RISKY

by Colette Tennant

People walk past a crater from the explosion in Mira Avenue (Avenue of Peace) in Mariupol on March 13. (Evgeniy Maloletka/AP via The Washington Post, March 15, 2022)

streets filled with rubble,

a bombed maternity hospital, pregnant women

bloodied, lying on gurneys in a swirl of confusion,

Sasha, a baby goat with broken front legs,

trying to nurse a vet tech’s ear.

Her owner promised she’d return for her

because she loves her.

 

We watch the news from Ukraine –

refugees bundled against late-winter cold,

In between these stories, news channels

run commercials for various cures –

Nucala for severe asthma sounds great,

but it might cause shingles.

Trelegy treats COPD yet increases

the risk of thrush, pneumonia

and osteoporosis.

Farxiga, for chronic  kidney disease,

could lead to dehydration, fainting, weakness,

genital redness and swelling, and hypoglycemia. 

 

It’s a tricky balance,

the cure and its reaction, so

military experts sit with newscasters,

their hands folded on the studio table.

They discuss various scenarios

for how to help Ukraine, each one

peppered with what ifs.

One possible cure – establish a no-fly zone

unless Putin reacts with chemical weapons.

Supply warplanes to the Ukrainians,

order an airstrike on that 40-mile-long convoy,

but any of those moves might start World War III.

It’s a terrible quandary,

this war we watch between commercials –

trying to find a remedy for this devastation,

knowing the reaction may be awful.

 

Colette Tennant is an English professor living in Salem, Oregon. She has two books of poetry: Commotion of Wings, published by Main Street Rag, and Eden and After, published by Tebot Bach. Her most recent book, Religion in The Handmaid’s Tale: a Brief Guide, was published in September, 2019 to coincide with Atwood’s publication of The Testaments. Her poems have been nominated for the Pushcart Prize and have appeared in various journals, including Rattle, Prairie Schooner, Poetry Ireland Review, and Southern Poetry Review.

THE ELECTION DISTRACTION

by George Salamon

"As Colorado wildfires burn, fears that climate change is causing 'multi-level emergency' mount." Photo: Calista Morrill, walking with her dogs Lucy, in front and Ollie, not pictured, watches smoke from the East Troublesome fire become lit by the setting sun in Lyons on Oct. 21, 2020. At the time Morrill, who lives in Lyons, said she had packed her bags in case she needed to be evacuated for the CalWood Fire. —Denver Post, October 26, 2020

"The world both literally and figuratively is burning. The apocalyptic skies of the West Coast only make that sense more real, more threatening. The urgency of the moment is inescapable." —Gary Hooser, "On behalf of my grandchildren" (an open letter to Kamala Harris),  The Garden Island (Hawaii), October 6, 2020

Darkness did not crash down on us

Like thunder, it rolled over us like

The Santa Ana winds, made us sick.

The lingering illness robbed us of

Vision and spirit, smothered the sublime,

Allowed spreadsheets and lists,

Pollsters and pundits to take the place

Of the educated and wise, technology

And efficiency to banish morality and

Beauty from our permanent searching

And seeking and neglect the spaces

That nourished our desire for answers.

The winds are still blowing, but soon

Rivers may refuse to flow, grains refuse

To sprout and the dark of night will fall

On people who no longer know how

To make light.

George Salamon, like Gary Hooser, wants the current captain of our ship of state to return to real estate, but does not think that it will be enough to awaken the humanistic spirit that has gone from "at bay" to moribund in his lifetime.

THIRTEEN WAYS OF LOOKING AT THE MUELLER REPORT

by Elizabeth Johnston Ambrose

Cartoon by Steve Sack Star Tribune Jul 23, 2019

“We chose these words carefully, and the words speak for itself. The report is my testimony.” 

—Robert Mueller announcing his resignation at the DOJ, May 29, 2019

“I’m just going to leave it as it appears in the report.”

