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The Cro-Magnon Election Campaign | Neil Fulwood

Ug say cavemen need bigger clubs
Clubs hit good
Hit animal get food
Hit plant get side salad
Hit other caveman if not same

Ug define not same
As too weak to use club
Ug define not same
As too lazy to use club
Ug define not same
As prefer company of other caveman

Ug say no food
For caveman who not use club
Ug say no help
For caveman weak or hurt
Ug define weak or hurt
As freeloader

Audience scratch heads
Ug thump club on ground
Freeloaders bad
Freeloaders drain on resources
Freeloaders worse than immigrants

Audience scratch heads
Ug thump club on ground
Immigrants come from other cave
Take our jobs
Audience thump own clubs on ground
Fists in air
Down with freeloaders
Down with immigrants

Ug say scratch X on stone
Vote Ug

Sounds of the Highway | Mary Bone

Metal against metal
Causing a terrible friction.
People mashing down on the pedal.
They don’t have any conviction.
Wood and bricks and chiming bells-
It’s not all music to my ears.
Breakfast’ s cooking, wafting smells,
Honks of horns, am I the only one who hears?
I’ve tried to get some sleep,
Only to toss and turn.
Someone’s going beep-beep,
For some quietness, my heart does yearn.

Ode to Amanda | Denny E. Marshall

She emerged winged-foot from the sky
Like an angel in Apollo’s shadow
Fathers from the heavens fingers
Announce with thunderbolts and lightning
Messages drift above to form shapes
In different layers of colored clouds

Lands on a mountain cap with harp
Notes cut like ribbons to reveal
Distance between the long still islands
In the stoke of beating heart and rhythm
Held my hand like feathers falling
Fell through her like warmth reclaimed

Up ahead rotating pastures play
Scenes of tall castles golden shine
Strong winds unfold the darkness away
Where loneliness once walked freely
Transforms into along with her eyes
Only sunshine regardless of the hour

More at http://www.dennymarshall.com/.

Criquet le Leaper | Giancarlo

for in dejection
and in hopeless render
on a shaky bastion
I’d write me a letter

two months and more than three
my reality, thine rosy thorn
down, in spiral, can thy see
in impression, was I forlorn

for now, I lay, curled, asleep
tumble dreading, in slippery slope
dreaming, hoping, I can leap
away, toward, in hint of hope

a number of moons, I’d count
a fortnight of five periods in rain
inklings of miseries, oh they mount
blot like ink, tattooed like pain

conquered even the hopefuls
a stretched out, foreboding reality
this land, roamed, by deceitful
now, a broken heart, have I thee

wish I may, the months, I’d skip
else, force embraced all dread
if I could only, through time, I’d leap
towards the time I’ve already med

not one person, would like to be
in the clutch of a weary heart
in wish, leap the future and see
jump in time, for anew, a start

Other Races Won | Christine Emmert

I failed to break the ribbon.
Panting and falling into alien arms.
What was won before
suddenly lost.
Fallen angels know the pain of earth
when they tried to outrun
the storms.

Time | JayM

Words of a moment,
Of stories that last a fleeting thought.
Youth a moment,
Fleeting rain driven,
By winds reminiscent,
Shall last for ever.
Words, a legacy,
Faces, a faded memory,
A moment’s tryst,
A lifetime of memories…

Nine Odd Haiku | Denny E. Marshall

knew had chance
name of new zine
rejection

don’t like things
that spin
removed from earth

timber area
internet usage triples
it’s login season

super computer
lightning fast and powerful
cape could be better

train station nary
locomotives on steel tracks
never seem to move

new pro football team
doubt they go to super bowl
they pick the name punts

strike long metal blade
on the thick stone prison wall
penn stronger than sword

university
offers three hundred degrees
must be an oven

the strict judge gave him
punishment of death sentence
ask, commas allowed?

Time to Check the Labels on Our Shirts | Donal Mahoney

Bangladesh is a land of money for clothing firms that pay very low
wages to workers in 400 garment factories near the capital of Dhaka.

Consumers in Western nations benefit from low retail prices for items of clothing these low wages produce.

Some Western consumers may remember that in 2013, 100,000 garment
workers in Bangladesh rioted in search of a monthly wage of $104, an increase they sought over the $39 a month many of them were being paid.

And it’s hard to forget that in 2013 a clothing factory in
Bangladesh collapsed. More than 1100 people died. And, of course,
there was that factory fire in 2012 that took the lives of 112
people.

The latest news story from Bangladesh seems to indicate things
aren’t that much better in that country in 2015.

On July 10, 21 elderly women, three teen-agers and a five-year old
child died when a stampede of hundreds stormed the home of a
businessman expected to provide a handout of free clothing during
Ramadan, the holy Muslim month of fasting and prayer. Thirty others
were rushed to a hospital.

The news story explained the businessman had been detained.

The story also pointed out that human stampedes are common during
charity handouts in South Asian countries.

The story failed to mention, however, that still common, too, are the low wages that make charity handouts in South Asian countries so attractive.

Perhaps it’s time to check the labels on shirts and other clothing
items before we Westerners buy them so we know who made them for us.

More at http://booksonblog12.blogspot.com/.

Memory Is Vermillion | Jenny Middleton

My mind a sky tumbled; a glass of thought.
I want to pour on to paper pearled drops
Of dew to quench the hungry, thirsty pages.
Bluely burned and lit words are forming you
Into a being of strange landscapes glowing
Dangerously; death darkly brooding and rank.
Each mental recess an avenue of despair.
You channel rivulets of words pain-bound
To a sea of messages sliding silver-grey
Beneath my hands. Pain, loss and soft beauty too
Shivers and something silk and richly woven
Has begun to sew itself to my clouded
Mind, despite the angry disapproving
Unbelieving staid stares and prying glances.
Past is alive and a throbbing agony
And all memory is vermillion.

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