L. A. Mereoie: Jacobean Christmas Myth
An inn-crawl! King of Christmas sports
Far tougher than a fell-run trail!
The course, not one to do in shorts,
Was measured out in yards of ale.
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Felicia Nimue Ackerman: Message to US Museums:
"Trump Says Smithsonian Focuses
Too Much on How Bad Slavery Was'”
– The New York Times, August 19, 2025
Our slavery wasn't so bad!
America didn't go wrong!
Our past gives us cause to be glad!
You’d better start singing this song!
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Henry Stimpson: Poetic Persecution
A socially prominent wife who
testified her husband used to
rouse her from sleep to listen
to poetry he had written won
an uncontested divorce on the
grounds of cruelty today. 17
Dec. 1936 Cambridge (Mass.)
Hubbie, don't make a peep.
No poem on earth
Is as good as sleep.
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Jake Murel: Cheers
No Danson, no Shelley,
no good food for the belly.
I wasn’t glad I came;
nobody knew my name.
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Paul Burgess: Economic Analysis: A President's Summary.
When market values start to soar,
my name's the one the crowds should roar.
But when the market stalls or tanks,
the guy before deserves the thanks.
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Bruce Bennett: Pertinax Revisited
Let chaos storm!
Let cloud shapes swarm!
I wait for form.
– Robert Frost
It’s getting late.
I wait and wait.
Is this my fate?
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Russel Winick: Ratings Changes
They used to be the kids that I was jealous of.
So popular and cool – I thought them far above.
No longer deemed elite, they’re still fine in my view,
The biggest change from then to now is I am too.
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Damian Balassone: The Choir
They try to tell the stutterer
she does not belong,
not knowing that the stutterer
is set free by song.
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Felicia Nimue Ackerman: Motivation Irritation
Jeff Gordinier's review of "A Rebellion of Care,"
by David Gate says, "[W]hat’s the harm in being
reminded to celebrate community and eccentricity?
. . . And yet motivational platitudes have a way of
undermining themselves in the aggregate."
– The New York Times Book Review
Even a single such platitude
Triggers my mutinous attitude.
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Pat D’Amico: What It Will Take
The powerful potentates on our planet
Who decry common sense – in fact they ban it,
Will gather in brotherhood, kindness and grace
When LGM armies invade us from space.
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Peggy Verrall: How Many Books?
Why do you have 1000 books? (Translation from the Dutch –
These language apps are fun, I find, and keep my brain in touch.)
I look at all the crowded shelves, the tables, chairs and floor . . .
But, sadly, I've downsized, you see, there's now no room for more.
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Bruce Bennett: The Poet’s Secrets:
Surprised by Joy, I told Lucille to hide,
forgetting what that closet held inside!
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Jerome Betts: From Honey To Marmalade
(Winnie-the-Pooh’s first appearance
in print under that name was in The
Evening News Christmas Eve 1925
with illustrations by J. H. Dowd.)
Anthropomorphic 1920s ursine who
Has now charmed for a century as Pooh,
What literary pundit had the power to foresee
Another bear whose name begins with P?
