EPSTEIN WAR

by KP Liles 

Cartoon by Nick Anderson

It was always about the crude.

Extracting the dark

archives out 

from under us.

A few wealthy men 

plotting to own

everything, down

to the last

liquified remains 

they groom 

to burn. Virgin 

trillions naked

for the taking.

O Power! the Power!

Unrivaled deployment—

Military, ICE, beyond oversight…

Taste Venezuela: 

lest we forget

it’s a jungle out there. 

War

drugs, law, lust

regime change

Mexico, Cuba

Minneapolis

Iran

Portland, Greenland

Behold! A politics of scandal 

heaped on scandal heaped

on scandal heaped on

morals. On truth.

Still, the trafficked girls

will not be

silenced. Drill! 

If you have the stomach for it.

It was always 

about the crude.

KP Liles desires a better, safer world for his daughter. For his son, his family, his students, his community, his fellow decent human beings. So, while he would have preferred to have spent time indulging in his newfound enthusiasm for birding, he felt obligated to put on the poet uniform for this piece.

WHAT’S THAT ANIMAL DOING HERE?

by Cecil Morris

In this provided photo from Oct. 13, 2024, an arctic fox is sheltered at the Bird Alliance of Oregon, after being spotted in Portland last week. After her arrival at the facility on Saturday, an exam confirmed her species, and determined the young female was hungry and dehydrated. The Bird Alliance is working with the Department of Fish and Wildlife to determine her next home. Courtesy of Bird Alliance of Oregon via Oregon Public Broadcasting.

First the deer grew bold, wandered between houses
and ate the blossoms and tender new growth
from the ornamentals we had planted.
They lifted their long heads, their mouths trailing
some asters or dahlia greens, their eyes wide
and unblinking, unconcerned by our presence.
They stood in our yards as placid as spring
their big ears unbothered by passing cars.
Yes, the crows, the jays, the shrieking seagulls
have long been fearless, ever intrusive,
like blackberry brambles pushing through fence
and dandelions lifting through the dirt,
insistent, tireless, quietly present.
And hungry cougars came down from the hills
to threaten joggers, snack on yapper dogs,
and haunt our dreams with their sleek fitness,
prowling embodiments of fear and guilt.
And now this—an arctic fox in Portland,
a seldom snowy metro area
of millions almost half way down the globe
toward the equator. Escaped, illegal pet?
Intrepid advanced scout for nature’s
reclamation of lost lands? One more sign
that we and all our works are just a part
of nature, as much its environs as ours?
Sure, she has that cute dog face and could be
a good best friend, a companion fluffy
and warm, but what will come next? Rangy wolves?
Polar bears after new blubbery foods
arranged along a street downtown? Slick slugs?
We are selfish and we don’t want to share.
We want wildlife to stay where it belongs.

Cecil Morris, a retired high school English teacher, has poems appearing in The Ekphrastic Review, Hole in the Head Review, The New Verse News, Rust + Moth, and elsewhere. He and his partner, mother of their children, divide their year between the cool coast of Oregon and the relatively hot Central Valley of California.

HAZED AND DIFFUSED

by Rémy Dambron

As the sound of our neighbor’s lawn 

mower pierces the silence of the hellish 
landscape forming just past our bedroom 
window my wife and I exchange mirroring 
glances of hostile befuddlement 
maddened by this man’s unfathomable 
indifference to the bewilderment of 
smoke flowing freely into his eyes 
and down deep into his lungs despite 
wearing a confident smile as he strolls 
absentmindedly through his yard 
pushing that obnoxious gas powered 
machine to shorten the small strip of 
parched grass that faces our still baffled 
faces now visibly posing the inevitable question 
what in the actual fuck is happening? 
We continue to watch in shock as I frantically 
google the news desperate to confirm that 
yes in fact there are wildfires blazing at 
our city’s doorstep in addition to riots and 
shootings and protests and looting and tagging 
and militias immersed in science refuting and 
that this conundrum of a man tending to his plot 
amidst the infiltrating remains floating in from 
burning homes incinerated cars perished 
businesses lost livelihoods vanishing forests 
and melted memories isn’t just symptomatic 
of some feverish dream or drug-induced vision 
or mystical illusion or some grave delusion but 
that our mutual astonishment is actual credible 
physical proof of the resilience of our little remaining 
sanity.

