Daniel Galef: Sketches of the Noble Sentiments
Hope
The widow who watches the waves;
the starved sharks that dance in the deep;
the angels that grimace on graves;
the sailor who swims in his sleep
Patience
Griselda, in a wedding dress like clouds,
whose train is sewn from seven silken shrouds
Purity
Lucretia chaste, but Tarquin chased her
Humility
“Please, after you,” says king to taster
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Alex Steelsmith: Playing With Fire
“Severe drought and dropping Tiber water levels . . .
uncovered an archaeological treasure in Rome:
The stone remains of the Bridge of Nero.”
–Archaeology News
Flibbertigibbety
Nero the Emperor
famously fiddled while
Rome was aflame.
Rome is now burned by a
climatological
crisis revealing a
bridge in his name.
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Jane Blanchard: Folie à Deux
It happens all too often, sad to say:
Some he and she hook up, decide to wed,
Then let a mutual delusion sway
Them from the truth they should believe instead.
No counterargument finds any way
To disabuse the minds of those misled,
Since reason on its own cannot allay
A fallacy conceived in fancy’s bed.
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D. A. Prince: Career Move
In another life I’d be the one
with skills like well-trained collies,
herding in one long snaking line
stray supermarket trolleys.
Shunting one trolley’s metal nose
tight to another’s back,
lining them up in ordered rows:
now that’s a life on track.
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Alex Steelsmith: A Good Deal of Theft
(On reading that some retail stores have become
targets of ‘grab and run’ thefts by large groups
of shoplifters during the Christmas period.)
Harumy-scarumy
‘grab and run’ shoplifters
plundering merchandise
get a good deal,
leaving no doubt that the
seasonal bargains are,
unmetaphorically
speaking, a steal.
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Heather Dubrow: My Refrigerator Sings the Blues
I book all my dental check-ups on time.
Even first draft poems know how to rhyme.
If obligations like that are stable
Why the hell am I still unable
To clear my whole fridge before some food rots?
Lemons and onions shouldn’t have these blue spots.
This leftover sauce? Now greening and mouldy.
I'd thought it was just a golden oldie.
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Kathleen Beavers: Our Stercoraceous Canine
Our new doggy dines on poopy –
Why? I have no clue;
She loves to scarf her poopy and
I don’t know what to do;
Is this some atavistic canine crap?
(a bad pun I intended)
All I can say for sure is
this habit must be ended!
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Tracy Davidson: Dine and Dash
Speedily-greedily,
Non-paying customers,
Stuff themselves silly then
Dash for the door;
Fraudulent, flatulent,
Dipsomaniacal,
Wallets still bulging but
Stomachs are sore.
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L. A. Mereoie: Discrimination
‘Flat Residents Only’ (Part of sign in Torquay)
And so the campaign launches
Outlawing pots and paunches.
Despite your mind’s profundity
Your body’s vile rotundity
Or hint of some protrusion
Will cause complete exclusion
And bar you from residing
In the housing we’re providing.
