ANOTHER APOLOGY

by David Feela


I’m so sorry for the pain
(Guess I’ll won’t do that again,)
I have caused my family.
(though I did it just for me!)
I know I have let them down
(I’d better appear with a frown)
and lost their generous trust.
(but wow, that generous bust!)
I would like to make amends
(I’d kick the media’s ends)
by trying to be the man
(and screw the devoted fans)
I used to be, one that repents
(but I love the endorsements.)
and puts it all in the past.
(How long does this interview last?)


David Feela's work has appeared in regional and national publications. He is a contributing editor and columnist for Inside/Outside Southwest and for The Four Corners Press. His first full length poetry book, The Home Atlas, is now available.
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NAMES OF THE DEAD

by Floyd Cheung


CLEAVER
FRAZIER
HAND
SHERMAN

Staff Sergeant
Sergeant
Lance Corporal
Sergeant

John
Daniel
Nicholas
Benjamin

Marysville , Washington
St. Joseph , Michigan
Kansas City , Missouri
Plymouth , Massachusetts

36
25
20
21

Beloved
Beloved
Beloved
Beloved


Floyd Cheung has taught American literature at Smith College in Northampton, Massachusetts, since 1999.
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THE DAY AFTER THE END OF THE WORLD (DEC. 22, 2012)

by Lori Desrosiers


I will walk out on my front porch,
watch the children throw snowballs,
cheer on the postman in his high boots,
marvel at sun filtering through pine branches,
sing a song my mother used to sing,
shovel some snow, sweep up the house,
make a call or two, joke about the weather,
pick up an ornament from the floor,
put on the tea kettle, start chicken soup,
sit in my chair, pet the orange cat,
finish the dishes, make the bed,
put in a load of sheets , edit a poem,
remark to my husband
how delightful it is
that we are still here,
after all that hullabaloo.


Lori Desrosiers lives in a big house with a front porch in Westfield, MA and likes to sit and observe the world, then write about it. Her poems have appeared in many reputable publications, including The New Verse News.
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JUST SAY O! NO! TO WAR

by Mary Saracino


We cast our votes for peace, not war
Were we wrong? We were wrong?
We filled our hearts with hope of change
Were we wrong? Were we wrong?
We cheered the Nobel Laureate on
Were we wrong? Were we wrong?
For sowing seeds of peace not harm
Were we wrong? Were we wrong?
Listen O, and heed the call
Don’t be fooled. Don’t be fooled.
The front line’s here, at home, not there
End the war. End the war.
With wages lost and health care woes
Hear our cries. Hear our cries.
Cast your vote for a different way
Keep the peace. Keep the peace.
Just say no, it’s not too late
Don’t escalate. Don’t escalate.


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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THANKSGRIEVING

by Elizabeth Kerlikowske


A few of us still at the table with cake and pie
and strong spiked coffee, another Thanksgiving
where football insists that men and Hoosiers gather
before an ever bigger screen in a choreographed
silence, where the judge sits as far away
from the felon as possible, and on the couch
an adopted black girl naps next to my father who
regularly says “nigger” except for today.
There’s that to be said for football.

But back toward the kitchen,
the next generation of women dishes to the next
about their aging folks, their quirks and questionable
decisions. When does helping become enabling?
And isn’t talk of what parents do always just
a little bit about money? To vent is good; to solve
from hours away impossible. Days of indigestion
elapse before I realize this. Sweet sight of faces…
if only their mouths were basted shut.


Elizabeth Kerlikowske's fourth book of poetry Dominant Hand is now available from MayApple Press. She teaches at Kellogg Community College and runs the annual Poems That Ate Our Ears Contest in Kalamazoo, Michigan.
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THANKSGIVING 2009

by George Held


The old football coach tells the radio host,
“It’s great we’ll have a night game
in the NFL on Thanksgiving this year.
Previously we just had the two early games.
Now we'll have something to watch
After we eat the turkey.”

Now, that’s something to be thankful for,
Like the news we’ll be out of Afghanistan
By 2017. Of course, that “we”
Won’t include the thousands of war dead
And the thousands who’ll die without health care.

The formula is dazzle ’em with football
And ignore ’em on ending the war
And providing universal healthcare
And reducing carbon emissions,
And pray the market won’t tank.

“We cower together to ask the Lord’s blessing,”
The old hymn goes. “He chastens and hastens
To make His will known.” Can his will
Include a gluttonous assault on factory
Farmed turkeys while the Lions mew on TV?

The first whites to give thanks in “The New
World” fasted a day or two before feasting.
Today only the poor fast and without choice
While gluttony produces obese, diabetic cattle
On two hooves throughout the land.

