COVID LARGESSE

by Ed Ahern

Aesop got it wrong.

Or at least incomplete.

This life-long ant realizes

some of my money will outlive me.

And here comes a Covid check.

More for the kids? Not likely.

But how to best squander it?

I’m too old for expensive vices,

and already giving things away.

Spas and salons are wasted

on a wrinkled, bald man.

What’s left is geriatric dissipation.

Grasshopper trips and meals,

shows and concerts,

gorged on at sedate pace,

with lessened senses and focus

and an age restricted diet.

 

Ed Ahern resumed writing after forty odd years in foreign intelligence and international sales. He’s had over three hundred stories and poems published so far, and six books. Ed works the other side of writing at Bewildering Stories, where he sits on the review board and manages a posse of six review editors.

SCREWGED

by Shelly Blankman

‘Tis the night before Christmas

and all through the House,

where the reps were so hopeful,

the Senate’s a louse.

T***p kills funds to feed families

as long food lines grow. 

Our incomes are shriveling

while his own funds flow.

The White House is lit 

with bright colors galore 

while suffering lingers

among the Black, Brown, and poor.

Small businesses are dying

while T***p continues to tweet

months after numbers 

clearly show his defeat. 

Not one single tweet 

about the sick and the dead

Medics, now heroes.

Hospitals now out of beds.

He pardons the thugs,

the rich white and male,

because white lives matter

while Blacks linger in jail.

He’s neglected the needs

he was sworn to protect.

In the end those he cared about

were extremely select. 

So Merry Christmas to all,

And to all a good night.

May next year be better

with T***p out of sight!

Shelly Blankman lives in Columbia, Maryland. She is author of Pumpkinhead, a collection of her poetry, printed for her as a surprise by her two sons, Richard and Joshua, currently quarantined in New York and Texas, respectively. Shelly's poetry has been published in a number of journals, including First Literary Review, The Ekphrastic Review, Halfway Down the Stairs, and Verse-Virtual.