PORTRAIT OF A PRIMARY

by James Schwartz

The many vs. the money 

Michigan vs. everybody 

Hospitals close

&

Everyone knows 

Our roads are too shoddy 

Medicare for all a solution 

As wildfires & pollution 

Poison our skies 

&

Blind our eyes 

To corporations' contribution. 

James Schwartz is a Detroit based poet and author of various poetry collections, most recently Amish Alchemy (Alien Buddha Press, 2026) and Poems 2 (with Sourav Sarkar, 2026).

EXTREME WEATHER REPORTS FOR THE 21ST CENTURY

by Melissa Balmain

“Shouldn’t we name extreme weather events after those contributing most to them? … Last hurricane season, a regular reader… suggested that hurricanes should not be named after random humans, but corporate brand names—specifically those [polluters] that have contributed most to the intensification of extreme weather.”
—Erik Assadourian and Esther Phillips, on Medium

Hurricane Exxon—from Maine down to Mass.—
appears, as we feared, to be hitting the gas.

Macroburst Google is knocking down birches
and churches as rescues lag far behind searches.

Bomb-cyclone Bezos refuses to stop
until it has flattened each mom and each pop.

Superstorm Congress? Crews strive to repair
the damage it’s done with its surging hot air.

And everywhere, Trumpulus clouds keep on raining
fresh plagues on the heads of whoever’s remaining.

AI-generated graphic by NightCafé for The New Verse News.

Melissa Balmain edits Light, North America's longest-running journal of comic verse. Her latest book of poetry is Satan Talks to His Therapist (Paul Dry Books).

FINE PRINT

by Tricia Knoll

Corporations make it so small you don’t

    read a word of it as if they save paper

    by cramming everything together 

what privacy you give up

hidden costs

contraindications, side effects –

one decreases cognitive abilities

on a drug doctors said I needed

as I age. Getting old

brings out glasses,

prescription or straight 

from the pharmacy rack. 

Woe: when it isn’t 8-point 

type, when it’s spelled out big

with a flaunty signature 

of a President who hates they, them

pronouns, turns the tables on being born

on safe soil, pardons killers, changes

the name of the highest mountain 

on the continent—the Great One. 

And on and on, writ large.  

Might as well be billboards

his words that make

my heart ache—what irony

I can’t even read his floozy signature. 

 

Tricia Knoll is an aging Vermont poet and feminist who hasn't yet conquered the heartache for women of losing the write to choose health care in so many states. She has nine collections in print, both full-length books and chapbooks. She is a Contributing Editor to the online journal Verse Virtual. She wonders how liberal folks will move forward in the coming years. 

CORPORATE SPRING

by Douglas Richardson

Fight for $15.

Walking west on 6th Street

All the trees are green

The sun is warm upon my face

My hair is moussed and preened

 

I’m listening to Corporate Pop

on my way to Corporate Eatery

I fling my tie around my neck

a leaf among the scenery

 

My table’s cleared

My glass is beered

All the unions disappeared

The working world is free

 

 

Douglas Richardson is a poet and novelist who lives in Santa Ana, California, with his wife Jen and cat Wes. He is the founder of Weak Creature Press. He has written a fiction series, American Strays, which comprises the novellas The Corruption of Zachary R., Trust Fund Baby, and Kay Sutter Through the Ages. His poetry has been published or is forthcoming in The American Journal of Poetry, Black Poppy Review, Cajun Mutt Press, Hobo Camp Review, Misfits’ Miscellany, The Nervous Breakdown, Straight Forward Poetry, Trouvaille Review, and Poetry Super Highway. In 2013, he won the Poetry Super Highway contest with his entry, “Notes from the Graveyard Shift.” 

THE EXECUTIONER'S FACE

by Matt Witt

Dozens still missing in Oregon. Jackson County District 5 firefighter Captain Aaron Bustard works on a smoldering fire in a burned neighborhood in Talent, Ore., Friday, Sept. 11, 2020, as destructive wildfires devastate the region. (AP Photo/Paula Bronstein via OregonLive)

We load the car—
two sets of clothes and
a lifetime of memories—
as skyscraper flames are destroying
hundreds of homes of
friends and neighbors
a mile away.
Did they get out in time?
And then what?

