PROFIT AND LOSS STATEMENT FOR MR. B.

by Steven Ratiner

 

“The Post needs to be a profitable enterprise that stands on its own two feet.  Let me tell you why. Because it’s a measure of its relevance.  If people won’t pay for our product, it’s not a good enough product.  It would be like poetry without rhyming, it’s too easy.” ––Jeff Bezos in an interview on CNBC reported by The New York Times, May 20, 2026

 

Too easy without rhyme?  Mr. B., I have news for you:

you’ve no understanding of the time that goes into

educating the tongue, cultivating the heart, so that words

might fly true to their destination, bearing the hard

 

truth of what’s required to be an actual human being in

our rancid/gilded age––where suffering’s a commodity

on the Stock Exchange, and all it takes is a few billion

in reserve to live gloriously without a thimbleful of pity

 

or the tonnage of regret.  News flash: your yacht’s run aground

on Circe’s island, as you quaff down cup after cup of kykeon

laced with nightshade, turning into swine along with your crew.

Ithaka can burn for all you care.  There’s no damned hope for you.

 

For what (another old poem) profit a man who gains the world but

loses his soul?  Such unspeakable waste.  What rhymes with that?

 

Steven Ratiner is the author of Grief's Apostrophe, published by Beltway Editions in 2025. He's also published three poetry chapbooks, a collection of poetry interviews, and appeared in several anthologies. His work has appeared in scores of journals in America and abroad, including Parnassus, Agni, Hanging Loose, Poet Lore, Salamander, Vox Populi, QRLS (Singapore), and Poetry Australia––and been translated into Mandarin, Spanish, Ukrainian, and Hebrew. He's also written poetry criticism for The Washington Post, The Christian Science Monitor, The San Francisco Chronicle, and other journals.  Giving Their Word—Conversations with Contemporary Poets was reissued in a paperback edition (University of Massachusetts Press).  He is Poet Laureate Emeritus for Arlington, Massachusetts, and was elected in 2024 as President of the New England Poetry Club, one of the oldest literary associations in America. Now, beginning its seventh year, his weekly Red Letter Poems features a diverse range of poets, from up-and-coming talents to some of the most important voices in contemporary poetry.

HOPE AND HISTORY RHYME

by Susannah Greenberg





Hope and history
stutter and gaffe.
Corruption and cruelty
point and laugh.

Then Joe rolls in
like Moses leaning on his staff,
sentence flows from sentence,
and then a paragraph.

He says so many dead,
and so many infected.
We deserve the truth.
We deserve to be protected.

Hope and history come together
when you need but don’t expect it.


Susannah Greenberg is an independent book publicist at Susannah Greenberg Public Relations.  

SHE BLEW IN ON LENTEN WINGS

a quarantine poem in four parts
by Jill Crainshaw

Painting M004351 from Life? or Theatre? by Charlotte Salomon at the Jewish Historical Museum.

I

she blew in on lenten winds
i think i’ll stay awhile
be your muse until this thing ends
her left eye winked a suspicious smile

you plan to stay awhile?
she tossed an ancient tweed jacket on a chair
looked at me with a smile
pushed back her fedora, twirled her hair

i eyed the tweed lounging careless on the chair
her costume convinced me—well, almost
the faded fedora, the uncontained wisps of hair
who are you? i smiled—a suspicious host

though her costume convinced me—almost
that she harbored dubious ends
who are you? i smiled—a guarded host
when strangers blow in on lenten winds

II

today i harvest the tomatoes i prayed for yesterday
she’s still here—says she’s a poet but i am unsure
no pen or paper, not much to say
she just watches me, smiles--a quaint saboteur

she’s still here--insists she’s a poet but i am unsure
what are you writing? i’d like to know
she just watches me, smiles—a quaint saboteur
who arrived uninvited, interrupting my flow

tell me again, what are you writing? i am eager to know
it’s not everyday a poet moves into my space
arrives uninvited, interrupts my flow
wearing a faded fedora and a dubious smile on her face

no, i’ve never had a poet move into my space
tell me—how can i rhyme your presence away?
because you are here uninvited, interrupting my flow
while i harvest summer tomatoes i prayed for yesterday

III

the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree
she waxed eloquent when i queried her work
i don’t know what she meant—she’s a shroud of mystery
and her presence here? a self-satisfied smirk

as she waxes eloquent when i query her work
which, if you must know, lacks reason and rhyme
and undermines her presence here, her self-satisfied smirk
what? is writing poetry considered a crime?

well, no—unless it lacks reason and rhyme
okay then—look at your hands, the lines in your face
i’m writing poetry right there and that can’t be a crime
we need to mark the moment—we need to leave a trace

she’s right—i see my hands, the lines in my face
a poem is emerging in the body of me
she’s writing it down; is that such a crime
when we know that the apple falls close to the tree?

IV

she blew in on lenten winds
brought with her a threadbare refrain
i never meant for us to be forever friends
but telling her to go has been in vain

she just keeps repeating her threadbare refrain
“you are dust; to dust you shall return”
and asking her to go has been in vain
her tweed’s still in the chair—no end to her sojourn

“we are dust; to dust we shall return”
she keeps saying—her eyes full of hope
just let me stay—expand my poetic sojourn
let’s rhyme our way together out of this weary worn out trope

she says it again—her eyes bright with hope
shining from beneath her fedora—her hope never ends
let’s rhyme ourselves away from this hackneyed hopeless trope
and see where we can travel if we follow different winds


Jill Crainshaw is an ordained minister in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) and a liturgical theology professor at Wake Forest University School of Divinity in Winston-Salem, North Carolina.