Culture

  There’s no age bar on titivating hair, Apart from putting rouge on wrinkled cheek. A Speaker has the right to looking fair, And prune her brunette hair once in a week. Pandemics come and go, but beauty stays. At eighty, beauty makes a second wave When handsome youngsters leer...

  The Church is Locked on Easter Day a rondeau The Church is locked on Easter Day Despite the stone being rolled away. The Christ awakes to greet the poor But they cannot get through the door To go to holy Mass and pray. Lay folk are told, at home...

  Lucrative On the Laundering of Drug Money As commodities go, you are harmless enough Whether tendered in coin or in crinkly stuff. But without you it seems that the world will not turn Men consort with the devil your favour to earn. They will cheat and deceive, yes, and...

Weave a circle round him thrice, __And close your eyes with holy dread, __For he on honey-dew hath fed, And drunk the milk of Paradise. —Coleridge, “Kubla Khan” Sam Coleridge smoked opium. Ho hum. If that’s what fueled the fire in his pupils I think Sam would have been a...

  When Logos lived within the heart of man, Then beauty bloomed and flowered forth at will--- And every house was built upon a plan; Order’s essence, captured and distilled. Then Lucifer, in all his hate and pride On gazing at the beauty of the saints--- To numb the pain...

  July 4, 2020 A monument falls Rioters have no remorse What happened this fourth?     Summer 2020 Sunny days are here! The beach is ideal and near. It’s Fall already?     Day Dreaming A warm summer day That should be spent at the bay. Not at work...

  London’s Docklands, Pre-Gentrification from a sonnet by Wordsworth Earth has not anything to show more foul Unless it be the same neath fog and rain; But no, for like Rasputin’s reechy mane This horror craves occulting in a cowl: Abandoned buildings, cheek by scabrous jowl, Eyes boarded shut or...

  Losing It He staggered round his living room in stunning disbelief As for the very umpteenth time, he’d gone and lost his teeth. He cried, “They’re in here somewhere, I must search and search” but then He couldn’t find his spectacles so he had to think again. He sat...

  They tried and failed. They’re trying still To steal our freedom; break our will--- The terrorists who torment days With ire and fire and Hades’ blaze. Our bones burn with their evil chill. Their deeds are scribed with Satan’s quill--- Twin Towers Felled! They aimed to kill The Western...

  Misdirection Some dictionaries and encyclopedias still define “fascism” as a far-right system of rule. They need to look again. The Party of self-righteousness, Imbued with far-left chatter. Deeds implemented and condoned, Rungs on the fascist ladder.     Speech Liberty, Guaranteed, Everywhere. Beware of those Who do not care....

For Nantes Cathedral Ravaged by Arson in July 2020, a Tribute  This holy place, where the enthusiasm of builders was succeeded by doubt following catastrophe, then hope expressed in restoration, is it not the symbol of the Church of Christ, and of our own history? – 2015 cathedral brochure Saint...

. Poet's Note: The Venerable Bede tells us that in the 7th century Caedmon, “having lived in a secular habit till he was well advanced in years, had never learned anything of versifying.” Leaving a celebration because he feared having to sing, he spent the night in a stable where...

  No Longer There I wonder if a change has come about. No longer do I feel that she is there As physical a being in her chair To me as I to her. My words ring out And they receive no answer but they flout The silence of the...

In Response to an Article on the Persecution of Falun Gong Practitioners in China I read the other day about the pain That you endure in some nightmarish place, Removed from sight, where sadists made insane By hatred press a jackboot in your face. Dear neighbor, whose sad face I...

  Before the plague I never knew my hands. The need to purify the human touch has turned my vision inward, but though much is taken; much remains---in human hands, the same, yet not the same. The bleak demands, that we remain impersonal, in such a time, to save the...

  I am a cardboard cutout. I sit here in the stands. I do not think. I do not blink. I do not clap my hands. You are a cardboard cutout. You sit there next to me. You do not cheer. You have no fear Of unreality. We are the...

  'I Shall A Mighty Hunter Be!' “I shall a mighty hunter be, The King of Kills, by God’s decree! Savannahs always guarantee a vantage camouflaging me. I’ll lie in wait with sharpened claws … until her keys unlock our doors! My human’s finished many chores, including patronizing stores for...

  We Siblings Three Attempt to add the hours we have shared: One hundred thousand, maybe thousands more? Our paths conjoined for several years before We struck out on our own and even dared Imagine we would chase our dreams beyond The borders of our joyful, sheltered lives. But now...

  I made her a bed with cushions and throws but she refused and slept in my bones. My skin, too tight for both my sighs and hers so she filled it with rot, making it home. ---Al-Mutanabbi, d. 965 CE She loves me till my body fades away. Kissing-with-fever...

  The Angels’ Share Oh many a peer of England brews Livelier liquor than the Muse, And malt does more than Milton can To justify God’s ways to man. — A.E. Housman When whisky’s aged in oaken casks, some ullage Should be expected, for it’s only fair That higher beings...

rhymes written after reading Simon Barnes’ blog post "Barn Owl in the Snow" Across the marsh, white passing over white, The silent hunter flies then loses height Descending to a favoured perch to stand And view with icy gaze an icy land. Stray snowflakes catch my fancy, frivolous But never...

adapted from Babrius, first century A.D., and Jean de La Fontaine, 1621-1695 __At least twelve thousand years (though likely more) Between the wolves and sheep had raged a war, Until the lupine clan convinced the ewes and rams They’d cease their onslaughts on the helpless lambs. The only stipulation to...

