CELLULITIS

by Felicia Nimue Ackerman

Felicia Nimue Ackerman is a professor of philosophy at Brown University and has had over 260 poems published in places including American Atheist, The American Scholar, Better Than Starbucks, The Boston Globe, The Chronicle of Higher Education, Down in the Dirt, The Emily Dickinson International Society Bulletin, Free Inquiry, Light Poetry Magazine, Lighten Up Online, The Los Angeles Times, The New York Daily News, The New York Times, The Providence Journal, Scientific American, Sparks of Calliope, Time Magazine, The Wall Street Journal, and Your Daily Poem. 

ADVENT

by Rachel Mallalieu




In the end, it won’t be the red
Starbucks cups or people who

Say happy holidays instead of
Merry Christmas, not

Ubiquitous Santa and his elves,
with no manger in sight

It’s video of a caged child who
writhes on a bench

Falls facedown and vomits
blood onto the floor

Staggers towards a toilet,
slumps to the ground

And convulses
then stills

That wages the war on Christmas


Rachel Mallalieu is an Emergency Physician and mother of five. She writes poetry in her spare time. Her work has been featured in TheNewVerse.News, Blood and Thunder and is upcoming in Haunted Waters Press.