Rémy Dambron is an activist, environmentalist, and author based out of Portland, Oregon. His work has appeared in What Rough Beast, Writer's Resist, Poets Reading the News, and TheNewVerse.News, focusing largely on denouncing political corruption and advocating for social justice. Without the love and support of his wife Susan, he would not be the writer he is today.  

A GRACE NOTE: JULY SUNDAY CARD GAME

by Earl J Wilcox

"The Queen of Spades" by Noumeda Carbone

Today—our last Sunday in July—
we fudge our usual routines.
No news shows, a quick glance
at the Sunday funnies, no church
service videos, not even asking
Alexa for some cool music.
Let’s be brave, forego allusions
to T***P, his desperate campaign,
send emails to friends in Portland,
only brief whispered prayers, no politics
as usual today. We agree to feed
the cats, refill the bird feeder, water
the lamb’s ear. A hot Carolina July
is normal enough. Aging plastic cards
are found, a family day for joy and peace
and hope. We spend the morning playing
our favorite card game, Hearts, in which
avoiding the dreaded Queen of Spades
is as much tension and grief we have
to give each other today


Earl Wilcox's back yard is open to squirrels, robins, and cotton tail rabbits. 

I HAVE LOST A COUNTRY

by Robert Knox



 

"What signifies the beauty of nature when men are base?" —Henry David Thoreau


He was thinking about the Fugitive Slave Act,
speaking at an anti-slavery rally along with Sojourner Truth in 1854
after Anthony Burns, who had escaped from bondage,
was arrested in Boston, where he has been
"working quietly in a clothing shop" on Beacon Hill.
It's just one more thing. It happens everywhere.
It's a tipping point.
Someone tips off a slave-catcher, they're hunting up North now,
empowered by federal law.
Burns is hauled before a special judge, in a special court,
created by the law to facilitate claims against persons of color
—"persons"! that Constitutional euphemism—by any white person.

Boston rallies and 'mobs' of protestors war with police,
seeking to free Burns, who is dragged through the streets
by federal marshals with guns drawn, guarded by an artillery regiment
and three platoons of marines, while thousands of angry locals
watch helplessly, cowed by force of arms.
Burns is returned to Virginia, shackled,
and flogged.

At the rally held in Framingham, Mass. on July 4, 1854.
Thoreau confided that he had suffered "a vast and indefinite loss"—
but, he asked himself, what was it? "At last it occurred to me
that what I had lost was a country."

And so, reading in yesterday's newspaper, and again today,
that armed thugs, "federal officers" culled from border police and ICE,
were firing weapons, hurling flash bombs,
and kidnapping protestors from the streets of Portland, Oregon,
where they had no lawful business to be
and where no assistance from the federal government
had been sought by local authorities—
but simply performing in the absence of all legal warrant
as T***p's chosen "Brown Shirts,"

I find myself thrown once again into days of  rage,
unsettled in my mind, as I too often have been
since the dark days of November 2016:
feeling deprived of something valuable, if imperceptible,
dear to me and to many,

that I too have 'lost my country,'
and that finding it again is no sure thing.


Robert Knox is a poet, fiction writer, Boston Globe correspondent, and the author of a novel based on the Sacco and Vanzetti case, titled Suosso's Lane. As a contributing editor for the online poetry journal Verse-Virtual his poems appear regularly on that site. They have also appeared in journals such as Off The Coast, The Journal of American Poetry, South Florida Poetry Journal, TheNewVerse.News, Califragile, and Unlikely Stories. His poetry chapbook Gardeners Do It With Their Hands Dirty, published in 2017, was nominated for a Massachusetts Best Book award. The chapbook Cocktails in the Wild followed in 2018. He was recently named the winner of the 2019 Anita McAndrews Poetry Award.