In the land of the fat, a slender black man
Will be king. Like other monarchs, he will
Gird his loins for war, grant favors to the rich,
And soothe the poor with resonant rhetoric.
Yea, we are thankful for him: he’s not the king
We had last year. Pass the gravy, please.


George Held has collected many of his New Verse News poems in The News Today.
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DUBAI ON E-BAY

by Earl J. Wilcox


First on the auction scene,
a multi-billion dollar ski slope,
followed by seventy-five sand islands,
and the world’s tallest (unfinished) building.
Bidding bonus: 500,000 Expat slaves
from the Philippines , Egypt , India , and Croatia .
Opening bid: Emirates’ dignity.


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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TOUGH YEAR TO GIVE THANKS

by Ray Brown


It was a tough year to give thanks.

Grandmother had seen it in the depression,
but she learned a long while ago to stay out of it.
The teenage daughter wanted a Blackberry
and the mother used to like an Italian Prosecco
before Thanksgiving dinner,
but after being out of work for nine months,
worried the unemployment was going to run out
he took a job at ShopRite bagging -
and they gave him a free turkey for Thanksgiving -
that was the only way they made it.

When he was a young boy, his parents had little.
He was happy then with little.
They were happy then with little.
Gave thanks for the little they had.
He and his family now had much more
and would not be happy until they had much more yet.
These are hard times….


Ray Brown lives in Frenchtown, NJ. He is a graduate of the University of Notre Dame and Rutgers-The State University of New Jersey. In 2009, his poetry has appeared in the 13th Annual Poetry Ink Chapbook (Moonstone Publishing), The Star-Ledger of Newark, and NJ Lawyer Magazine. He received a NJ Poetry Society 2009 Recognition Award, and will be published in upcoming volumes of the Edison Literary Review, the Big Hammer, FreeXpresSion, and the River Poets Journal.
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THANKSGIVING: OUR PUSHCART PRIZE NOMINEES

The New Verse News is proud to nominate for the Pushcart Prizes the following poems published in our pages in the last twelve months . . .

“Venison” by Thomas Reynolds

“News On a March Full Moon” by David Plumb

“Sacramento” by Eliza Kelley

“Gunman Kills 8 at N. Carolina Nursing Home” by Steve Hellyard Swartz

“Sculpture, Ohio, Spring 1970" by Mary Turzillo

“Autumn Turns Through Stratified Wars” by Scot Siegel

. . . and thanks all the writers who have shared their passionate poetry with our readers this year.

RAPTORS

by CB Follett


High on the thermals, raptors are winging.
They circle the heights, easing south.
           Buteos, Accipiters, Harriers, Peregrine
Red Tail hawk banks against clear air, flashing
the rufous under-blush that gives him name.
          Sharp-shins, Coopers, Merlins, Ferruginous
Their beaks are curved, their plumage concinate.
Slicing the wind, in sweeps the Kestrel,
sleek, small, and bullet straight. The Windfucker.
             klee klee klee    killy killy killy

Down in the canyons, raptors are circling
in long limousines. On executive-gray car phones,
they are riding the thermals of stock buys and leverage,
their sharp claws extended. They are wheeling the air paths,
and dealing down, and their beaks are red.
             sell sell sell    buy buy buy

In the deep dark of the penta-building,
raptors rip the flesh of war,
circle the heights of power, riding
thermals of their special interests.
Hawks tear the clean white dove feathers
into ribbons of red.
               rat-tat-tat    rat-tat-tat

Deep in the dark undergrowths, the raptor is waiting.
His breathing circles, riding thermals of night,
in the parks, in the big, unweeded city.
His claws are curved, as he grabs, hurts, kills.
               And his cry is silence.


Winner of the 2001 National Poetry Book Award from Salmon Run Press, CB Follett has had poems published by Ploughshares, Alligator Juniper, Calyx, Americas Review, Peregrine, The Cumberland Review, Rain City Review, Ambit (England), The MacGuffin, Snowy Egret, Birmingham Poetry Review, New Letters Review, Psychological Perspectives, Without Halos, The Iowa Woman, Heaven Bone, Green Fuse, Black Bear Review, among others. She has been in many anthologies; received contest honors in the Billee Murray Denny, New Letters Prize, the Ann Stanford Prize, the Glimmer Train Poetry Contest and several contests from Poetry Society of America, among others. Five poems have been nominated for a Pushcart Poetry Prize plus three nominations as an individual poet. The most recent of her four collections of poetry is And Freddie Was My Darling, 2009. CB Follett is publisher/editor of Arctos Press, including the anthology, GRRRRR, A Collection of Poems About Bears; she was publisher and co-editor of RUNES, A Review of Poetry, 2001-to 2008.
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GUERNICA

