MMX

Poem by Charles Frederickson; Graphic by Saknarin Chinayote

Year of tamed housebroken Tiger
Losing marriage top ranking endorsements
Iconic image luminosity aura eclipsed
Focused Nadal gaining rose-pink spot

Pissed off Wiki-Leaks wet dreams
Soiled slitted sheets shat upon
Julian Assanger exposing topless XS-rated
Inhouse – outhouse cables secreting double-dip-lunacy

Hi-lites footie’s cosmic champ Spain
Jump-starting enlightened Dark Continent ’s Afreakonomy
Aung San Suu Kyi unarrested
Liu Xiaobo’s Nobel Green NV

Bye-buy Dubai blunder to asunder
Burj Khalifa tallest manmade erection
Devastating Haiti Chile China earthquakes
Oily greed volcanic ash holes

2011 Year of White Rabbit
How’s Wonderland Mad Hatter 4D
Twilight Twitter vampires flexing absolutes
Gaga Google I-tube Blackberry Yahoos

Collaborative up-stARTISTS Charles Frederickson and Saknarin Chinayote have created more than a thousand colorful hand-drawn, colorful e-gadfly etchings. Art gallery exhibits can be accessed in the archives of Ascent Aspirations, Listen and Be Heard, New Verse News, Poetry Cemetery and Avant-Garde Times. Published covers and graphics artwork have appeared in Dance to Death, Decanto, Eclipse, Poetry Sz and Taj Mahal Review.
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BLOODLINES

by Phyllis Wax


The old guy with his long white beard
has nothing to teach
his baby-faced replacement.

The child doesn’t need lessons    
in how to continue the journey
from war to war, from cruelty
to torture. It’s in his genes,
part of his DNA.


Phyllis Wax keeps up with the news in Milwaukee, WI, where she also muses on the prospects for the future.  Her poetry has appeared in or is forthcoming from Your Daily Poem, Wisconsin Poets' Calendar, Ars Medica, Out of Line, Verse Wisconsin, Seeding the Snow, A Prairie Journal, The New Verse News and many other journals and anthologies. 
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DISAPPEARED IN PLAIN SIGHT

by Buff Whitman-Bradley

Undocumented poem

This poem has traveled a thousand miles

And risked its life to get here

Now it waits on the corner hoping

That someone driving by will offer it work

Homeless poem

When the cops see this poem in greasy fatigues

Sleeping in an alley

They roust it out of its cardboard shelter

Jab it in the ribs and tell it to move on

Jobless poem

This poem asked to use the toilet

Once too often during its 16-hour shift

And was fired from its job

Making $150 jeans for $2 a day

Indigenous poem

The reason this poem is lying

Beheaded in a ditch next to its murdered infant

Is that it refused to vacate its ancestral land

To make way for mining corporations

Orphan poem

When this poem was still in utero

Its mother sought treatment for AIDS

But couldn't afford to pay for the drugs

And died soon after the birth

Collateral damage poem

This poem lost both of its legs

And all of its friends

When the school they'd taken refuge in

Was repeatedly bombed

Incarcerated poem

When it complained about the food

This poem was dragged from its cell

Savagely beaten

And placed in spirit-crushing isolation

Evicted poem

The banker misrepresented 

The abstruse technicalities concealed

In the fine print of this poem's mortgage

Which caused it to lose its home

Uninsured poem

When this poem was diagnosed

With breast cancer

Its insurer fabricated a loophole

And cancelled its policy

Indefinitely detained poem

This poem does not know

What it is charged with

Or the evidence against it

And will never go to trial

Combat veteran poem

Tormented by what it saw and did in the war

This poem tried several times

To commit suicide

And finally succeeded

Amazonian poem

By the time the oil company stopped drilling

The pristine waters of this poem's home

In the rainforest

Had become toxic sludge

Campesino poem

This poem was forced to leave its fields

For sweatshops on the border

Because agribusiness corn

Destroyed small-scale farming

Dineh poem

The government hired this poem

To dig up uranium on its own lands

And paid it with

Radioactive tailings and cancer

Enemy of the state poem

While it was handcuffed to a metal bed spring

Thousands of volts convulsed this poem's body

After which it was raped

Again and again and again

Enemy combatant poem

Sold to the CIA by a rival faction with a grudge

This poem endured years of torture

To force disclosure of information

It did not have

 