  Editing with the OED for Rita Bornstein __Like a mental abattoir, the OED, With brumous exactitude, looms over me As my blue pen prunes my cachaemic prose, Decorticating glut in orderly rows. Excessive eikonology, they say, May work for those who love facetiae And frilly essays built of guipure...

  Abracadabra The written word is magical And not just something clerical. You scratch some marks into the sand; I see the marks and understand What you are thinking in your head Without a single word being said. Like channeling or ESP The thought goes straight from you to me....

  The potato blight and resultant Great Famine struck Ireland from 1845 to 1851. Potato crops didn’t recover until 1852, by which time at least one million people had emigrated to escape poverty and starvation. A further one million people perished during this period. Meanwhile, Australia experienced a gold rush....

  The Falcon “In what distant deeps or skies Burnt the fire of thine eyes? On what wings dare he aspire? What the hand dare sieze the fire?” ---William Blake, The Tyger Falcon, falcon, flying high Over pines that scrape the sky, What ingenious deity Has framed your feathers, formed...

by Andrew Benson Brown James Sale’s HellWard is the first volume of a planned trilogy entitled The English Cantos. If the quality of the current volume is any indication of the two forthcoming ones, then there is much here for the poetry lover to enjoy, learn from, and look forward...

  a villanelle My heart goes out to those unknown, Whose life by Time’s cruel hand erased, Their ravaged, riven, nameless stone. Shattered, lost, grass o’ergrown, No date to tell when coffin placed. My heart goes out to those unknown. How many winds and rains hath blown, To scourge the...

  Ab Initio Mundi* *ever since the beginning of the world At first the darkness reigned o’er all that was, Until a little point of light emerged. That grew and grew regardless, as it surged Ahead and climbed to greater heights because It was controlled by heaven, on the whole,...

  in memory of my father-in-law, Pietro Lorefice (1938-2020) The bell now tolls, dear Pietro, for this hour When we must bid your faithful soul adieu, And lay to rest that mortal frame we knew, Now spent, like withered grass or faded flower. I knew that you were likely to...

  My marriage failed (they always do.) Emotionally unequipped To work things out without a script, We didn’t try to talk it through. What do I pay that therapist for? You can’t see what emotions mean Until you get them on the screen. We left them on the studio floor....

  When the wokest of folk virtually convoke In a year of elections and riots and fear, Uncle Joe from the basement the Nanny will stoke. He’ll invoke Ms. Kamala as newscasts evoke, “She’s a centrist!” to mask a career racketeer When the wokest of folk virtually convoke. Will Kamala...

. Upon a boat, by ocean bound, Below the sun, upon the sound, The bait, a line, a reel, a fish: Bound for butter, herbs and dish. . . Alec Ream is a writer living in Virginia. His poetic work and creative fiction have been widely published. A member of the...

  Madcapfesto We’ll unlock prison gates and let the inmates saunter out. We’ll tear down wall and rule; we’ll sponsor every lug and lout. We’ll overlook drug smuggling and the trafficking of sex. We’ll hike up workers’ taxes to increase the welfare checks. Equality. Equality. We’re proud to make that...

by Joseph S. Salemi The poetic effusions of some people are so incompetent that they cross the line into unexpected humor, and thereby become valuable. Such is the case with the work of William Topaz McGonagall (1825-1902), whose poetry has been kept in print long since his demise—first, as a...

Winner and Runners-up of The Society of Classical Poets 2020 Haiku Competition Judged by Mike Bryant and Susan Jarvis Bryant See all entrants here.   Thunder-bellied clouds Move slow over heathered hills, Pregnant with June’s rain ---Savannah Leahy, Competition Winner   Sixteen Runners Up   With soft clicks and clucks,...

  A Ditty What happened to the human race? It vanished, friend, without a trace. And what, pray tell, of humankind? You may well seek, but will not find. And finally, humanity? It slipped into insanity.     It’s Coming ... I won’t accept a chip. I will not take...

  dedicated to all those braving injustice in Hong Kong with nobility of spirit Muffled voices, anguished cries, Trampled freedom, published lies, Flouted treaties, threatened fates, Outlawed protests, closed debates; Unveiled changes to the Law, Breaking backs with final straw, Taking rights to speak and pray From the people every...

  Hero of Her Heart On February 9, 2007 Sgt. James J. Regan of the 3rd Battalion 75th U.S. Ranger Regiment was killed on active service in Iraq. Some time after the funeral, Sgt. Regan's fiancee Mary McHugh visited his grave in the Arlington National Cemetery where he was buried...

  Due to a recent government edict, approximately 5 million Australians must wear masks whenever they leave the house. We wear a mask because we’re told That COVID has us in its hold, And if outside we dare appear Without this prophylactic gear Authorities will slap a fine Because we...