EXTREME WEATHER REPORTS FOR THE 21ST CENTURY

by Melissa Balmain

“Shouldn’t we name extreme weather events after those contributing most to them? … Last hurricane season, a regular reader… suggested that hurricanes should not be named after random humans, but corporate brand names—specifically those [polluters] that have contributed most to the intensification of extreme weather.”
—Erik Assadourian and Esther Phillips, on Medium

Hurricane Exxon—from Maine down to Mass.—
appears, as we feared, to be hitting the gas.

Macroburst Google is knocking down birches
and churches as rescues lag far behind searches.

Bomb-cyclone Bezos refuses to stop
until it has flattened each mom and each pop.

Superstorm Congress? Crews strive to repair
the damage it’s done with its surging hot air.

And everywhere, Trumpulus clouds keep on raining
fresh plagues on the heads of whoever’s remaining.

AI-generated graphic by NightCafé for The New Verse News.

Melissa Balmain edits Light, North America's longest-running journal of comic verse. Her latest book of poetry is Satan Talks to His Therapist (Paul Dry Books).

LOST HIGHWAY

by Steven Kent

It will not be an easy process [to rename streets called after Prince Andrew]. Details on residents’ bank accounts, credit cards, driving licenses, utility bills, property deeds, even pet microchips, will have to change, as will business letterheads and cards. —The Guardian, November 29, 2025

The cost is high to change a roadway's name,

But those which honor Andy (some now claim)

Should be rechristened, each and every mile,

To spare us walking single-pedophile.

Steven Kent is the poetic alter ego of writer and musician Kent Burnside. His work appears in 251, Asses of Parnassus, The Dirigible Balloon, Light, Lighten Up Online, The Lyric, New Verse News, The Orchards Poetry Journal, Philosophy Now, The Pierian, Pulsebeat Poetry Journal, The Road Not Taken: A Journal of Formal Poetry, Snakeskin, and Well Read. His collections I Tried (And Other Poems, Too) (2023) and Home at Last (2025) are published by Kelsay Books.