by Alan Catlin

"in my hometown
there's even a nightclub named
Guernica." Jessica Hagedorn

where they play nothing but
dangerous music, atonal and
dissonant, so strident unmuffled
ears bleed, are assaulted by solo
guitar riffs, percussive drum beats,
organ blasts; killer sounds one and
all. The bouncers are all armed guards,
uniform like Nazis. No one dares
to intrude, tires to leave once they
are locked in for the night of danger
and beauty, gangster love and heart
throbbing infarctions. The heat inside,
the unnatural light inspires visions,
tropical apparitions vivid as death
squads, angles from hell with pilot's
licenses, machine guns and bombs.
In my town there is a night club named
Guernica where turf wars are fought
and lost, where the innocents plead
for mercy and are denied. In Guernica,
I am the demon on the dance floor,
the one with a coat of arms: blood
splatters on a field of clay.


Alan Catlin's latest chapbook is a long poem, Thou Shalt Not Kill, an updating of Rexroth's seminal poem of the same name. Whereas Rexroth riffs on the abuses of the Eisenhower adminstration, the update observes abuses of power in the previous administration with particular attention to the cynical, criminal behavior towards the Katrina hurricane victims.
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ONE SALAAM, TWO SALAAMS

by Michele F. Cooper


1
Barack salaams the Emperor,
cameras rolling and Fox lit for joy.
“We don’t bow,” they insist.
“He’s a Muslim, a fake, has links
to terrorists, wasn’t even born here,”
all on prompts before the President
straightens up and CNN’s showing tapes
of Nixon and Eisenhower bowing low.

2
No salaams for an old lady,
stooped as she walks to the bus.
She’s been cowed by the years
since she lost the twins
in Qandahar , caught in crossfire
on their way to a temple station,
plus the neighbor's boys in Iraq ,
scared to death, they were,
saying their last goodbyes at Hood.

3
I asked Barack, after shaking his hand
and keeping my posture tall,
why he salaamed that skinny emperor.
“In a word?” he asked. “Respect.”


Michele F. Cooper is the first-place winner in Poetry Canada's Rhymed Poetry Competition and the TallGrass Poetry Competition, second-place winner in the Galway Kinnell Poetry Competition, author of two books and numerous published poems, founding editor of the Newport Review and Crone's Nest literary magazines, and of a chapbook series, Premier Poets. She recently won honorable mentions in the Emily Dickinson and New Millennium Poetry Competitions. Her book Posting the Watch has just been published by Turning Point, the narrative poetry imprint at WordTech. She is listed in Who's Who in America, Contemporary Authors, and the Directory of American Poets and Fiction Writers, among others. She recently moved from the edge of a small horse farm (not hers) to Providence, RI, and now to the Cleveland area, where she writes and works as a book editor.
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DISSOLUTE SONNET

by Esther Greenleaf Murer


Sundays I drive three blocks to services
and pray the Lord to banish all these strange
ill-mannered folk that twist my world awry.
What could be more dire, what could be graver?

I like my burgers! Damn the consequences!
So what if the cattle never see a range?
It's not my fault that prices are so high,
when they take all the jobs and do no labor.

Here's what we need: a supermanic pres-
ident with magic powers to rearrange
the universe and so construct the pie
that I will always have more than my neighbor.

For all the world is clamoring for change,
and so am I, but only in my favor.

Esther Greenleaf Murer lives in Philadelphia. In addition to New Verse News, her poems have appeared or are forthcoming in The Externalist, The Ghazal Page, Mimesis, Light Quarterly, and Town Creek Poetry.
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PUBLIC DISCOURSE

by David Chorlton


Between a plane out of Georgia
and his connection
to Las Vegas, a passenger in Phoenix
wears a T-shirt with the words
Keep the South Beautiful
Put a Yankee on the Bus
beneath the confederate flag.
When incivility takes off

there’s no telling where
it will land. Maybe route seventeen
where a young man has music
turned loud enough for me
to hear through his earphones
and the only word I discern
is bitch, growing longer
each time until it is biiiiitch. Look away

and there’s a woman
who chose for today
a shade just grey of blue
with her message to humanity:
I’m busy
Your (sic) ugly
Have a nice Day
Sometimes it isn’t even words,

but a crucifix that blazes
on its chain
where it says Believe,
believe or get out of the way.

David Chorlton watches the world from central Phoenix where he lives and writes. Sometimes, though, he rides buses. His new chapbook, From the Age of Miracles, appears this summer from Slipstream Press as the winner of its latest competition.
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