FOR THE STANSTED 15

by Matt Broomfield

"The case of the 15 activists convicted last Monday of ‘intentional disruption of services at an aerodrome,’ an offence carrying a maximum penalty of life imprisonment, over a non-violent protest which stopped a deportation flight from leaving Stansted airport should not only worry all those who care about the rights of those threatened with removal. It should alarm anyone who cares about the right to protest. The disproportionate charge will have a chilling effect. Amnesty has called this 'a crushing blow for human rights in the UK'; Liberty said it was a 'malicious attack' on the right to protest.” Photograph: Kristian Buus/In Pictures via Getty Image —The Guardian, December 11, 2018

“Disease X represents the knowledge that a serious international epidemic could be caused by a pathogen currently unknown to cause human disease, and so the R&D Blueprint explicitly seeks to enable cross-cutting R&D preparedness that is also relevant for an unknown “Disease X” as far as possible.” —World Health Organisation


disease X represents

the flash-drives full of martyred friends
the murals whose eyes you can’t put out
the secret slideshows shown on bedsheets
to comrades hiding in the hills

disease X represents

the breath which we breathe on you
the knowledge we share

disease X represents

our refusal to answer the questions whose answering
is mandated by law, the referral to lawyers
who cannot be afforded, the good work of lawyers
regardless, the virulent brown goulash
served through iron cat-flaps in Styrofoam trays
to the rag-pickers, card-scammers and lesbian mothers
the good and bad migrants, the friendless and their friends
the guerrilla paramedics, organ-grinders and thieves
the class coalescing for want of a class

disease X represents

the willing foreclosure of futures
which do not end in grief, the return of the gaze
the huff of breath rich with pathogens unknown
the tracing of banned words in filth, the moue
the return of the paper unsigned

disease X represents

your refusal to believe we would choose to subsist on so little
your demented insistence on finding out why, as though
the way which you ask us is not itself a cause

disease X represents

the exorcism of the cop which you put in our heads
through the refusal to think ill of our friends, whom we love
through the refusal to mourn the death of those
dead only in the most trivial sense
through the banned touch of hands in the pockets
of concrete overcoats, the obvious erection
on the back of the dirt-bike
running memory cards through the demilitarised zone
the reckless proclamations of love through the encrypted app
sweet enough, we have to hope, to radicalise the judge

disease X represents

the explicit search for the necessary evil
the conscious acceptance of the status of a bomb

the incendiary touch of hands between friends
which brought down the plane from the sky

Matt Broomfield is a poet, activist and writer currently living and working in Rojava in solidarity with the socialist-feminist revolution there. His debut fiction pamphlet was published in 2018 by Dog Section Press, his poetry has been shared across London by Poetry On The Underground, and he is a Foyle Young Poet of the Year and can be found on Twitter at @hashtagbroom. 

JANUARY 13TH, 2017

by Marc Swan

https://www.womensmarch.com

In a short hop against convention, my wife
and I were married on a Friday the 13th. Today
a road trip to honor one. We drive to Belfast, two
hours north, to the Farmer’s Market. My wife’s
a large fan of fresh produce even in wintertime. We
meet a local farmer with twenty-three water buffalo.
I’m staggered by the number, more shocked by how
they survive. This isn’t India or Southeast Asia. She
assures me they have a warm barn, plenty to eat.
My wife buys milk for yogurt. The farmer tells us,
you’ll be amazed. I’m starting to feel the healthy
pull of the day. We travel route one to Rockland
for lunch, the warmth of an Irish cafe. Good food,
friendly staff generous with their time, tables fill
as people trundle in from the cold wind blowing
outside. From here we drive south to Wiscasset
to see a favorite shop owner who in short order
expresses her growing feelings about the election.
Every Friday thru the holidays she’s been donating
twenty per cent of her sales to five nonprofits that
will likely be battered under the new regime.
Her heart sings Cohen’s “Hallelujah" as we talk
of support for those things that separate thinking
folks from those who think chaos should reign.
Across the street in another store, a saleslady we’ve
never met senses our liberal lean. Running her hands
thru her thick blond-tinted hair, she talks of the march
in Washington and how important it is to be there—
she will “next Saturday.” Eyes water as she goes
on about rip and tear on what was once understood
as democracy too quickly becoming something
with another name from lessons never learned:
fascist, authoritarian, despotic and in these
difficult times we live, simply wrong.

Marc Swan’s poems have recently been published or forthcoming in Scrivener Creative Review, Crannóg, Mudfish, Gargoyle, Nuclear Impact Anthology, Coal City Review, among others. He lives with his wife Dd in Portland Maine. 

SUNSET COMMENT ON THE NEW YEAR

by George Held

29 December 2016

It’s one of those glorious sunsets,
Like an ad for New Mexico, that makes
You feel blessed to be alive even as
Authoritarianism leaks over the horizon –
Orange and gold flames with a purple core
Over New Jersey without the seasonal
Obstruction of leaves on the trees –
What might it presage, what tacit
Message doth it bring, this dynamic neon
Peach Melba of a twilit sky? Not the Orange
Man risen from New York City towers
To loom Kong-like over even the sunset,
The sky, the compliant Universe,
The galactic figure of our tabloid
Imaginations?
And now the fire in the sky
Deepens like a Roman omen, the night
Rushes in to drape dark auguries
About the perishing republic, and we brace
For the inevitable inauguration, the sunset
A mere glowing ember in the charred evening.

George Held, a frequent contributor to TheNewVerse.News, has received ten Pushcart nominations, including ones for both poetry and fiction in 2016. His new poetry chapbook is Phased II (Poets Wear Prada, 2016).