CAPO GHAZAL

by Esther Greenleaf Murer

Of course I’ll release the funds.  But first, do me a favor.
No, of course you’re not being coerced—just do me a favor.

Those shitholes out there are trying to undermine me!
They have to be slimed and aspersed, so do me a favor.

Help me out with this and I’ll invite you to the White House.
Just do your best (i.e. worst) and I’ll take it as a favor.

Rudy is coming with an offer you can’t refuse:
end up in the Dnieper feet first, or do me a favor.

This transcript is going to the secret computer system,
so forget that we ever conversed; just do me a favor.

Esther Greenleaf Murer is a longtime contributor to the TheNewVerse.News.  She lives in Philadelphia.

THE ELECTION IS RIGGED

by Llyn Clague





THE ELECTION IS RIGGED
blares the hand-painted sign beside the road
for every passing 4X4, SUV, BMW.

THE ELECTION IS
RIGGED—a neighbor, living on my street,
screams scam!  Every time I pass,
scam! . . . scam! . . . scam! . . .

Man—I want to say—
you don’t even know me
and you insist we cannot play fair.

THE ELECTION, you cry, IS RIGGED
even before the first whistle
in the raucous, unruly, Saturday-celebrating stadium.

2

Remember the games we played as kids?
Throw an elbow, give a furtive kick, scratch—
sure, we wanted to win.
But, say it aloud or not,
we knew, victory “earned” by cheating
was a sham.

THE ELECTION IS RIGGED
Have the adults, in their games, lost
what we had as kids?
Are the rewards so rich,
they’re willing to “win” at any cost?

And you, neighbor, before you roar . . . RIGGED
to every passing semi, RV, antique classic,
don’t you realize, if you are right,
our entire American “democracy”
is a sham?

Of course you do.
Out of the many, there is no shazam,
no will of the governed,
no “voice of the people.”

No voice of you and me.

3

THE ELECTION IS RIGGED
And maybe, my neighbor down the street,
whom I don’t know, you are right—THE ELECTION
IS RIGGED, though maybe not
how you think.

Nobody is bribing the refs,
nor paying off rogue players in the stadium.

Long before the soft whistle
in the teeth of the first volunteer
opening the precinct door,
all across this wide continent
federal, state, and local elections
ARE being rigged—

by precise gerrymandering,
by particular ID cards,
by cascades of designated cash.

RIGGED, at the very least,
to the very best of their manipulative ability,
by our election-selecteds
and their precise, particular, dedicated minions.

You grieve me, neighbor, living on our street,
screaming at every passerby
THE ELECTION IS RIGGED,
not because you are wrong,
but because you may be right.

And if you are, in the stampede
after the shout of Fire! in our national theater,
we will be crushed, you and I together.

Llyn Clague is a poet based in Hastings-on-Hudson, NY.  His poems have been published widely, including in Ibbetson Street, Atlanta Review, Wisconsin Review, California Quarterly, Main Street Rag, New York Quarterly.  His seventh book Hard-Edged and Childlike was published by Main Street Rag in September, 2014.

AMERICA'S DIVIDES

by Gil Hoy

Centre of equal daughters, equal sons, 

All, all alike endear'd, grown, ungrown, young or old, 

Strong, ample, fair, enduring, capable, rich, 

Perennial with the Earth, with Freedom, Law and Love . . .  

Embedded into this video is a 36-second wax cylinder recording of what is thought to be Whitman's voice reading four lines from the poem "America:”  Recording: Copyright Eric Forsythe, 2012–2013. Made available on the Whitman Archive with permission of the rights holder. Audio may be reused for non-commercial purposes, with credit to Eric Forsythe and the Walt Whitman Archive. For more information on this recording, see Ed Folsom, "The Whitman Recording," Walt Whitman Quarterly Review, 9 (Spring 1992), 214-16.

                         I.

I see you, Walt Whitman---an American
Rough, a Cosmos!  I see you face to face!

I see you and the nameless faceless
Faces in America's timeless crowds of men
and women who you saw in your mind's eye.

I see you crossing the river on your ferry.
I see you walking down the public road

Where everyone is worthy. Neither time,
Place nor distance separates.
     
                         II.

You once saw the currents of corruption,
Fast flowing into the land that you loved.
You once saw that which had departed

With the setting sun, half an hour high,
For when another is degraded,
so are you and I.

You once saw what had flowed in with the
Rising flood-tides feverishly pouring---

Tides saturated and soaked with exploitation,
Bribery, falsehood and maladministration.