We hit the back roads,
searching for safety,
with Bob Dylan howling through car speakers:
"The soles of my feet,
I swear they're burning."

Decades of reports said
this was coming
without climate action.
"Hotter temperatures."
"Disappearing snowpack."
"More frequent and more intense fires."
"Urgent transition needed to solar."
"Rapid investment in energy efficiency."

We can already picture
the photos the media will feed us
of some scraggly guy with stringy hair
who may have dropped a match—
with headlines: “What caused the fire?”

There will be no photos of
corporate lobbyists
whose puppets for years said
let's double down on what got us here
or who gave us half measures
and asked for applause.

We drive through the smoke,
community destroyed,
and now Dylan’s voice is sounding more desperate:
"The executioner's face,” he wails,
“is always well hidden."




Matt Witt is a writer and photographer from Talent, Oregon. His website is MattWittPhotography.com.

PUT YOUR MONEY WHERE YOUR MOUTH IS

by George Salamon

Graphic by Know Your Meme

"Put your money where your mouth is."

—Rainbow Round My Shoulder: The Blue Trail of Black Ulysses

by Howard Washington Odum. 

Indianapolis: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, 1928: 132.

Words and gestures demand no sacrifice:
BLM marches for criminal justice,
We could sure use more of that.
Corporations commit to workplace equality,
We could sure use more of that.
Progressives call for wealth redistribution,
We could sure use more of that.
Liberals seek equality in healthcare access,
We could sure use more of that.
But what are they doing to get more?
I propose 10 years of a tithe for justice
And equality at work, in the doctor's office,
In courts of law, in schoolrooms and
Lecture halls across our divided nation,
Ten percent for ten years, collected from
The institutions, organizations and persons
Now placing ads, shouting and painting
Slogans, writing columns and letters and
Op-eds advocating a life of dignity and
Freedom from want for the working poor,
The unemployed poor, the homeless poor,
For Black and Brown, Yellow and White
People in the Rust Belt, in Appalachia and
On Farms, in crowded and sunless apartments,
Sleeping on kitchen or bathroom floors or in
Shelters seeking a safe place for themselves
And their children, blocks away from the condos
Where the CEOs, COOs, CFOs, Esq.s, MDs,
CPAs, MBAs and their lobbyists allow a few
Crumbs to fall off their richly laden tables for
Those "less fortunate" at Thanksgiving and Xmas.
Put your money where some of you have put your
Mouths and signatures and contribute from your
Billions in assets to gradually transform a decaying
Society into a working community, acknowledging
That "happy days" are not the privilege of a very
Few in a land of vast natural and human resources,
And that we will never be in the American experiment
Or enterprise together unless you do better by
Doing good.


George Salamon casts a cold eye on what our "meritocracy" is doing to, but not for, working-class and middle-class Americans,  but will wait and see how many mean what they now say—at least for a while, in St. Louis, MO.

THE BALLAD OF SCOTT PRUIT

by Edward Zuk

Image from “Environmental Plundering Agency by Brian McFadded at The Nib.

When health and safety threaten greed across this land of ours,
To whom do corporations turn to exercise his powers?
Who trashes standards then explains it with a bland cliché?
It is Scott Pruitt, mighty leader of the EPA!

Who scoffs at scientists and what they claim to be “the truth”?
Who likes to joke with lobbyists inside his soundproof booth?
Who flies in secret round the world in first-class all the way?
It is Scott Pruitt, jet-set madman of the EPA!

He kicks and headlocks edicts, punches rules right in the nose,
Then knocks out regulations with his well-timed body blows.
Who cares if it’s all legal or the courts demand a stay?
He is Scott Pruitt, fearless fighter of the EPA!

When nonexistent death threats make this dauntless man afraid,
Security is there so that he will not be waylaid.
It’s well-spent dollars from the taxes of the USA
To save Scott Pruitt, precious treasure of the EPA!

When streams and rivers are too clean and need some mercury,
When oil is trapped in parks without a well to set it free,
When species are endangered but somehow still hang around
Without that one more final blow to lay them in the ground,

When woodland ponds are lacking coal ash and some manganese,
When people ought to breathe in smoke and lead from factories,
What do the billionaires and massive corporations say?
We’ll call Scott Pruitt, matchless leader of the EPA!



