Bill Knott: A Sudden Departure
A sudden raisinstorm broke
Raisins falling everywhere pellmell.
The occasion uniqued my head, I thought
If this can happen raisins raining
Upon persons paining why I can leave anytime
Without feeling shame
George Witte: After the Recent Unpleasantness
it wouldn’t kill you to consider
dancing, just this once, alone
in backyard secrecy while dawn
arrays dishevelled underclothes
Video: Chico Marx Plays Beer Barrel Polka (from A Night in Casablanca, 1946)
Leonard Joseph “Chico” Marx (1887 – 1961) was an American comedian, actor and pianist. He was the oldest brother in the Marx Brothers comedy troupe, alongside his familial brothers Adolph (“Harpo”), Julius (“Groucho”), Milton (“Gummo”) and Herbert (“Zeppo”). His persona in the act … Continue reading
Michael Simms: Puppy Rolling
When I take Josie to the dog park she likes to find a puppy, preferably a rare breed like a Shiba Inu or a New Guinea Singing Dog and roll it down the hill.
Gerry LaFemina: A Slight Misunderstanding
What I heard was that she was interested
in accidents, so I envisioned those frozen moments
(perhaps only milliseconds), the liminal frames
when we realize an event is unavoidable
Linda Nemec Foster: Sean Penn Leaves Ukraine for Safety in Poland
Once, I visited a cemetery there, on the border between Poland
and Ukraine. Stark and beautiful. Green and calm. No dead
man walking there. Not even ghosts. Only the long lines
of graves and rusting crucifixes nailed to trees.
Bill Knott: Sonnet
The way the world is not
astonished at you
it doesn’t blink a leaf
when we step from the house
T. R. Hummer: Think
It’s impossible sometimes to make your way
through the undergrowth—think of Desoto,
Think of Cabeza de Vaca hacking down briars
Video: The Opposites Game
An English teacher asks his class: ‘What’s the opposite of a gun?’
Stephen Dobyns: Can Poetry Matter?
Heart feels the time has come to compose lyric poetry.
No more storytelling for him. Oh, Moon, Heart writes,
sad wafer of the heart’s distress. And then: Oh, Moon,
bright cracker of the heart’s pleasure.
Abby Zimet: Concerned Collins Calls Cops On Constituents Committing Communist Chalk Crimes
Susan ‘Snowflake’ Collins was so troubled by chalk-wielding desperados who hate-crimed the (public) sidewalk outside her house by (politely) asking she protect the rights of those women that she called the cops on them – this, while her party of neo-fascists and Christian zealots works tirelessly to drag us all back to the 1300s…
Jose Padua: Puñeta
Mother, you were the history
that never made the books,
the woman who fed us
chicken flavored with garlic
and ginger, sweet pork with
soy sauce and rice
Richard St. John: The Tao to Disneyland 
Disneyland at last: The draw-bridged entry! Monorail!
Tom Sawyer’s cave. Gators on the Jungle Cruise. Natives
passing in canoes. Snack-bar at the Matterhorn.
Wendy Cope: The Waste Land
A Phoenician named Phlebas forgot
About birds and his business–the lot,
Which is no surprise,
Since he’d met his demise
And been left in the ocean to rot.
