MARY ON THE CAMPAIGN TRAIL

by Suzanne Morris

The irrepressible

Mary Richards has

seized the cap she had

tossed in the air,

shined up her high brass

walking boots, and

temporarily stepped down

from her iconic pedestal

on Nicollet Mall at the

corner of 7th Avenue

in Minneapolis.

At the urging of

the Vice President and

the Governor, who

wholeheartedly agreed

nothing could be

Minnesota Nicer than to

have Mary on board

as a campaign adviser,

the 1970's TV character

who cheered women on

in the chase for their dreams

recognized at once

the meaningful encore

to her long-running

top-rated sitcom:

cheering on the first Black/

Asian American woman

in her quest for the

highest office in the land

right up to the

5th of November

when–God willing–

the VP and the Governor

will carry the day and

all the joy

into the White House

for the next four years.

Then, with parting advice

for the new President

to remember her example

Mary can climb up

on her pedestal again,

toss her cap

in the air, and

turn the world on

with her smile.

Suzanne Morris is a novelist with eight published works, and a poet.  Her poems have appeared in several anthologies, and in online poetry journals including The New Verse News, The Texas Poetry Assignment, and Stone Poetry Quarterly.  She resides in Cherokee County, Texas.

THE NEW NOVEMBER

by Jan Steckel

for Garrett Murphy

 

Late October is the New November,

the nova ember, when all slates

are made new. Ladybug, ladybug,

fly away home, your statehouse is on fire.

If you can’t vote the bastards out, 

drag along your electoral hammers,

spousal skull-crushers. Surveil those 

ballot boxes through the sights 

of your AR13s, only wear masks 

when you’re Ku Klux Klanning.

Proud Boys will be bashers.

It’s the ballot-harvesting festival,

so let’s go smashing pumpkins.

MAGA MAGA make it rain, it’s

lefty-hunting season again.

Kristallnacht’s in fashie-fashion.

Jack-o-Lannister, slide down

the Capitol bannister.

Olly olly oxen free!

Open season/no more reason:

civil discourse is passé,

democracy’s so yesterday.

Grab your billyclubs, shillaleghs, 

flagpoles, sheriff’s star,

little red baseball cap.

It’s mass grave o’clock, wake up, 

smell the decomposing bodies.

Get up off your brass knuckles—

Let the midterms begin!

Jan Steckel’s book Like Flesh Covers Bone (Zeitgeist Press, 2018) won Rainbow Awards for LGBT Poetry and Best Bisexual Book. Her poetry book The Horizontal Poet (Zeitgeist Press, 2011) won a Lambda Literary Award. Her fiction chapbook Mixing Tracks (Gertrude Press, 2009) and poetry chapbook The Underwater Hospital (Zeitgeist Press, 2006) also won awards. She lives in Oakland, California. 

THE VIEW FROM WHERE I SIT

by Brooke Herter James

 

The cloud of fog

hovering

over the mountain

has shaped itself

into a jaunty cap—

the kind one might wear

to a party 

or a parade.

Brooke Herter James is a poet living in Vermont.