JUST LINES

by Billy Easton

The UN General Assembly has voted to replace the traditional world map with one that more accurately reflects the size of Africa… The US was the only nation to vote against it—while there were six abstentions. —BBC, September 5, 2026

My teacher would pull down the whole world—

a big map at the front of the room.

Greenland, at the top, jumped out

as big as Africa.

 

But it’s not. 14 Greenlands fit inside Africa. 

 

So now, one hundred sixty-four of the United Nations voted 

to set the lines right. 

Only one voted NO. 

Because, they said, changing the map 

was superfluous, cognitive justice, 

they want to focus on genuine problems,

take the Gulf of Mexico or Lake Ontario. 

Take Greenland. Take it. 

 

That one country of NO stood to lose 45 percent of their landmass—

on paper.  And Greenland, no longer so huge,

the size of a single African nation—not as desirable 

for groping hands, engorged ego. 

 

So much surface ceded to Africa—in pen and ink.

No reparations checks, just a reality check. 

Imaginations, cognitions unchecked.                                                 

Just lines on a page.

Just                  lines.

 Just. 

Billy Easton took up poetry after retiring to Portugal following decades of organizing for social justice in the USA. He’s published in: Made from Midnight: A Requiem, The Dissident Voice and, forthcoming, Writers Resist.

ASSYMETRICAL WAR

by Paul Burgess

 

Cartoon by NICK ANDERSON @andertoon.bsky.social

They’re hoping schools won’t rain as rubble showers
resulting from an errant missile strike. 
I can’t afford the drive to see the flowers 
around the gorge I’d waited months to hike. 
They fear they’ll find their children split in half 
or buried under shrapnel, dust, and rocks. 
I’m scared the jagged line upon a graph 
will show decreasing values of my stocks. 
Their sky’s become an endless sea of threats 
erupting with the sights and sounds of war,
but over here, we’re making mobile bets 
on every prop the market’s apps can score. 
There’s something vaguely troubling, sad, and dark 
about an age of gulfs so deep and stark.


Paul Burgess is the sole proprietor of a business in Lexington, Kentucky that offers ESL classes in addition to English, Japanese, and Spanish-language translation and interpretation services. He has recently contributed work to The Road Not Taken, Blue Unicorn, Light, The Orchards, Snakeskin, The Ekphrastic Review, and several other publications. 

DOES THE SUN RISE (FOR ME)?

by Indran Amirthanayagam

Does the Sun rise 

for me? Or if not 

for me, does it rise

for my brother,  

for my sister?

What about

the sun rising

over Tehran

or Gaza,

London,

or Doha?.

Does the sun

rise for me?

Who is 

my brother?

Who is 

my sister,

the mother

wailing beside

the rubble

of the school,

her girls

bombed

to bits?

Does the Sun 

rise anyway

over killing fields?

Does it rise

over our bodies

thrashing 

in the dark?

Does it rise

exposing

the open 

grave?

Does it rise

helping plants 

to bloom?

Does it rise

whether

we live 

or die?

Indran Amirthanayagam writes a Substack. He has just published Isla itinerante ( Editorial Apogeo, Peru, 2025) and White Space Sonnets ( Sarasavi publishers, Sri Lanka, 2025). His other publications include El bosque de deleites fratricidas ( RIL Editores), Seer (Hanging Loose Press),The Runner's Almanac (Spuyten Duyvil), Powèt Nan Pò A: Poet of the Port (Mad Hat), and Ten Thousand Steps Against the Tyrant (Broadstone Books). He is the translator of Kenia Cano’s Animal For The Eyes (Dialogos Books) and Origami: Selected Poems of Manuel Ulacia (Dialogos Books). He edits The Beltway Poetry Quarterly, hosts the Poetry Channel on YouTube, and publishes poetry books with Sara Cahill Marron at Beltway Editions.

THE OBLITERATOR

by Steve Rodriguez

"Supreme Leaders" by Nick Anderson

President Donald Trump has put the United States on the verge of war against Iran with the goal of ending that nation’s nuclear weapons program, less than eight months after proclaiming he had “completely and totally obliterated” that same program. —HuffPost, February 20, 2026

Back in ’71, during the spring semester of sophomore 
year, after receiving a long streak of D’s and F’s,
my geometry teacher surprises me with a quiz grade
of C+. I read the comment “good job” and for
one second revert to being a humble twerp,
suddenly contrite about previously 
disregarding each of his homework assignments.
 
Then that second passes, and I once again act
out the more familiar role of arrogant jock. 
From my seat, I shout out “Good job? Ha!  Admit it,
old man. I totally obliterated that loser quiz.” 
The bell rings.  As my fellow students depart,
I loudly repeat my point…“OBLITERATION.”  
 