Buff Whitman-Bradley's poetry has appeared in many print and online journals.  With his wife Cynthia he is co-producer/director of the award-winning documentary film, Outside In,  and co-editor of the forthcoming book About Face: GI Resisters Turn Against War (PM Press, 2011).  He is also co-producer/director of the documentary Por Que Venimos.
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FRAMED BY A HOLE IN THE SCREEN

by Becky Harblin


Corn spread out for the deer
each and every hoof print
in the snow filled.
Spots of blue, gray, and red.
Mourning Doves, Blue Jays,
Cardinals, Squirrels, and briefly,
a small rabbit.

Bellies being filled in the houses,
cookies and toast
and eggs surround electronics.
Wrapping paper
piled in the computer box,
one-handed Wii being played
while drinking hot cocoa.
Children’s voices.

The old computer recycled,
landing next year in Africa.
Where 10 year old dusty dark
kids strip, burn,
and search the piles
of hard drives,
to sell the noxious metals.
Their bellies only filled for a day,
these children with no voice.
And no one is computing
the damage
to their kidneys, livers, and brains.


Becky Harblin works as a sculptor and Wellness Arts Practitioner. She lives on a small farm in upstate New York with a few sheep, and an old newfoundland dog. The daily haiku she writes can be found online.   Her poems have been published in various places including New Verse News.
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WHY DEMOCRATS CAN NEVER WIN

by Andrew Hilbert


They complain.
Obama's not doing enough!
Obama is not delivering on his campaign promises!

Then Obama does something.

They complain.
Obama didn't do it the way I wished he would have!
Obama didn't take up this other issue before the one he just solved!

Obama,
When you're going to do something
Just do something else instead.


Andrew Hilbert lives and works in Orange County. He also edits Beggars & Cheeseburgers magazine.
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THE LUNACY OF HOPE?

by Steve Hellyard Swartz


The jester draped in moons and stars
Poses the question: Just How Far
Are we willing to go
Before we give up hope?
The jester and I were up at three
To watch the moon and the earth come between him and me
A sheep nearby said what the heck
And begin to ba-ba something from Brecht
Eine kleine Moon of Alabama
Talk turned as talk does to our old friend Obama
For three hours we three watched as the sky turned black
We watched, as we've watched, as the clock turned back
We watched, as we've watched, for something brilliant,
earth-shattering, life-changing, something golden and great,
to at long long last, start
The jester, the sheep, and me watched
As it just grew more dark


Steve Hellyard Swartz is Poet Laureate of Schenectady, NY. He is a frequent contributor to New Verse News. Swartz is a 2011 Pushcart Prize nominee for Poetry. His poems have appeared in The Patterson Review, The Southern Indiana Review, The Kennesaw Review, and online at Best Poem and switched-on gutenberg. He is the winner of a First Place Award given by the Society of Professional Journalists for Excellence in Broadcasting. In 1990, Never Leave Nevada, a movie he wrote and directed, opened at the US Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah.
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QUANTUM- LEAP REVELRY

by Roxanne Hoffman

 

 

))  a  ((

//  baby  \\

)) CRIES! ((

\\  doubt  //

\\ exits //

>>  

// === \\

// father- \\

//   HOOD   \\

J grinning :-)

\\  holding  //

\\ infant //

XY

// José \\

//  knows!  \\

||  ======   ||

||   LIFE’S   ||

|| MIRACLE ||

\\ ====== //

\\ === //

YX

// == \\

// Night’s \\

//  oblivion  \\

// Peaceful  \\

(( QUASARS ))

