ANKLE MONITORS

by Phyllis Wax

Summertime—

and we bare shoulders,

legs, ankles, feet

except

this summer

thousands of ankles

are not bare.

It doesn’t matter

if they’ve followed

the rules, filled out the forms,

gone to all the appointments. 

It doesn’t matter

if they’ve paid their taxes,

committed no crimes,

volunteered at the local school.

They can still be snatched,

handcuffed and whisked away. 

And, if they’re lucky enough to be released,

they are bare-ankled no more.

The monitors strapped to those ankles

are meant to track and stigmatize,

remove the bare joy of summer.

Phyllis Wax writes in Milwaukee, where she observes the goings-on of the country and the world. She has read in coffee houses, bars, libraries and on the radio, and has participated in poet/fiber artist collaborations. Among the journals in which her work has appeared are Gyroscope Review, Writers Resist, Jerry Jazz Musician, Rise Up Review, Mobius: The Journal of Social Change, Wordpeace, The New Verse News, Naugatuck River Review, Your Daily Poem, Feral.

NEW YORK CITY, 7 AM, SUNDAY, 2026

by Naomi Pliskow

Fat pigeons peck hopefully

at Saturday night’s scat–

tickets, receipts, ketchup-stained napkins–

dotting grey cement as though they were 

the leaves of autumn.

 

The Saturday night squawks and judders, 

the clangs and gulps and sighs,

are replaced by an echoing quiet,

as though covered by a layer of soft cotton

intruded on only by pigeon murmurs and 

the petulant honk 

of a single metal beast on rubber legs

piloted by some human who didn’t   

make it home last night.

 

The smell of sweat and alcohol

from a hooded passerby  

interrupts the aroma   

of bread baked at four this morning

when the baker’s dark hands grasped soft white dough 

trying to hold on to these islands 

for just a little while longer

before being forced to return  

to his ravaged own,

where people peck for leavings

like hopeful morning pigeons

and bake bitterness into 

every scarce loaf.

Naomi Pliskow published her first poetry collection in a three-ring binder at age eight. She recently returned to writing poetry after a long hiatus. Her poems have been published in One Art, Adanna, Schuylkill Valley Journal, Canary, and several anthologies. Her satirical song lyrics were published in The New York Times in 2024. Her chapbook Entering the Water will be released in September of 2026. She is editor of the Philadelphia Mad Poets Society newsletter.

T.P.S, T.P.S, T.P.S.

by Indran Amirthanayagam

No more mother of exiles.

No more hands outstretched

to the tired and poor, 

the huddled masses. 

No more strolling 

on the boardwalk

at Coney Island 

or by the Golden Gate

or on the cobblestoned

streets of the French Quarter,

where Americans gather.

No more Haitians 

fleeing gangs, rapists

and house burners.

No more Syrians

escape artists

from Assad father

and Assad son.

No more 

Allen Ginsberg

denouncing 

the damnations

of Moloch.  

But listen.

We accept mortality, 

that we are on earth 

a little space. But we 

are here now, 

and deportation orders,

we will challenge 

each one. Organize, 

Strategize. 

Hide our brothers 

and sisters. 

To the churches!

To the sanctuary cities! 

Distract and resist ICE.

Do not accept 

any supremacy

in the decision 

to deny Temporary 

Protected Status 

to Haitians 

and Syrians.

Indran Amirthanayagam writes a Substack. He has just published Isla itinerante ( Editorial Apogeo, Peru, 2025) and White Space Sonnets ( Sarasavi publishers, Sri Lanka, 2025). His other publications include El bosque de deleites fratricidas ( RIL Editores), Seer (Hanging Loose Press),The Runner's Almanac (Spuyten Duyvil), Powèt Nan Pò A: Poet of the Port (Mad Hat), and Ten Thousand Steps Against the Tyrant (Broadstone Books). He is the translator of Kenia Cano’s Animal For The Eyes (Dialogos Books) and Origami: Selected Poems of Manuel Ulacia (Dialogos Books). He edits The Beltway Poetry Quarterly, hosts the Poetry Channel on YouTube, and publishes poetry books with Sara Cahill Marron at Beltway Editions.

CATALOGUING OUR NAMES

by Karen Marker

 

Cartoon by Nick Anderson

Homeland Security Wants Social Media Sites to Expose Anti-ICE Accounts. —The New York Times, February 13, 2026


Still in the down of the dream world a text 
comes from Mona that says you are so brave
which means she must have seen my Facebook post 
about ICE and knows of the threats made 
about collecting names. I also named 
the commandment from Exodus about how 
we should treat the stranger. 

Such a long list of us, once strangers ourselves. 
Will they record our names, imprison all of us, 
including the thirteen-year-old who read the torah portion 
and the rabbi who said all who want to take a stand rise
and come up for the blessings?  No one was left in their seats.  
We were packed so tight together, all of us touching 
someone who was touching the parchment, another name 
for light holding the words like a mother. Like the mother 
who stood beside me holding her child 

with deep brown eyes staring straight into my eyes.
She didn’t look away from my tearing up 
like I can’t look away from what keeps me awake 
at night thinking of the children in the prison camps,
the names I need to speak so I won’t forget.
Receiving blessings, touching light, 
we were one breathing body.  