Mr. Prebbles—a low IQ dope who closely
resembles one of Nixon’s crewcut aides—smiles
and responds with “I trust you have turned over
a new leaf, and that studying becomes a habit.”
I toss the quiz on his desk and demand he cross 
out the words “Good job” and replace them with something
 
like “You quite simply obliterated this quiz,”
and that the o-word be underlined with glitter. 
After mentioning the obvious—that high school 
teachers don’t stock such primary grade art supplies–
he shakes his head and asks me to leave the classroom.  
 
Later in fifth period, my English teacher  
smiles and refers to teacher lounge banter
mocking my awkward use of “hyperbole”
in math class. I tell her, “You’re no Shakespeare,” 
and that I alone will judge what is “hyperbole” 
and what can be deemed as “obliteration.”  
Miss Jones chuckles and seems to dismiss me 
as if she is both Funk and Wagnalls.
 
Not until much later in the afternoon do
I gain more clarity on the fine nuance
of language. While attempting to pitch my baseball
team to victory, I am overwhelmed by our
cross-town rivals who decide to tee off
on both my fastballs and curves, scoring ten runs in
two innings before Coach Funk yanks me away from
the mound. Yes, me!  Ace of the staff. Later, as we
 
suffer from a fifteen-run differential, and 
I am sitting disconsolate on the bench, Funk
offers me an assessment. “The last time someone 
got hit that hard was the day my B-17 
squadron obliterated Dusseldorf.” I nod,
reverting once again to that quiet, modest, 
humble self before retorting, “‘Obliterated’
may be too harsh a word.”  He snaps back, 
“Obliteration means to utterly destroy
 
or remove. From the Latin oblitteratus,
which refers to blotting out or erasing.”
Sure enough, that happens to be the last time I
pitch during my junior year. The coach finds ways
to keep me off the field. I am erased. 
Wiped off the map. Obliterated, so to speak. 
 
In the meantime, we win every remaining game 
while becoming league champions. Still, this account
is far from a lesson in adolescent humility. 
Later that summer, I devise a wicked pitch—
a breaking ball I term “The Obliterator.” 
So effective!  And I alone decide how much so.   
 

Steve Rodriguez is a retired U.S. Marine Corps officer and a retired high school English teacher. He resides in San Diego, CA.  

FOR THE WATCHERS

by Greg Watson

 

 

Driving my daughter to school this morning, circling the block past the long line of buses, we notice again the parents and neighbors who now stand watch on each corner, braving the sub-zero St. Paul air like half-frozen shepherds, red hearts stitched to their bright yellow vests. Some wave, some sway from side to side in puffy down jackets and snowsuits, silver whistles dangling, as if this were a dance with music only they could hear. "I'm glad they're here," my daughter says. "But I wish they didn't have to be." I nod in agreement. I miss the fourth grade crossing guards, their orange plastic flags waving up and down in sync, laughing with each other, looking each way twice. Though they have not disappeared as the others have—Amalia, Valentina, Angeles, Santiago, Liam, Diego—stolen and flown by secrecy of night to a windowless room thirteen hundred miles away. Stolen by those who call themselves the law. Last night my daughter stayed up past bedtime reading a book about the Montana grizzly attacks of 1967. I asked if was too scary, too intense, and whether it might give her nightmares. "No," she said evenly, "wild animals don't scare me, or natural disasters. Only people sometimes. Only people."

Greg Watson's work has been featured in numerous literary journals and anthologies, and has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net. He is the author of eleven collections of poetry, most recently Stars Unseen (Holy Cow! Press). He is also co-editor of The Road by Heart: Poems of Fatherhood (Nodin Press). His forthcoming collection, The Shape of Your Absence, will be published by One Subject Press in April. 

TO THE REPUBLIC

by Athena Kildegaard

It is hard, right now, to think

of America, my country, it no longer
holds together inside its borders. 
Four decades ago, every school day, 
I asked one of the twelve-year-olds
in my charge to lead us in the Pledge
of Allegiance. It was the law, this recital.
As good a way as any, I thought, to begin.
Words, words, slippery as jello cubes,
hardly join, now, to anything real.
My heart beats, my hand firms itself
to my chest—this friction, this viva—
but my tongue dare not lift, my lips
not open, my body not burst
with air, with light. America, where
have you gone?

You are in Minneapolis,
America, handing out scarves and hats,
standing beside your neighbors, lifting
whistles to your lips because your lips
have power, your breath has power,
you are teaching us how to be Americans.

Athena Kildegaard is the author of six books of poetry, most recently Prairie Midden (Tinderbox Editions), winner of the WILLA Literary Award. 