\\   redshift   //

\\   ===   //

XX

// == \\

*Stars*

//    talk    \\

//    unto     \\

))   Virgins,   ((

((    WISE-    ))

))     guy!     ((

\\   =====   //

\\  ====  //

~X~

// FACT \\

//    or     \\

//     ??????    \\

((     Y~chrom~    ))

))  oh~some  ((

((        j       ))

  =

      (( ZERO-gravity ))     

 

FYI <3 U QT 4VR XOX

 

 

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

 

Roxanne Hoffman worked on Wall Street, now answers a patient hotline for a New York home healthcare provider. Her words can be found on and off the net in such journals as Amaze: The Cinquain Journal, Clockwise Cat, Danse Macabre, The Fib Review, Hospital Drive, Lucid Rhythms, Mobius: The Poetry Magazine, The Pedestal Magazine, and Shaking Like A Mountain; the indie flick Love And The Vampire; and the anthologies The Bandana Republic: A Literary Anthology by Gang Members and their Affiliates (Soft Skull Press), Love After 70 (Wising Up Press), and  It All Changed In An Instant: More Six-Word Memoirs by Writers Famous & Obscure (Harper Perennial). She and her husband own the small press, Poets Wear Prada. 

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WUNDERTÄTER

by Barbara Lightner


Christ the Claus hefts
the Christmas cross
to the holyday hill.
A star shines in the heavens
showing the way for
His red rattletrap truck
to a windswept world
where each chimney awaits
the fire of new birth.

On the billboard-lit strip
into the known world,
He hefts the tree to His shoulder,
dragging it the long way ahead.

The road is lined with
the sad, lonely, lives of those
who have lived in walled enclaves
of high and ignoble consumption.

He clambers past proud-as-a-peacock
Moms and Dads carrying Wal-Mart away.
He sees children glazed with the glut
of too many toys; grans and gramps 
deep in their cups,
 a’snore in the dark of it all.

Through the valley of the shadow
He vexes on, Greed and Confusion
darkening the way. He sees into the homes
of children, sickly, scraggly, from lack.
He shakes his head sadly for the kids
squatting on playgrounds in isolation
or grouped into broils of bullying
and bragadocchio.

He shudders at the unkindliness
of neighbors, watching them leave
on the last train streamlining
its way to Harangue and Harass.

He ascends, to miracle a morrow
rid of muck in a world run amok.

Psalms of the day break night’s illusion
to morn. Chimneys await a phoenix-fire
of new birth. Christ the Claus descends.

The crackle of fires in last night’s grates
snaps a new day’s triumph;
everyone up at the crack of dawn
to a hearty God rest, ye, merry
in a rum-pum-pum of the heart’s drum;
like a mustard see in a cauldron of fire.


Author's Note: Santa Claus’s precursor St. Nicolas was known as Wonder Worker, Wundertäter, for his good deeds on behalf of the poor and the suffering.
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Barbara Lightner began writing incidental poetry in law school to escape the tension and boredom of death by law. Currently she is a 71-year-old shameless agitator as poet living in Milwaukee, WI. She has been published in works by Grey Fox Press, the Angel Press, IOBA, Wisconsin Light, Out!, and the Lovely County Citizen. Her poetry has appeared, or will appear, in Verse Wisconsin, Poesia, the Table Rock Review, New Verse News, Come Be a Memoirist, the Zocala Press’ chapbook series, and the feminist anthology Letters to the World. Her website is The Book Barrow.
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OUR READING PLEASURE

by J. D. Mackenzie


Even my old friends
who never write fiction
provide great amusement
as Christmas draws near

They send us long lists
of glowing achievements
running with bulls
and promotions at work

I read of new toys
the red cars and sailboats
golf scores and condos
honor roll kids

Somehow they leave out
the scandalous secrets
their sad midlife crises
their doubts and their fears

