WAR BREAKS OUT…

by Indran Amirthanayagam

Source: The Spectator

in every field, on every street,
booming, blooming, blasting, 
blathering, while fishmonger

and greengrocer, student
and priest, run home until
walls shudder and windows

crack and shrapnel rains
on the silver,  the cats,
the children, oh the children

bleeding and screaming.
What absolute lack of 
foresight, no bunkers, 

no caverns, no metro 
tunnels close by to wait 
until bombers and drones 

return to base, nowhere 
to hide. In the fields, 
farmer on a tractor, another 

with a hoe; tally ho, 
fellow, go now to your God. 
We the executioners

rule the skies. 
War did not break 
like a pimple

or rash
or pus-ridden
bacterial flesh.

A human being
ordered bombers
and bombs 

to launch. 
A human being, 
otherwise known 

as a  leader, 
a democrat,
of what’s otherwise 

seen as a democracy.
And by the way,
the State is me.

Cartoon by Ramón Díaz Yanes.

Indran Amirthanayagam has just published his translation of Kenia Cano’s Animal For The Eyes (Dialogos Books, 2025). Other recent publications include Seer (Hanging Loose Press) and The Runner's Almanac (Spuyten Duyvil). He is the translator of Origami: Selected Poems of Manuel Ulacia (Dialogos Books). Mad Hat Press published his love song to Haiti: Powèt Nan Pò A (Poet of the Port). Ten Thousand Steps Against the Tyrant (BroadstoneBooks) is a collection of Indran's poems. He edits The Beltway Poetry Quarterly and helps curate Ablucionistas. He hosts the Poetry Channel on YouTube and publishes poetry books with Sara Cahill Marron at Beltway Editions.

PIETA

by Kay White Drew

for Women’s History Month

To the women in the Vietnam memorial:
One of you holds the dying soldier, one hand
to his chest. One hand, not two. You seem to know
he is beyond CPR, past the point where
anything can save him. The new volunteer
who crouches behind you, stricken,
in her fresh fatigues and boonie hat, must
know this too, green as she is. Your hand rests
on his shrapnel-filled chest not to rescue,
but to comfort, to say, “You’re not alone.”
Your sister-in-arms who’s become
the best friend you’ll ever have,
lays her hand along your arm
for mutual comfort and support
as she calls for help out of habit
in her resonant voice. To a compatriot:
“Need a doctor over here!” To the universe:
“Enough! For the love of God, enough!”

In a time when petty tyrants rewrite
history to suit their bigotry, your granite
tableau stands solid in resistance.

Kay White Drew is a retired physician whose poems appear in various anthologies and internet outlets including The New Verse News. She’s also published short stories and several essays, one of which was nominated for a Pushcart Prize, and a memoir, Stress Test. She lives in Rockville, MD with her husband. Spending time in nature helps her stay sane in these difficult days.

STATISTIC

by Howie Good

After six years of war in Yemen, it looks like the world’s worst humanitarian crisis is being forgotten and treated with indifference. —Atlantic Council, September 17, 2020. Photo: Burying a child who was killed in an airstrike in Sana, Yemen, in 2017. Credit: Yahya Arhab/European Pressphoto Agency via The New York Times, September 16, 2020.

A boy lies sprawled

by the edge of the road,

his chest torn open

by a chunk of shrapnel.

You could see his heart beating

if you bothered to look. 

Howie Good is the author of The Death Row Shuffle, forthcoming from Finishing Line Press.

BAZAAR

by Janice D. Soderling

At least 19 people have been killed and several injured by a bomb strapped to a girl reported to be aged about 10 in north-eastern Nigeria.—BBC News, January 10, 2015. Photo: NY Daily News

Weep, weep, weep,
for small fishes in the bay
caught in nets of intricate knots
where they only came to play.

Let fall a tear for hedgehogs
caught in a guileless snare;
duped by an innocent carrot,
and hoisted in the air.

Past cinnamon and saffron,
she glides with modest grace;
bundled nails and shrapnel,
brief inches from her face.

Weep, weep, weep,
for humankind's tragic flaw:
it feeds its tender brethren
into godhood's dimpled maw.


Janice D. Soderling is a previous contributor to The New Verse News.

WAR

by James Bettendorf

“Suffer the Children” by Janice Nabors Raiteri (2007)

I cannot see the sun rise
            red white yellow horizon
                        I see blood of children
                        form rivers in the streets.

I cannot hear the muted moans of lovers
            passion arms legs tangle
                        I hear keening of mothers
                        Sons, daughters ripped from their arms.

I cannot taste the melon or berry
            sweetness tongue juice chin
                        only the dry residue of lead
                        cannon smoke clouding my face.

I cannot smell the aroma of lilacs
            roses garden blues lilies
                        only the acrid cordite of gunpowder
                        copper odor of innocent blood.

I cannot feel warm breath on my cheek
children grandchildren friends lover
                        only the sharp pain of shrapnel
                        tearing holes, shattering bones.


James Bettendorf taught math for 34 years at various levels and in his retirement begin writing classes at the Loft in Minneapolis, MN. He was accepted for a two-year poetry internship in the Loft Master Track program in 2006 and has been working on a manuscript with his mentor/advisor, Thomas R. Smith.  He has had poems published in Rockhurst Review, Light Quarterly, Ottertail Review, Talking Stick Vols. 18 - 23 and Free Verse.