FINAL JEOPARDY

by Darrell Petska

Zellyart

The formerly democratic
North American republic
despoiled by an authoritarian regime
that ruled through extrajudicial measures
typified by deploying masked,
heavily armed federal agents
to suppress violently
civil protest and political expression,
consequently instilling a sense of fear

as in the bureaucratic authoritarianism
of Pinochet’s Chile
where federally dispatched agents
violently swept citizens away
to unknown locations
for intimidation, humiliation,
interrogation, and abuse—
acts later adjudged to be
crimes against humanity.

What was America?


Darrell Petska is a Middleton, Wisconsin writer.

ANY FUNCTIONING ADULT 2020

by Marc Swan




On a lawn down a side street off a main drag
in Portland Maine, it catches my eye—
simple phrase in red, white and blue
with a big bang center stage
to that intact region our current leader
can’t claim—a brain that thinks, acts,
feels with compassion, caring, humanity.
A sign in a yard can’t change the world
but it can open thinking beyond
media thrum and whimper—
insult, injury, uncertainty, and help us feel
we can make a difference
as clichéd as that may be. Grab your pen,
paper, keyboard, text, phone, load up
the information highway with a message
echoing these immortal words—
Yes We Can.

Marc Swan has poems forthcoming in Stonecoast Review, The Nashwaak Review, Channel Magazine, Floyd County Moonshine, among others. His latest collection today can take your breath away was published by Sheila-na-gig Editions in 2018. He lives in coastal Maine with his wife Dd, an artist, clothing designer and maker.

TONIGHT IN PORTLAND

by Penelope Scambly Schott






Winds gust.
Rain slashes.
Douglas firs bend.
Pine cones pound my metal roof.
Have I mentioned how much I love my roof?

Have I described cardboard under sleeping bags?
Shopping carts heaped with wet collections?
The meager windscreen of a dumpster?
A wet dog under the only blanket?
Did I say how cold this rain?

In our whole liberal city
there is not enough
hot soup.


Penelope Scambly Schott is a past recipient of the Oregon Book Award for Poetry. Recent books are House of the Cardamon Seed and November Quilt.

TONIGHT

by Penelope Scambly Schott

The Oregon state legislature passed a law that will go into effect on Jan. 1, 2019, that will allow the city and state to work together to clear camps under an intergovernmental agreement. In many cases, local officials are better equipped to help connect people with needed services like shelters and affordable housing. The partnership will also make clearing camps that exist on neighboring city and state property more streamlined. Under the agreement that Portland City Council approved Dec. 19, officials will give people at least 48 hours notice, and up to 10 days notice, to move from Oregon Department of Transportation property. That timeframe will significantly speed the process of sweeping encampments on ODOT property. Photo credit: Joe Riedl. —Willamette Week, December 19, 2018

Winds gust.
Rain slashes.
Douglas firs bend.
Pine cones pound my metal roof.
Have I mentioned how much I love my roof?
Have I described cardboard over sleeping bags?
Shopping carts stuffed with wet belongings?
Did I specify how bitter tonight’s rain?
In our whole city there is not
enough hot soup.


Penelope Scambly Schott, author of a novel and several books of poetry, was awarded four New Jersey arts fellowships before moving to Oregon, where her verse biography A is for Anne: Mistress Hutchinson Disturbs the Commonwealth received an Oregon Book Award for Poetry. Several of Penelope’s books and individual poems have won other prizes. Her individual poems have appeared in APR, Georgia Review, Nimrod, and elsewhere.