Our Christmas letter
is boring by contrast
the truth is quite tranquil
we like it that way

It’s not that we suffer from
lives less fulfilling
it’s just that we share them
in far different ways


J. D. Mackenzie was born in rural Oregon and wandered through brief careers as a steelworker, sommelier, psychiatric aide (following in the footsteps of his much older fraternity brother Ken Kesey) and grant writer before eventually settling into his current roles as college administrator and poet.  A 2011 Pushcart Prize nominee for Poetry, his work has appeared in several anthologies and publications, including Rogue River Echoes, New Verse News, Four and Twenty, Poets Ponder Photographs, The Moment, and Poets for Living Waters. He lives with his family in the foothills of Oregon’s Coast Range.
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WEDNESDAY NIGHT AT METRO BOWL

by Erren Geraud Kelly


We hold hands in a prayer
Circle before and after games
Sometimes, I make strikes
Others, gutter balls
My mom limps and with her one good hand
Wins a game
Aunt Cleotha thinks the immigrants
Should learn English, if they are going
To live in America
She’s in the 175 club
Me and Aunt Irma talk about the TV show
“Desperate Housewives,”
When she’s not picking up spares
The trailer park by her house
Is full of Katrina victims
Irma also got two strikes in a row
The brotha bowling beside me
Hits strikes every time


Erren Geraud Kelly is a poet based in New York City, by way of Louisiana, by way of Maine, by way of California and so on. He has been writing for 21 years and has over three dozen publications in print and online in such publications as Hiram Poetry Review, Mudfish, and Poetry Magazine(online). His most recent publication was in In Our Own Words, a Generation X poetry anthology; he was also published in other anthologies such as Fertile Ground and Beyond The Frontier.
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WINTER SOLSTICE PRAYER

by Mary Saracino


Deep night, Dark night
Night of the longest sigh
Soulful night, Sacred night
Night of the longest dreams
Cold night, Holy night
Night of unfurling desires
Womb of the world, Birther of hope
Bringer of peace and good will
Pray, pray for all good things
That suffering for all will end
That life will thrive and generosity reign
In the hearts of all humankind
That joy will rise and children will fly
On wings of prosperity
Oh hear our plea, this silent night
When the moon is round in the sky
When hopes are high and eyes are wide
with delight and audacity
May Love prevail tonight, and always
Leading us back to our Source
May we dance with the dark, without hesitation or fear
And savor her promise of plenty
Deep night
Dark night
Night of the longest sigh
May our weary hearts stay vigilant and receptive
To all that is loving and dear


Mary Saracino is a novelist, poet and memoir-writer who lives in Lafayette, CO . Her most recent novel, The Singing of Swans (Pearlsong Press 2006) was a 2007 Lambda Literary Awards Finalist. Her short story, "Vicky's Secret" earned the 2007 Glass Woman Prize.
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ANOTHER VERSION OF THE GOINGS-ON AT THE SOLSTICE CHRISTMAS VILLAGE

by Christina Pacosz

                         With apologies and gratitude to Lou Rakowski, 
                                  my best friend Suzanne's father,
                                  whose Christmas village was a wonder
                                  he surpassed each Christmas of my childhood.

The century-old granite fireplace mantle has been cleared
of found statuary and object d'art
in favor of this new town of miniature ceramic buildings
lit from within.
An image usually reserved for the description of a certain look in the eyes
that, we are told,  means
a soul is staring out at you.

But the exiled Russian princess is having none of that religiosity
as she prepares to play the tiny piano –
Tchaikovsky, maybe Chopin, or Glazunov, who knows?
She's even considered
a Joplin rag in honor of the new world she's come to.
The boy and girl cheerfully decorate the tree while the calico cat plays
          at their feet
with the milk she's spilled.
The goral couple are down from the mountains – the Tatry, the Urals,
          the Wasatch, the
Appalachians – the peaks they've missed since they took their very
          first step toward the valley.
Still,  they're happy to be in the village on the bedrock of stone.
The snow lies deep
lit from within – there's that image again! – by all the wishes
of this world and beyond for peace and bread.