What can I text Mona that will soothe her fear
for the dark skin she got from her Indian Hindu 
father, her Mizrachi Jewish mother?  Even 
with her credentials that made her a top doctor
specialist, gave her a beautiful suburban life, 
she’s still afraid for her son and tells me she couldn’t 
survive without her medicines, not one day 
in that prison camp and I admit I’m just as scared 
of being sent away. It’s all that’s unhealed 

that makes us even more afraid.  It is the cage,
the chains, the clanging doors of our brains, 
how the past climbs back up and casts us out. 
But now Mona is calling, telling me how
everyone’s been working so hard in Ohio, like one
family.  At least for today there’s a stay by the judge, 
the Haitians in Springfield are safe.

    
Karen Marker is an Oakland, CA. poet activist and retired school psychologist whose poetry of protest and hope in response to the news will be coming out as a book in the coming year.  Her poetry has appeared in NVN and various other journals including The MacGuffin, The Monterey Poetry Review, the Haight Ashbury Literary Journal, Slant, and WordPeace. Her book of flash memoir and poetry Beneath the Blue Umbrella is available through Finishing Line Press and explores resilience in face of family trauma.  

THE DEMOCRATS' POST-MORTEM 2024

by William Aarnes

Graphic credit: Eniola Odetunde  Axios

That shamelessness could triumph is our shame.  

What tactic worked? Beyoncé’s walk-on song?

We have nobody but ourselves to blame.

Resentful people rule. So why inflame

them more with hopeful talk they hear as wrong?    

That shamelessness could triumph is our shame.  

You’d think by now we’d play a better game.    

Why hint at climate? Why not go along—

back fossil fuels? We have ourselves to blame.

The ads we ran were far too nice. So tame.

Why not something like Haitians don’t belong?

That shamelessness could triumph is our shame.  

Our nuanced stances came across as lame.    

Why didn’t we present ourselves as strong  

enough to bring—in days!—world peace? We’re to blame.

Next time let’s make attracting men our aim.

Why didn’t we bring up that golfer’s schlong?

That shamelessness could triumph is our shame.  

We have nobody but ourselves to blame.

William Aarnes lives in Manhattan.

A FAIR WITNESS

by Gina A. Turner

 

A Fair Witness [a profession invented in Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert Heinlein] is an individual trained to observe events and report exactly what is seen and heard, making no extrapolations or assumptions. – Wikipedia

I hear that people who shouldn’t be in this country are eating pets

I see state troopers at schools in Springfield, Ohio

I hear a candidate say “I have to create stories so that the media pays attention”

I see Springfield’s CultureFest cancelled over safety concerns

I hear what the 45th president said: people from Haiti “all have AIDS”

I see colleges in Ohio holding classes remotely

I hear lawful residents in Ohio called “illegal aliens”

I see elementary schools evacuated due to dozens of bomb threats

I hear what our country’s former leader said: Haiti is one of the “shithole countries” 

I see my Haitian friend promote her book on achieving a just economy

I hear a member of the Haitian community say

“We’ve been receiving a lot of threats, physically and verbally”

I hear parents say that their children are terrified

 

I hear people say that they are still undecided about their vote

Gina A. Turner is a Professor of Psychology at a community college in Pennsylvania. Her work has appeared in Poets Online, The New Verse News, and her school’s literary magazine The Laconic. She lives with her husband and dog in Lambertville, New Jersey. 

ZERO SUM HUMANITY

by Tricia L. Somers

“All the People—Oppressed by Black Cloud,” 1982, by Evelyn Williams

Under the rubble

Our loved ones, homes, and any kind of hope

We’ve been robbed

by a criminal we cannot see

Our loved ones killed and already buried

We are victims of this Climate Crime Catastrophe

Under a bridge

Huddled with our scared children

Our faith has been shaken

and our babies are still...shaking

Invite the world to witness your humanity

Anxious and jittery awaiting a fleeting glimpse

Like an endangered species or already extinct

Under hooves and cracking whip

We find ourselves in seeking but a mere chance

Have us to walk over your bridges

Only in shame do you chase us away

You don’t necessarily need an earthquake

for your country to crumble away

Tricia L. Somers can be found at Outlaw Poetry, Milk Carton Blog, and the upcoming Rat’s Ass Review for Winter 2021. Also the semi-annual print journal The American Dissident includes poetry, essays and debates with the editor, who is known to be somewhat testy. Issues 41 and upcoming 42.

HORRIBLE

by Alejandro Escudé

‘We must demand that national leaders create a fair and humane immigration system, including a path to citizenship for immigrants, and a safe and fair asylum process for Haitians and all others seeking refuge in the US.’ —Xochitl Oseguera, The Guardian, September 28, 2021. Photograph: Félix Márquez/AP

There are horses galloping 

Within the word, horrible.

Lashing at migrants, 

Centaur on the Rio Grande.

The water parts at first 

To let in the fifteen thousand,

Refugees from Atlantis 

Who bore a hurricane, a quake. 

Children held aloft by mothers 

With earth-bare arms.

I paint the scene for you 

In poetic bronze, a cowboy

Breaking a colt in chaps 

On a corner store in Sedona.

Only this bronze is flesh, 

A border patrol agent in chaps,

Lassoing a sun containing 

The origin of language. 

Syllables like hooves, 

Ten gallon hats, and boots along

The river the color of bronze, 

Dividing a land formed 

Of bodies from the land itself. 

Congo moon, Texas slug. 

Alejandro Escudé published his first full-length collection of poems My Earthbound Eye in September 2013. He holds a master’s degree in creative writing from UC Davis and teaches high school English. Originally from Argentina, Alejandro lives in Los Angeles with his wife and two children.