LIKE GOLD

by Karen Olshansky

This image, contained in the indictment against former President Donald Trump, shows boxes of records on Dec. 7, 2021, in a storage room at Trump's Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach, Fla., that had fallen over with contents spilling onto the floor. Justice Department/AP via TIME.

In front of deep yellow drapes

on the stage of the gilded ballroom

stacked in haphazard rows

in the marbled powder room

under the crystal chandelier

behind the commode

piled high like cardboard towers

in a storage closet near clothing 

wrapped in cleaner’s plastic

spilled like a garbage can ransacked 

by raccoons in cartons overturned

with scattered yellowed 

newspapers and photos:

precious papers,

secrets that protect, that keep 

us safe, that the braggadocio

hordes for his own pleasure and profit,

a man protected by

slavish minions

and deplorable citizens 

in thrall to an UnAmerica.

Karen Olshansky lives in Marin County, California with her husband and a well fed Koi named Pickle Face. She writes poetry in order to maintain her sanity. Her work has appeared in The Literary Nest, Tuck magazine, The News Verse News and the anthologies Lingering in the Margins, Unsealing Our Secrets, and Unspoken.

THANK YOU, STORMY

by Peggy Turnbull 

You know how to manage power,
dressing like an offensive weapon,
steering through men, creating
a wake where dicks stir, leers creep,
implanting images
into strangers’ wet dreams,
your iconic self melting
into unknown imaginations,

smiling to evoke volt-filled fun,
teasing that leads to a luxe room
where naked Donald
awaits, stone-faced on the bed,
erection quivering beneath
the belly of his junk-food appetite,
a devilish abyss
gilded with pyrite,
where nature smokes, razed,
all gentleness cropped
like a mountaintop.

Grimacing, you absorb
his distilled contaminants.
Sorrowful angels
send you compassion.
A bouquet of cut roses
nods in recognition.
We all have bad days.

But the aftermath’s best.
You, refusing silence.


Peggy Turnbull lives in Wisconsin near Lake Michigan.  Her micro-chapbook Rocking Chair Abstract was  recently published by the Origami Poems Project.