ODE TO MY CITY

by Elizabeth Stansberry

When I ask my friend in California about Portland,
She says that it is a
Liberal Bubble,
A land where you can sleep until noon,
And still have a career,
A place where the shooting star tattoo on your face,
Will not
Get you fired.
I breathe in church music,
And I never tell her.
I curve my body into a crooked question mark,
Never wanting
To tell her.
She should know
I think.
Haven't you watched the news ?
There is possibly a new planet,
Again,
And a new Portland,
On the rise.
While gliding down Broadway street,
My liberal blinders tightly fastened,
My liberal blinders highly fashioned,
I anticipated the glamour of an art show.
Roche chocolates, white wine,
white walls,
A tingling white noise in the night.
Portraits of suburbanite ghosts and
Goblins.
Snippets of Halloween intentions.
I would sip the white wine, tasting of olives
Dipped in sugar.
This is Art?
I would whisper to my friend.
I look up to see,
I have walked through a red light,
Admist my dreaming.
I am suddenly sharply aware
Of everything.
Like a bat looking for
Prey.
I see the Patriot Prayer March.
They are not
Praying.
They are not
Marching.
They are waving American flags,
They are waving Signs that say ,
"Proud to be White."
Proud boys.
Proud to be racist.
Proud to be angry.
Proud about beating a liberal with
the American flag on Saturday night,
And going to church in white dress shirts,
Sunday morning.
I am standing in my fake diamond necklace,
And the dress that looks expensive,
And I am suddenly angry
Too.
I am waving my middle finger at the patriots,
Like it is the last thing I will ever do.
I am waving my cane at rabid bystanders,
Unhinging,
Unhinging the armor of
White Privilege.
I want to tell my friend in California,
That there is a new Portland
On the rise.
I know she wouldn't believe
Me.

Elizabeth Stansberry has been writing poetry since she was 8 years old. She has been published in Oregon Art's Watch, Eclectic Muse, Soul Fountain, Skyline Review, Eskimo Pie Journal, Mused Magazine, Red Fez Journal, and others. She is a secretary and security guard at Prosper Portland. She has many other day jobs. Her most recent poem is published in the book Not My President from Thoughtcrime Press. Stansberry currently resides in Portland, Oregon.

SPIDER CAUGHT IN THE ASH WEB

by Tricia Knoll

Image source: Hiveminer

Ash flakes into the new fall spider’s web
on the corn stalks. Wind ferried specks
from the wildfires raging on the cliffs,
smoke hazard on the east-west freeway,
a breathing caution. Ash on the rose petals,
fading ones facing diminishing blooms.

The Dreamers’ frail web tears,
dragged down under ash, victim
of fires hundreds of miles away.
An urge to struggle free of this
drift acknowledges the flames
of hope that kindled the work,
the time of learning to weather
seasons, grow up in storms,
and pursue the road of their lives.

Tricia Knoll is an Oregon poet watching the ashes of burning trees fall on Portland, Oregon. Ash coating the garden flowers, tomato plants, mucking up windshields. At the same time, the news on DACA and its impact on hundreds of thousands of young people seems overwhelming.

LOVE & HATE ON A PORTLAND TRAIN

after the last words of Taliesin Myrddin Namkai-Meche

by Scott C. Kaestner





hate versus love on a train
hate slashes at love, stabs
love in the heart, claims two
brave souls who defended
love in the face of hate and
as love lays dying on that train
a victim of hate, one last brave act
one last message of love, one last
ounce of love to give offering hope

"Tell them, I want everybody to know, I want everybody on the train to know, I love them."

Scott C. Kaestner is a Los Angeles poet, a dad, Lakers fan, guacamole aficionado, and leftist dreamer. Google 'scott kaestner poetry' to peruse his musings.

SNOW

by Mimi German

A Portland baby is dead after being found last week in freezing temperatures with his homeless mother in a bus stop along Southeast Powell Boulevard. The infant, found Jan. 9, marks the fifth death on Portland's streets during the cold weather this year. Four homeless people died of exposure in the first 10 days of 2017. A week after the baby was found, it's still unclear whether he died of exposure hours after being born outdoors or was stillborn. But the circumstances of the child's death illustrate that much of the tragedy on Portland's streets involves untreated mental illness. Photo of Portland snow on January 11, 2017 by Joe Riedl. —Nigel Jaquiss, Williamette Week, January 11, 2017

I took a shovel to the ice

before the thaw
would bring the rains
before the rains
would bring the flood
before the flood
would raise the worms
before the worms
could feed the birds
before the birds
could shit upon

frozen people
lying dead
in sleeping bags
on the sidewalks
of this City.


Mimi German is a Poet and Activist/Organizer and free radical for change in Portland, OR.

