3 VERY GOOD YOUNG POOR

by Mickey J. Corrigan

Justice Department under scrutiny for revealing victim info and concealing possible enablers in Epstein files...

     In a 2018 email to Epstein, another redacted individual wrote: “I found at least 3 very good young poor.” 

     “Meet this one,” the person continued. “Not the beauty queen but we both likes her a lot.” 

     —CNN, February 5, 2026

The redacted
they culled
they hawked
they bartered
girls not women
sucked in a nightmare
too young to grasp
escape, recover
now women not girls
faces splashed online
names and nudes
abusers hidden
blacked out shame
very good young poor
splashed in full
nothing on, nothing
protecting them 
from bad old rich
powerful driven
to use, abuse, lie 
in other countries
powerful men
lose positions 
power, face
while in the US
very good girls
young poor
sucked in
spit out
while the machine 
of money, power, abuse
drives on, on
the system as is
only winners winning

Originally from Boston, Mickey J. Corrigan hides out in the lush ruins of South Florida. Salt Publishing in the UK released Project XX, a satirical novel about a school shooting. Bloodhound Books UK published What I Did For Love, a spoof of the classic Lolita. Poetry has been published in literary journals, chapbooks, and collections.

BEFORE EARTH IS LOST

by George Salamon

“In Conclusion” by Peter Kuper at The Nib

"Humans have become as great an influence on the planet as the asteroid that wiped out the dinosaurs," Anthony Barnosky, Stanford University biologist, quoted in The New York Times, July 30, 2021

Paradise was lost long ago,

now it's the turn of Earth,

where humans have assumed

privileges and rights for themselves:

this island belongs to us, one

nation claims, another the right

to inhabit space.

We're mammals, denying the

prehistory of our origins, the

story of how our ancestors

turned the earth's jungles into

today's fortress of machine

and stone.

We've moved too quickly past

the awe for earth's order, left

behind in the wild, playful

nature of the child, now that 

we are beginning to feel the

coming storm.

George Salamon lives and waits, hoping for the best, in St. Louis, MO.

DRONES

by Stew Jorgenson




The streets are pink with mud.
Too many people unfriended.
There's a bear shaking the tree.
The hive is pissed off.
It's hard to find peace of mind
in this culture war.
Everyone's buzzing to the sound
of other people's mad noise.  
Take a deep breath.
A little pepper spray
goes a long way,
up close and in your face.
We rage at the machine
but we are the machine.
Just one black swan away
from a social meltdown
of 2nd amendment proportions.
This is your complacency
wake-up call America.
The bees are dying.
Our democracy is stale.
It's a colony collapse disorder.
We like to wave our flags
until everyone tears up
and gets stupid.
Nothing gets done,
but it feels good
to blow off a little steam and
take credit for throwing a hissy fit,
like in the cold war comedy
The Russians Are Coming
where people panic,
the whole town is in an uproar,
mob mentality takes over,
no one listens to reason, and
Jonathan Winters is imploring people,
"We've got to get organized!"
Only this time it isn’t funny.

Stew Jorgenson is a part-time wordsmith who has more words than he knows what to do with each day.  Sometimes he uses the extras for poetry, celestial navigation, or target practice.  He has worked on farms, fishing boats, and in factories.  He is currently employed as a freelance muse wrestler.  He's skilled at mistakes, guilty by association, and suffers from occasional bouts of inspiration.

STOPWATCH MEDICINE

by E.F. Schraeder

Image source: Kikim Media

By the time I sat down I was
exhausted from my last patient.
Fifteen people a day

deserve full attention. 
Fifteen minutes
per consult.  Period. 

Sorry I kept you waiting, I say,
but look at her: perched
on that flat table beneath

a thin paper shroud, brown eyes pleading,
really? like a trapped field mouse.
She says nothing.  Good.

Don’t accept it, the thing
this medicine machine turns us
into greedy little monsters.


E.F. Schraeder's creative work has appeared or is forthcoming in Corvus Magazine, New Verse News, Five Poetry,  and elsewhere. Her chapbook, The Hunger Tree, was a semifinalist in the New Women's Voices series at Finishing Line Press and is forthcoming in summer 2013.