TWO QUATRAINS

I’ll Take a Shot at It
by Rick Mullin

“For all of the money we are spending, NASA should NOT be talking about going to the Moon — We did that 50 years ago,” Trump said on Twitter. “They should be focused on the much bigger things we are doing, including Mars (of which the Moon is a part), Defense and Science!” —The Washington Post, June 7, 2019

The president speaks of supply chain enhancements:
When Exxon connects all the parts,
We won’t know precisely just where the moon ends
And where the new Mars venture starts.


Rick Mullin's newest poetry collection is Lullaby and Wheel.


A Marriage Made In Hog Heaven
by George Salamon

"Once a book-selling giant, Barnes & Noble sold to hedge fund.” —Crain’s New York, June 7, 2019

You want my books,
I like your money,
This looks like a transaction
Breeding mutual satisfaction.

George Salamon used to buy lots of books at Barnes & Noble, but has never been inside a hedge fund.

BREAD AND CIRCUSES 2014

by George Salamon

Charities are being run by for-profit financial firms. And take our most prestigious universities. It's become an oft-repeated argument that they have become hedge funds with tax-exempt colleges attached. --Jesse Eisinger, ProPublica, Dec. 10, 2014

Nothing is sacred, all is corrupted
From giving to learning
Wall Street money and
Corporate voices
Confer commands.
A people once free and proud
Has been bought and sold,
Hired and fired, outsourced,
Downsized and rightsized,
Sliced up like a salami.
His knife, he attacks with
"Sharklike intensity."
His smile is dazzling.
He's got our bread
And we are his circuses.


George Salamon taught at several East Coast  colleges, worked as a business journalist and editor, and now contributes regularly to the Gateway Journalism Review, Jewish Currents and The New Verse News from St. Louis, MO.