IF THIS IS THE POEM YOU READ WHEN I'VE BEEN MURDERED BY ICE

by Hailey Elles

Cartoon by Dennis Goris.

This is survival. 

My friend says 

“we are at war

with our government.”

We also discuss

her new winter boots, 

which hold snugly 

as she walks her dog, 

clipping her prophecies 

and beaming them to me. 

This disjointed 

correspondence

is how she is with me 

as my studded tires grip 

these switchbacks 

like a prayer– 

I am praying 

there will be no children

waiting by the doors 

of the middle school 

I was supposed to open 

five minutes ago–oh, 

I am tired. It is not possible 

to go faster. And anyway, 

every tree is sparkling 

on this cold morning, 

almost invisible 

against the sunrise, 

as red as the drag in blood-

shot eyes. All the plowmen 

are out, salting the roads,

trying to preserve any

beautiful, useful thing.

Hailey Elles is a writer, teacher, and literacy organizer who lives in Bridgewater, Vermont. She has a masters in secondary English education and is currently pursuing a masters in English as a Breadloaf Teacher Network Fellow at Middlebury College. Her writing has appeared in various journals and publications, most recently in Half and One, the BLTN Journal, and Poet's Choice.

SCHOOL WELLNESS TIPS

by Andrew G. Scott

Here’s a hack

from the school counselor

to stay positive this year.

“Include personal wellness goals

in your passwords.”

Great idea.

DoNotGetShotInSchool26!

Andrew G. Scott is a pen name for a public school teacher who has decided to share an inside view of public education in the United States.

MASS SHOOTING #8

600 block of Jackson Ave., Muskegon, MI, Dec 6, 2025

“2 people dead, three others, including child, injured in Muskegon shooting”

by Ron Riekki

“Sure, this world is full of trouble

I ain't said it ain't.”

—Douglas Malloch, “It’s Fine Today”

They say there are 200 different words for snow

in the Sámi language, like the northern Sámi

 

vahtsa, which is new snow on old snow, which

now is the case, driving a rented car on plowed

road, but then turning onto the street of our latest

 

mass shooting in Michigan and instantly it’s

unplowed, so thick with snow that it scrapes

 

the bottom of the vehicle, yet ice on the tires

so that the car swerves back and forth, with

a realization that I can’t stop, so I drive by

 

a house with caution tape lying in snow, but

it doesn’t look like the photos or videos online

 

of where the shooting happened and I wonder

if it’s another incident, especially since this city—

Muskegon, Michigan—has been plagued with

 

a dozen shootings: 9mm and Glock and “AR-

style rifle” and “stolen pistol” and “handguns”

 

and another shooting on the 1400 block of

Gyrock and a “19-year-old has been arraigned”

and nine killed and eleven injured in Muskegon

 

this year alone, a population of 38,000, and it’s

26 degrees with the wind chill, two months since

 

the last mass shooting; and a Democrat online

tells me it’s due to the cold, and someone else

online says it’s due to astrology, wants to know

 

the alignment of the stars, and I stare at the home

I think where the shooting happened, but I can’t

 

stop, the street empty, absolutely nobody outside,

and the house where it happened looks dead, no

lights on inside, but, later, down the street, I see

 

a window with bright white Christmas decorations,

a snow-colored fake tree elegant in the window,

 

and I swing the car around once there’s plowed

road and go down it again, still not able to stop,

still swerving, windows down, the cold frowning

 

into the car, a church nearby unplowed as well

as if no human has been down this street since

 

the shooting, the feel of abandonment, how that

tends to be the feeling of so many of these sites

of shooting, and I stop at a shop, a garage, closed

 

for the night, a large sign saying BLOOD’S all

in red, all in caps, such an odd name for a “front

 

end clinic,” the address 13-something, and

the building bone-colored; getting my bearings,

I drive, looking for anyone to talk to, but all

 

is winter-quiet, a worker stepping out of a back

exit of a restaurant, wiping sweat off his fore-

 

head with his sleeve, his breath visible, and

then, amidst all these closed stores: a liquor

store, how so many of these mass shootings

 

are near liquor stores and churches, parks

and cannabis dispensaries. A 4-year-old

 

was shot at this mass shooting. A 22-year-

old woman and 25-year-old man killed.

A worker throws out piles of cardboard

 

into a dumpster—no recycling—massive

letters of SAM’S DRINK ALL on the store,

 

such a bizarre name, like a command, and

the worker tells me he has no thoughts on

the shooting, doesn’t want to talk about

 

the shooting, doesn’t want me going into

the store, calls and confirms that I am not

 

allowed into the store, but then teenagers

walk into the liquor store and there seems

to be no problem with this. Seeing two

 

children alone in a car, the mother later

emerging from inside. I talk with a 14-

 

year-old who wanders up, says that his

birthday is tomorrow. He’s with a friend.

