiber.
No one feared
asbestos fiber.

Romans built the
Appian Way
without advice
from E. P. A.

No Ralph Nader
going on a
crusade for safety.
Pax Romana.

Caligula
was quite a pain
but didn't have
an acid reign.

No immigrants,
advised the omens,
and no hyphen-
ated Romans.

Terrorists in
distant regions—
dealt with swiftly
by the Legions.

Rome eternal.
Why so great?
Was no welfare
city-state.

Roman women
caused no strife.
Knew their place
like Caesar's wife

Let Nero fiddle,
Cicero strum.
as Romans dump in
Mare Nostrum.

Goths and Vandals
made their grim pact
without environ-
mental impact.

Do these verses
have  you stumped?
Let’s just say that
you’ve  been Trumped.





















Edmund Conti is a reformed litterbug (excepting of the poetry landscape).