BEFORE THE ANTI-TRUMP RALLY

by Jon Wesick

Model Train Museum, Balboa Park, San Diego

Three hours sleep, one hour early
I wander Balboa Park. If only
today was just about healing crystals
and the gentle girl selling yoga pants.
It’s unseasonably hot as if flames of spite
burned the calendar back to August.

There have always been two Americas. Banana Republicans
elected the America of empty promises,
magical thinking, witch hunts, and internment camps;
the America of George Wallace and Bull Connor.

Little hope
for a country this far gone.
If I’m lucky, a lonely exile
of plantains and fried yucca.
The bureaucracy of overseas visas
so disheartening.

There’s a Japanese bridge
in the gully below the tea garden.
Up ahead a Baroque tower
and gold-flecked dome of lapis lazuli.
I’ll miss this place, its people,
my language

One protester shot in Portland.
My bulletproof vest, too bulky
for today. Ten minutes left. No time
for the Model Train Museum’s miniature world,
a world more perfect than this.
I backtrack toward a perilous future

Anti-Trump protesters in Balboa Park. Nov. 12, 2016. Photo by Jean Guerrero/KPBS

Jon Wesick hosts Southern California’s best ice cream parlor poetry reading and is a regional editor of the San Diego Poetry Annual. He’s published hundreds of poems and stories in journals such as the Atlanta Review, Berkeley Fiction Review, Metal Scratches, Pearl, Slipstream, Space and Time, Tales of the Talisman, and Zahir. The editors of Knot Magazine nominated his story “The Visitor” for a Pushcart Prize. His poem “Meditation Instruction” won the Editor’s Choice Award in the 2016 Spirit First Contest. Another poem “Bread and Circuses” won second place in the 2007 African American Writers and Artists Contest. Jon is the author of the poetry collection Words of Power, Dances of Freedom as well as several novels.

RACE

by Howard Winn

Micah Kogo of Kenya captures first place in the Beach to Beacon 10K road race in Cape Elizabeth Saturday. Kogo won his second Beach to Beacon race in three years with a time of 28 minutes, 3.2 seconds. --Ernie Clark, Bangor Daily News, Aug. 03, 2013. Image source: http://www.beach2beacon.org/

There are no black faces in my town
in the suburbs of Portland, Maine,
except when they run the marathon
from Crescent Beach to the Portland Head
lighthouse where usually vacationers leave
the tour buses to admire the wild waves
whitening  the Atlantic water
against the splintering rocks of our
craggy Casco Bay.
On our street of young couples
with the requisite two small children,
the portable basketball hoops and backboards,
scooters and skateboards,
it is tricky to tell them apart
which is what is overheard when
they speak of the black faces
that appear once a year.
The hard young men who bicycle
in spandex and stream-lined helmets
after work and on week-ends,
leave for labor in similar SUVs
at about the same time each work day.
Young toned wives with careful hair
watch the exuberant toddlers
and run together in packs
on Shore Road during their nap time
or when the Granny is in charge.
But never that one time of year
when the Africans from Kenya,
Ethiopia, Ghana, Congo or South Africa,
male and female, race the road
from Beach to Beacon and
win for the money to send home
to hungry villagers who export
their beloved sons and daughters
world-wide to run the marathons
for white Western money.
Afterwards what is left
is the newspaper reports,
in paper and on the Internet,
the signs along the roads announcing
the mileage covered and to come,
the washable paint on the highways
that make beginning and end
of our world famous race
until it is rained away,
the bleachers in the park
and the portable potties for
observer and participant.
The signs, white and red,
announcing the event
and warning of street closings
will come down eventually, detached
and stored by the Town of Cape Elizabeth
for the competition next year
when black faces will appear
to run and win that race again.


Most recently Howard Winn had poems and fiction published in The Dalhousie Review, Descant (Canada), Cactus Heart, Main Street Rag, Caduceus, Burning Word,  Pennsylvania Literary Journal. Southern Humanities Review, Cutting Edgz and Borderlands. His B. A. is from Vassar College. His graduate degree is from the Writing Program at Stanford University. His doctoral work was done at New York University. He is a State University of New York faculty member.