A STATION WAGON FULL OF NUNS

by Brian O’Sullivan

You can’t beat that in a court of law, a gray-
bearded lawyer said to Archie Bunker, citing 
a venerable adage of the bar, when Archie’s
whiplash suit ran afoul of just such
a station wagon. Those station wagon witnesses
were childless, one presumes, but they were not frivolous, 
in the culture’s eyes; instead, they were taken as models 
of probity. Who knows if that was correct? Maybe 
one of them had run a Magdalene laundry
before coming to Queens, or helped a predatory
priest cover his tracks while she wielded a ruler
to swat down unruly Queens kids. 
But maybe another gently slid a bowl 
of milk in front of a starving kitten, or gently 
held the hand of a single mother in labor. 
Maybe, in their station wagon, they were talking about
their service, and about the futures of the people whom 
they served. But now a senator tells us that 
the childless have no direct stake in the future. 
And I want to ask what happened to make 
him believe that we can only care about
that which belongs to us, and not about 
the station wagon to which we all belong.


"We are effectively run in this country via the Democrats, via our corporate oligarchs, by a bunch of childless cat ladies who are miserable at their own lives and the choices that they've made and so they want to make the rest of the country miserable too," Vance said. "How does it make any sense that we've turned our country over to people who don't really have a direct stake in it?" he asked.

Brian O'Sullivan teaches English at St. Mary's College of Maryland. His poems have been published at The New Verse News, Rattle, ONE ART, HOWL, and other journals. He is a reader for Chestnut Review.

COALS

by Elizabeth Johnston

Image source: DonkeyHotey

“[He] is being raked over the coals in the press right now. People are trying to destroy him”

—Glen Beck in “Witch Hunt: Bill O’Reilly Deserves the Benefit of the Doubt” 

“We will not be staked this time.” 

–Cari-Lee Miller, “Granddaughters”

Myth smokes with the corpses we’ve inherited,
simpering seventy-times-seven girls:
Gretel, escaping the oven to wrap arms around her dead-beat Dad.
Persephone in a singed bikini boarding the bus for Spring Break.
Corn-woman begging for the stake so bellies might be fed.

We are the granddaughters of the witches you burned
and our tongues won’t, anymore,
wrap around the lie:
            Once, Long Ago, Far Away

Like fugitives of Pompeii
we’ve borne the blistering surge,
been arrested mid-joy, fixed
to the earth for centuries, lain airless,
buried under soot, cocooned
our voices like fingers
cast in their clawing.

But go ahead, storytellers.  Rewrite.

Return to the scene shouldering your excuses like shovels,
dismissive as a pickaxe.
Fill the void with your plaster white,
your sight-seer-safe.
Stake your claim. Charge your fees.

There’s profit in bigotry, big money in violence.

Stand over the volcano’s mouth piece,
sermonize, ejaculate,
make your pithy sacrifice.

Never mind the ghosts
who sneak up from behind,
palms facing forward.


Elizabeth Johnston teaches writing, literature, and gender studies in Rochester, NY. A past contributor at TheNewVerse.News, her most recent work appears in The Atlantic, Feminist Formations, and The Boiler.

r > g

by Tim Kahl

French economist Thomas Piketty has spurned the Legion of Honour, the country’s highest distinction, on the grounds that the government should not decide who is honourable. Piketty, author of the bestselling Capital in the Twenty-First Century, which has become compulsory reading for world leaders, added: “They’d be better off concentrating on boosting growth in France and Europe.” --The Guardian, January 1, 2015

after Thomas Piketty

In the space between profit and economic rent

the wood of the forest grows to have a price placed

on it. Who is to pay for the license to gather it?

The owner comes to realize his land is earning more

than he is. He lines up a string of assets to

satisfy conditions for maintaining the wealth effect.

The rate of return on capital (r) is bigger in

the room than any of the tables and chairs,

the knives and forks, the working doors on cabinets.

Everyone sits down to eat and secretly they

are served by the incorrigible invisible hand

that has been replaced by the hand that grabs

and is giving the middle class the middle finger.

What is wealth doing now? No one seems to know.

It travels into safe crevices that are not

upset by light. It goes by the name of anonymous

and hypnosis. It is surreptitious and tries its best to

reinvest where its privilege won't be revealed.

If someone understands how to apply a tax to it, 

in just a moment it will melt again into the dark.

The amount of economic growth (g) measured

between the polar caps will always lag behind

the impact of a good amount of capital 

whose managerial class will rise to the apex

of steadfast vigilance. They shepherd funds

across the borders to come to peaceful rest 

in their blessed state of inheritance.

Work hard, play by the rules, and you get a stake

in the outcome. But that notion is so passé.

The holders of debt have foreclosed on the government.

Run for the hills and take your children with you.

Build a bunker. Get a gun. Are there any ideas that 

can prevail in this cynical age, in this grim era of discipline?

Tim Kahl is the author of Possessing Yourself (CW Books, 2009) and The Century of Travel (CW Books, 2012). His work has been published in Prairie Schooner, Mad Hatters' Review, Indiana Review, Metazen, Ninth Letter, Sein und Werden, Notre Dame Review, The Really System, Konundrum Engine Literary Magazine, The Journal, The Volta, Parthenon West Review, Caliban and many other journals in the U.S. He appears as Victor Schnickelfritz at the poetry and poetics blog The Great American Pinup and the poetry video blog Linebreak Studios. He is also editor of Bald Trickster Press and Clade Song. He is the vice president and events coordinator of The Sacramento Poetry Center. He also has a public installation in Sacramento {In Scarcity We Bare The Teeth}. He currently houses his father's literary estate—one volume: Robert Gerstmann's book of photos of Chile, 1932.