The Christmas Fool, the Solstice Jester
believe they hold everything together
but not without the help of the Star Boy,  the Gwiazdka,
who is eyeing the sky in the Alaskan print on the wall above him:
a grosbeak pair, red and yellow, perch on birch branches; Prussian blue fills the horizon.
He's ready to ring the bell in his hand
when the first star appears on Wigelia, Christmas Eve.
This is a Polish village, too, after all.
Star of wonder
the English carol says.

The animals
- the bear, the donkey, the beaver -
who refuse – now – to talk
on this most magical of nights
though once they shared all the Stories the world knew
with anyone who would listen
wait for the evening edition of the newspaper
to hit the street.   The woman in red
with the white apron and scarf
has written an expose
about the destruction of habitat, the diminished diversity,
the loss of lives.
The blast furnace of greed
lit from within
that kills us all.


Born and raised in Detroit by working-class Polish-American parents, Christina Pacosz’  poetry/writing has appeared in literary magazines and online journals for almost  half a century. A poet-in-the-schools and a North Carolina Visiting Artist, she has published several books of poetry, including Greatest Hits, 1975-2001, Pudding House, 2002, a by-invitation-only series.  Her chapbook, Notes from the Red Zone, originally published by Seal Press in 1983, was selected as the inaugural winner of the ReBound Series by Seven Kitchens Press in 2009.
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A CLIMATE CHANGE CHRISTMAS

by Jon Wesick


There’ll be no midnight ride in a sleigh.
The ice cap’s melted away.
No smiles for your daughters.
His workshop’s underwater.
Santa’s not coming to town.

Smog-belching SUVs
mean empty spaces under trees.
Those wanting presents
better take antidepressants.
Santa’s not coming to town.

He’s traded boots and red coat
for wooden mast and lifeboat.
He’s no longer jolly
due to man’s carbon folly.
Santa’s not coming to town.

Those bright Christmas wishes
now sleep with the fishes.
Christmas gets meaner.
His home like Katrina
Santa’s not coming to town.

With polar climate like Aruba
the elves all learn SCUBA.
The children now frown.
The reindeer have drowned.
Santa’s not coming to town.


Host of the Gelato Poetry Series, instigator of the San Diego Poetry Un-Slam, and an editor of the San Diego Poetry Annual, Jon Wesick has published over two hundred poems in journals such as the The New Verse News, New Orphic Review, Pearl, Pudding, and Slipstream. He has also published forty short stories. Jon has a Ph.D. in physics and is a longtime student of Buddhism and the martial arts. One of his poems won second place in the 2007 African American Writers and Artists contest.
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TOM AND HUCK REFUSE TO TELL ALL

by Earl J. Wilcox

You don’t know us without you’ve heard about a man named Mr. Mark Twain
or Sam Clemens. The lies they’ve told about them two is mostly true, though
who can believe a lie if a feller can’t even make up his mind about what his
name is. Now the way we hear it is Sam wrote a book about hisself and Mark,
but made it clear he did not want anybody to know what he said in the book
until a whole hundred years after he was dead and gone.  Land o’goshen, child,
enough could happen in a century to make a person want to just up and tell
a stretcher or two.  Hell fire and damnation, telling the truth about Teddy Roosevelt
or any of them writer friends of Sam and Mark might just give the whole world the heebie-jeebies or even cause us to git religion and go to church. Shoot, we ain’t going
to give away everything they said in that book they wrote a hundred years ago
because if we did it might make us feel civilized— and we’ve been there before!


Yrz truly,
Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn


Earl J. Wilcox writes about aging, baseball, literary icons, politics, and southern culture. His work appears in more than two dozen journals; he is a regular contributor to The New Verse News. More of Earl's poetry appears at his blog, Writing by Earl.
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