I ask how we stop gun violence, if they

 

heard about the shooting. They tell me

they know there’ve been shootings. How

 

do we stop them? One of them walks

away, into the store.  The 14-year-old

remains, saying it’s “parenting” and

 

"finances," that “it gets harder every year,”

that people sell drugs to survive. I ask

 

how he’s avoided it: “work and school

and sports.” Football.  Behind him,

the words liquor – beer – wine – lotto.

 

These liquor stores near mass shootings,

always so busy. The 14-year-old goes inside.

Ron Riekki co-edited Undocumented: Great Lakes Poets Laureate on Social Justice.

COLUMBIA, THE GEM OF THE CENSORS

by Felicia Nimue Ackerman

“The Thinker” on Columbia’s campus. Photo by Jason Zhao at Unsplash.

Academia Confronts a Watershed Moment at Columbia, and the Right Revels. Threatened with losing $400 million in federal funding, the university agreed to overhaul its protest policies and security practices. —The New York Times, March 22, 2025

Seeing all the force you wield,
Thinking we had better yield,
Letting politicians rule,
Why pretend we're still a school?

Felicia Nimue Ackerman is a professor of philosophy at Brown University and has around 335 poems in places including American Atheist, The American Scholar, Better Than Starbucks, The Boston Globe, The Chronicle of Higher Education, Down in the Dirt, The Emily Dickinson International Society Bulletin, Free Inquiry, Light Poetry Magazine, Lighten Up Online, The Los Angeles Times, The New York Daily News, The New York Times, Options (Rhode Island's LGBTQ+ magazine), Politics/Letters, The Providence Journal, Scientific American, Sparks of Calliope, Time Magazine, The Wall Street Journal, and Your Daily Poem. She has also had eleven previous poems in The New Verse News.

DIDN’T COME TO SCHOOL TODAY

by Shawn Reagan

Demonstrators hold a rally and march to protest a recent increase of activity in the area by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents on February 01, 2025 in Waukegan, Illinois. Scott Olson/Getty Images via ABC News.

I don't know why Lorenzo      didn't come to school today. 

Just as he didn't       present his project yesterday.

So much unknown      so easy to lose track of days. 

So, I hold to what I know.       I remain resolute. 

I know when gesture      is really Nazi salute.

I know the smell      of new school fascista.

I know it's winter      and there's ICE on the streets. 

and 

I know Lorenzo      didn't come to school today. 

Authors note: I am a teacher with many immigrant students. After Trump’s inauguration, ICE vehicles and agents began appearing on our city streets. Many of my Hispanic students had to stay home from school at this time. They were often the only members of their family who could speak English in case of a knock at the door. While the students have now returned, the fear remains.

Shawn Reagan is a poet, teacher, and husband from Minnesota. A sleeping giant of the poetic world, his work is currently focused on life with bipolar 2 and depression. He was shortlisted for the 2024 Tadpole Press Poetry Prize.

TRANS FATS

by Chris Kaiser

This is not a real book. Its cover has been A-I generated at Shutterstock by The New Verse News to accompany this poem.

Trump falsely claims children being forced into gender transition ops at school in rambling fantasy-filled rally speech. —The Independent, September 9, 2024

I sent my boy to his fifth grade class 

and he returned a girl, 

apparently operated on by the school nurse,

without our permission, 

just like Trump predicted. 

The school also confiscated his backpack 

(or her backpack? I’m not sure. 

It was easier to imagine others 

with this woke problem). 

In his—ok, wait here while I ask 

my previous son what pronoun to use. 

He said she wants to play 

with his sister’s dolls, 

while she said he wants an operation too. 

I’m confused. 

And then my wife mentioned polyamory,

and I said, we already store our guns 

in more than one bunker. 

The book they confiscated from my son’s — 

wait here—

“Terry!” 

He said she wants to spell her name with an ‘i’.

The book they confiscated from Terri’s backpack was

“Trans Fats: The Real Story,”

which the school librarian, 

who moonlights as the science teacher, 

thought was about fat boys transitioning 

into skinny girls, 

and vice reversa. 

Though Trump railed against 

these secret surgeries as if they’re evil incarnate, 

I’m not so sure. 

Terri has since won All State 

in her youth softball league

and her sister is on track to win gold 

in boy’s figure skating.

Chris Kaiser’s poetry has appeared in Rattle, Eastern Iowa Review, Dissident Voice, Better Than Starbucks, and The Scriblerus, as well as in anthologies from Moonstone Press. His poetry also appeared in Action Moves People United, a music and spoken word project partnered with the United Nations.