Edward Zuk is a poet from British Columbia, Canada. His work has appeared in The Queen's Quarterly, The Raintown Review, Modern Haiku, and TheNewVerse.News. 

TRANS PACIFIC PARTNERSHIP

by F.I. Goldhaber

Image source: The Journal of Personal Cyberconsciousness

First Abraham Lincoln let them live longer than people.
Then the U.S. Supremes gave them personhood and freedom.
Privileges of citizenship -- free speech and the pretense of religion
-- to gain tax reductions and eliminate workers' rights.

The president wants to allow their interests to supersede
sovereign nations' ability to serve their people.
Laws protecting safety, clean air, public health, will be waived
if it's possible they'll inhibit corporate profits.

Protection of corporate revenue will usurp all
individual rights to free expression, privacy,
due process, and the ability to afford housing,
food, medical care, education, transit, internet.

Forget about human rights. Only corporate power
carries any weight. They bought the U.S. government and
many of the world's leaders, jailing any who speak out.
They negotiate in secret to take away more rights.


As a reporter, editor, business writer, and marketing communications consultant, F.I. Goldhaber produced news stories, feature articles, essays, editorial columns, and reviews for newspapers, corporations, governments, and non-profits in five states. Now, her poems, short stories, novelettes, essays, and reviews appear in paper, electronic, and audio magazines, ezines, newspapers, calendars, and anthologies.  Her latest book of poetry, Subversive Verse, collects poems about corporate cruelty, gender grievances, supreme shambles, political perversion, and race relations.

SELF-MADE MAN

by Tom Russell

I gave birth to myself.

I discovered fire so that I could eat
whatever I, alone, produced.

I didn’t read your books,
you read mine.

I coined all the phrases.

I invented the wheel
and built all the roads
that wheels carry my money on.

I did all this with no help from anyone.

I created the dial tones and cyberspace
and made all the deals.

I forged all my own tools,
and that includes you.

Now you want to abuse me
with your regulations and taxations.
Blathering about responsibility
and shared sacrifice.

Suck it up, weasels.
Next you’ll be wanting your own bootstraps.

I don’t care who among you
gets sick or dies.
It pleases me
to see the spite you have for each other.

You are blind and weak.
Even if you could see my curtain
you wouldn’t be able to move it
and know that I am there.


Tom Russell works for the Omaha Public Library in Omaha, Nebraska. His poems have appeared in The New Verse News, Shot Glass Journal, and Crab Fat Literary Magazine.

TRICK OR TREAT

by Gil Hoy

Corporations are no longer
inanimate sterile things.

They’re now breathing fleshy
with blood money flowing
through wheels levers pistons
rhythmically turning
deep sea blue to ghoul red

anointing black robed
Victor Frankensteins
to keep Fiends well nourished
and magically cause Creatures
to rise from the dead
with their wild incantations.

While Monsters use up
all free speech that is uttered
mere mortals can't buy a word
just a consonant here and again
found in a graveyard.

Some Adams of Victor’s Labors
think (?) contraception
against religion (!), then
Wretches trump people (!?)
as The Modern Prometheus

dissects ghostly law
like a science school project
held together by webs
taken out by morticians
with the afternoon’s trash.

With all mad scientists
the Vile Insects may elect
the black sky’s the limitless.
In the meantime

have mercy
on the poor corporation
yellow lips watery eyes
shriveled face
resist the temptation
to be a bigot.

Gil Hoy studied poetry at Boston University, and started writing his own poetry in February of this year. Since then, Gil’s poems have been published in Soul Fountain, The New Verse News, The Story Teller Magazine, the Clark Street Review, Eye On Life Magazine, and Stepping Stones Magazine.

WHERE THE WHITE PEOPLE ARE: WOMEN'S REPRODUCTIVE RIGHTS

by J. Bradley

Image source: Daily Kos

Feed yourself until you are thick,
as a strip mall. Tattoo your Tax ID
on your forearm, your neck.

Answer quickly when asked about
your EBITDA. Answer quickly
when asked about what was gained
from what was written off.