                         III.

When you saw the motionless wings of
Twelfth-month sea-gulls, When you walked

Along Manhattan Island---When you watched the
Ships of Manhattan, north and west---

Could you see Wall Street banks
Seizing the homes of your beloved countrymen,
Voyaging in their fragile ferryboats? The carpenters,

Quakers, scientists and opium eaters; The immigrants,
Squaws, boatmen and blacksmiths; The farmers,                        
Mechanics, sailors and priests?                                                

                          IV.

Could you see the monstrous megaton corporations
Feasting on America's flesh blood bones, those
Nameless faceless parasites

Sucking the soul from your loved land,                                            
Like a malevolent disease?                                                              

                            V.
For you saw quite clearly the political and
Economic malfunctioning mutant ties that connect us.
Neither time, place nor distance separates.

And you saw very clearly the sickly green sludge
Secreted by lobbyists to their bought and sold

Henchmen soldier baby-kissers, to slow and
Stop the flow of nourishing rushing sea tides
Into your dear, revered democracy.

                            VI.

You saw the evil dark patches---the clinging selfish
Steadfast pernicious grasp of the flourishing one
Per cent oligarchs, Who lusted, grubbed, lied, stole--

Were greedy, shallow, sly, angry, vain, cowardly,
malignant--Seeking only to hold onto their fool's
Gold and preserve the status quo.

                           VII.

Each still furnishes its part towards the death of
America's democracy. Each still furnishes its part

Towards destroying her soul. The mocking bird
Still sings the musical shuttle to the tearful

Bareheaded child, and the final word superior for
America may still be her death, death, death,
Death. The sea has whisper'd me, too.


Gil Hoy is a Boston trial lawyer who is currently studying poetry at Boston University, through its Evergreen program, where he previously received a BA in Philosophy and Political Science. Hoy received an MA in Government from Georgetown University and a JD from the University of Virginia School of Law. He served as a Brookline, Massachusetts Selectman for four terms. Hoy started writing poetry two years ago. Since then, his work has appeared in Third Wednesday, The Write Room, The Eclectic Muse, Clark Street Review, TheNewVerse.News , Harbinger Asylum, Soul Fountain, The Story Teller Magazine, Eye on Life Magazine, Stepping Stones Magazine, The Penmen Review, To Hold A Moment Still, Harbinger Asylum’s 2014 Holidays Anthology, The Zodiac Review, Earl of Plaid Literary Journal, The Potomac, Antarctica Journal, The Montucky Review and elsewhere.

TITUM ARUM

by Joan Colby



  The "corpse flower" at the Chicago Botanic Garden was manually opened Sunday morning after it failed to bloom, but the flower did not emit its trademark odor as expected. —NBC Chicago, August 31, 2015


At the Botanic Garden,
The corpse flower was getting ready
To bloom—a once in a lifetime affair.
Fifteen feet high, its vast hulk bulged
Ready to release the stench
That dung beetles adore,
That maggots desire.
But at the seminal moment
Spike decided it could not
Compete in a state rotten
With the stink of politicians:
Four of the last seven governors
Did time—fraud, bribery,
Racketeering, corruption.
The putrid fly leaves in the book
Of their chicaneries
Overwhelm any official flower.


Joan Colby has published widely in journals such as Poetry, Atlanta Review, South Dakota Review, The Spoon River Poetry Review, New York Quarterly, the new renaissance, Grand Street, Epoch, and Prairie Schooner. Awards include two Illinois Arts Council Literary Awards, Rhino Poetry Award, the new renaissance Award for Poetry, and an Illinois Arts Council Fellowship in Literature. She was a finalist in the GSU Poetry Contest (2007), Nimrod International Pablo Neruda Prize (2009, 2012), and received honorable mentions in the North American Review's James Hearst Poetry Contest (2008, 2010). She is the editor of Illinois Racing News, and lives on a small horse farm in Northern Illinois. She has published 11 books including The Lonely Hearts Killers and How the Sky Begins to Fall (Spoon River Press), The Atrocity Book (Lynx House Press) and Dead Horses and Selected Poems from FutureCycle Press. Selected Poems received the 2013 FutureCycle Prize.  Properties of Matter was published in spring of 2014 by Aldrich Press (Kelsay Books). Two chapbooks are forthcoming in 2014: Bittersweet (Main Street Rag Press) and Ah Clio (Kattywompus Press). Colby is also an associate editor of Kentucky Review and FutureCycle Press.