—Robert Mueller before the House Judiciary Committee, July 24, 2019

I

Among so many rapid-fired questions
The only obvious thing
is Mueller would prefer to refer us to the Mueller Report.


II

We are of three branches, broken
Like a felled tree
In which there caws the Mueller Report.


III

The Mueller Report spun in the extreme heat and tornados.
(no small part of climate change—but who cares?)


IV

A president and an attorney general
are one.
A Robert Mueller Testimony and a Robert Mueller Report
are one.


V

No one knew which parts to read first
The parts on collusion
Or the parts on obstruction
The Mueller Report in its entirety
Or just the CliffsNoted testimony.


VI

Pundits twittered
after the barbaric wait.
Whole sections of The Mueller Report
Crossed out.
The omissions
deduced in skittled sentence fragments
   An impeachable case?


VII

O dim subjects of T***pworld,
Why do you dream of singing canaries?
Do you not see how the Mueller Report
Hops all over you?


VIII

I know the difference
between careful words and testimony;
But I know, too,
That the Mueller Report is involved
In what I know.


IX

When Mueller flew the coop
It marked the end
Of many chattering hopes.


X

At the thought of The Mueller Report
steaming on a platter,
the frenzied mobs readied their forks.
Would they eat crow?


XI

The president rode over Washington
In a military parade.
Once, a fear pierced him,
In that he mistook
The shadow of his leaked Access Hollywood tape
For the Mueller Report.


XII

The President and his cronies are celebrating.
The Mueller Report must be flying south.


XIII

We’ve been waiting all year.
They are snowing us.
And we are going to be snowed.
The Mueller Report flapped
For 400 pages. Then nose-dived

            A cooked goose
            A mockingbird
            A raven cawing Never More.


Elizabeth Johnston Ambrose's work appears in The Atlantic, McSweeney's, TheNewVerse.News, The Weekly Humorist, The Satirist, The Belladonna, and many others.  She lives in Rochester, NY and is a founding member of Straw Mat Writers.  Twitter: @libbyjohnston74

TRUMPTY DUMPTY

by Catherine McGuire





Trumpty Dumpty sat on his wall,
Trumpty Dumpty looked on toward the fall.
“I’ve won their horse race, I’ve got my own men—
I’ll make America greatest again.”

Cheered by a racist, misogynist rabble,
Trumpty Dumpty struts and he babbles—
“It’s gonna be HUGE, cause everyone loves me.
I own the party; there’s no one above me.”

In the hallways of power, the leaders are shocked—
this kind of revolt should be easily blocked,
and yet Trump has smashed the establishment boys;
he can stoop even lower than the worst red state ploys.

And smug pundits claiming, “It could not happen here”
choke on their words and cry in their beers,
“It’s the death of conservatism! Horror of horrors!
If Trump becomes president, there’ll be no tomorrow!”

So now Trumpty Dumpty wants to be crowned;
wants the Bushes to grovel, Paul Ryan to bow down.
Though he thinks he has won this political bet,
Trumpty Dumpty may find elephants never forget.

And Trumpty Dumpty will find in the race,
most voters require at least some social grace.
Small-hand obsessions and childish tweets
show the orangest candidate can’t take the heat.

While the world looks in horror, while the world holds its breath,
the voters will choose if we pull back from the death
of what makes America historically best—
patience and kindness, tolerance, respect.

But that’s not up to Trumpty; that job’s up to us!
Enough with the rhetoric—it’s time to discuss
where we’re going with neighbors, we can and we will
back away from the hatred and turn down the shrill.

Find your opposite number, have a coffee or beer—
chat for an hour, unlearn your fear.
We live here together, and together must work
to uncover and vanquish the hatred that lurks

where people feeling unheard and under attack
blame their lost future on the Latin, the Black—
don’t put your trust in a strange orange man;
let’s bring our country together again.

Catherine McGuire is a writer and artist with a deep concern for ecology and our planet's future. Her first full length poetry book, Elegy for the 21st Century, will be published in October 2016 by FutureCycle Press.