When you purchase your first Congressman,
we might begin to listen.


J. Bradley is the author of the graphic poetry collection, The Bones of Us (YesYes Books, 2014), with art by Adam Scott Mazer.

TIME TO PLAY OUR GAME

by Stephanie Sesic

Image source: Daily Kos

     (with apologies to Joe Raposo)

one of these things is not like the others
     the proud owners of glorious cocks
     beloved collections of parasitic cells
     corporations closely held as a clandestine lover
     cunts and the sluts who hoard them
one of these things just doesn’t belong
     you see men are only human
     the justice they invented embryonic
     while the money eats what it needs to grow
     from the body that belongs to anything but her


Author's note: Italicized lines are from theSesame Street song, "One of These Things," by Joe Raposo. 

Stephanie Sesic teaches English at Kent State University. Her work has appeared in various print and online publications, and her chapbook The Intimate Verge was published by Pudding House in 2008.

THE RULE OF LAW

by Lucille Gang Shulklapper

I am woman, where are men ?

On the Supreme Court, inside 100 foot buffer zones,

 in states where they enforce vaginal probes,

in Congress where they love my fetus,

but starve my child when she is born?

I am woman.  Where are men?

Here are black men who stand in long lines to vote ,

poor men who hunger on minimum wage,

lawless men who start wars with lies,

Congressmen who tie our president’s hands,

rap a gavel every three days, say the Senate

is at work, deny climate change, control

my body to let others counsel me,

but not counsel them.

Here are men,

In the Supreme Court,

ruling corporations are people

ruling women’s health rights

are not buffered in the

Divided States of America.

  

 I am woman.  Where are men?

I am woman.   Where is mankind?

Lucille Gang Shulklapper is a widely-published poet and fiction writer with work appearing in Slant, Consequence, Main Street Rag, and New Verse News among others, as well as four poetry chapbooks.  A new poetry chapbook and a picture book are forthcoming in 2014.

THE CORPORATOCRACY

by Buff Whitman-Bradley





The beast has many bellies
The beast has many eyes
But does not have a single ear
To hear the children’s cries

The beast has certain methods
For entering our heads
For trampling on our spirits
And leaving them for dead

It sells us worthless trinkets
And artificial dreams
It hijacks our tomorrows
With twisted scams and schemes

It threatens and intimidates
To silence all our voices
While chillingly intoning that
There are no other choices!

The beast is always famished
Lucre’s what it eats
It finds the pennies of the poor
Particularly sweet

And when old people die of cold
And infants starve to death
The gorging beast feels not a twinge
Of sorrow or regret

The beast has many bellies
The beast has many eyes
But does not have a beating heart
To heed the children’s cries


Buff Whitman-Bradley is the author of four books of poetry, b. eagle, poet; The Honey Philosophies; Realpolitik; and When Compasses Grow Old; and the chapbook, Everything Wakes Up! His poetry has appeared in many print and online journals. He is also co-editor, with Cynthia Whitman-Bradley and Sarah Lazare, of the book About Face: Military Resisters Turn Against War.  He has co-produced/directed two documentary films, the award-winning Outside In (with Cynthia Whitman-Bradley) and Por Que Venimos (with the MIRC Film Collective).  He lives in northern California.

REV. BOEHNER'S HOMILY

by Ed Bennett





We have devolved,
you and I and the others,
the men and women around us
bunkered into our place,
our last stand
until the next one,

without a step or glance
into the middle ground,
the no-man’s land
of negotiation, reasonableness,
the anathema of all things
neither black nor white.

This is why we speak the parable
of vaginas with an off-switch,
the blood right of automatic fire,
the self imposed exile of
twelve million of those
who have the wrong accent.

We will ignore
the needs of those
without a lobby or PAC
but will make citizens
of every sacred corporate logo.
Let us pray.


Ed Bennett is a poet and reviewer living in Las Vegas, NV. His works have appeared in The Externalist, Touch: The Journal of Healing, The Lavender Review, Quill and Parchment and Lilipo. He is a staff editor for Quill and Parchment Magazine, the recipient of a Pushcart Nomination and the author of “A Transit of Venus”.