ANYMORE

by Frederick Wilbur

We don’t tolerate ripples in window glass anymore,
the waving landscape smoothed out.
Switchbacks of moral choice are GPS’ed
as Robert Frost never conceived. Now we drive
for miles with turn signal blinking right,
then U-turn back to well-traveled interstates.

Scarecrows don’t hide in corn fields anymore,
each tassel-top chemicaled to a plastic crown—
nature is an industry, a corporation,
littered with hashtags, threat assessments,
sentimental cemeteries for passed pets.

Silence isn’t noticed much anymore,
too many ringtones, beeps, and bling,
seepage from ear buds, drones overhead—
distraction, distraction, distractions, distractions.

Wisdom isn’t countenanced anymore,
everything digitalized, Googled, auto-corrected, auto-filled.
Compassion is granted by proxy, by on-line donation.

No sincere grief anymore,
as opinions bully and greed and hate rule,
even Free Speech shows up with a gun.

But if we rant out of fear, we are not free anymore.


Frederick Wilbur has authored three books on architectural and decorative woodcarving, and a poetry collection, As Pus Floats the Splinter Out. His work has appeared in many print and on-line reviews including Shenandoah, Main Street Rag, Comstock Review, The Dalhousie Review, Rise Up Review, and Mojave River Review. He was awarded the Stephen Meats Award by Midwest Quarterly (2017). He is poetry editor for Streetlight Magazine.

TO MY GRANDSONS IN THE FUTURE

by Cathryn Shea

You benefit today from your innocent
enthusiasm for worms, grasshoppers,
and anthills. You study foxtails
and poppies, wade in the Yuba River.

When you read this in high school,
my hope is that you are in a public one.
Well-funded, or at least with an adequate budget
for the arts. I hope your summer is still
not breaking heat records
and in winter the Yuba does not flood
causing mudslides.

I hope you do not suffer premature neck strain
from bending over your cell phones.
If you have cell phones or know of cell phones.
Perhaps you wear a device attached to your eyes.
Perhaps you wear an embedded chip.

Does anyone mention climate change anywhere?
(That was a euphemism anyway.)
Is capitalism still running rampant?
Does your vocabulary even include such words?
Have robots taken over the classroom?

I ask you too many questions
and I apologize. By the way,
did you know apologia is the root
of apologize? Such a beautiful word

of remorse. I can’t imagine your vernacular.
I digress. (Oh, I can just hear you chiding.
Grandma uses too many strange words.)

I do hope there is still a Nature you can escape to.
Where the din of machinery can’t be heard.
Where artificial radiance
does not vie with the night sky.

Cathryn Shea is the author of four chapbooks including Backpack Full of Leaves (Cyberwit, 2019) and Secrets Hidden in a Pear Tree (dancing girl press, 2019). Her first full-length poetry collection Genealogy Lesson for the Laity is forthcoming from Unsolicited Press in September 2020. Cathryn’s poetry appears in New Orleans Review, Tar River Poetry, Typehouse, and elsewhere. See @cathy_shea on Twitter.

THE FALL OF SKY MALL

by Martin Ott

The bankrupt SkyMall catalog may be rescued by a former Shark Tank contestant. Scott Jordan, the chief executive of a company that makes clothes with pockets specially designed for smartphones and other gadgets, plans to bid for SkyMall's assets. . . . SkyMall, a mail order catalog that has been found in seat-back pockets on airplanes for 25 years, filed for bankruptcy last week. It was famous for selling gadgets aimed at travelers, as well as variety of offbeat items like Sasquatch statues and glow in the dark toilet seats. --CNN, January 28, 2015

Catalogs floated in dark matter somewhere between seat pocket and a wrinkle in time. Where were you when the sky began raining solar-powered cooling hats and serenity cat pods? Many had just heard that the universe may not have exploded from a single point. The crowds trampled each other to catch the squirrel tree climber sculptures and plush referee turkey hats. In an alternate universe time ran backwards. Some were maimed by the dinosaur trophy friezes and peacock dreams mirrored plaques. The volley of God-hand statues with cradled cats whistled down and you reconsidered the notion of pi. Were you one of the first to catch a wrist cell phone carrier or head massagers, each one unique like melting snowflakes or conjoined twins? The fabric of the universe was weary. Millions marched with wine glass holder necklaces and alien butlers, waistband stretchers and sling couture, slumber sleeves and Siamese blankets. Nothing lasts forever except ideas of forever. Spaces between borders filled with a new theory of universal expansion. The deluge ended somewhere over the Rockies. The fasten seat belt lights dinged and you woke with dried spittle crusting lips, hoping you didn’t snore or feel up the person in the next seat over. The dream of owning everything remained. Your hand trembled to open the window shade. The person next to you sighed. The crinkle of paper. The light looking like it was made. 


A previous contributor to The New Verse News, Martin Ott is the author of six books of poetry and fiction, including the forthcoming books Underdays (University of Notre Dame Press) and Interrogations (Fomite Press).