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WEEK OF AUGUST 24

by Steven Kent

“Holy water: Nuns fight Italian town’s plans to take away their beach club”
—The Guardian

No special dispensation? Listen, mister,
Don’t ever try to tangle with a sister.
You think these nuns will fold? Oh, faithless fool,
You clearly didn’t go to Catholic school!

by Marshall Begel

(with thanks to Shel Silverstein)

“60 cats rescued from abandoned sailboat anchored off beach in Washington state”
—CBS

Jellybean, Hercules, Buttercup, too,
seized an old sailboat, enlisting as crew.
“Let’s hook us some tuna, lets haul in the cod!
Does anyone know how to wind up a rod?”

Jelly was captain, Butter set pace.
Order was kept with a spritz to the face.
The fish weren’t biting according to plan—
“Does anyone know how to open a can?”

The odor of litter began to increase
till meddling fishermen called the police.
These valiant sailors of Washington’s shores
request a new residence—how about yours?

by Viv Priestley

“You’re more likely to die in a car accident on a day when a major music album is released, a team at Harvard has found. The researchers looked at the 10 most popular albums released on Spotify in 2017-2022… and found that fatal accidents were 15.1% higher on the day of release. They linked the findings to motorists trying to play the new music on their phones while driving.”
—Oddacity News

Enough with a cappella round the clock
To dash some passing sailor on a rock!
If maximum destruction is our goal,
Let’s switch to Spotify and rock and roll.

by Julia Griffin

“A Texas appeals court has slashed the $50m judgment to $1.5m against Alex Jones, founder of the rightwing platform Infowars, over falsely calling the 2012 Sandy Hook school shooting in Newtown, Connecticut a hoax. … The unanimous opinion issued by the Texas third court of appeals found that Sandy Hook parents Neil Heslin and Scarlett Lewis did not show sufficient evidence that harassment enflamed by Jones’s hoax claims rose to a level that would allow them to exceed the state’s $750,000 cap on damages.
—The Guardian

Your tears when strangers mocked your little child
Don’t merit 50 million bucks. That’s wild.
We don’t dispute the bullet through his head;
Let’s say one million and a half instead,
For distribution by the court cashiers:
One quarter mill for each of his six years.

by Steven Urquhart Bell

“‘Checking before [weed-whacking] could save a hedgehog’”
–BBC

If Larkin hadn’t killed one, though,
We wouldn’t have “The Mower,”
A hugely moving piece of verse
That doesn’t trade on gore.

And also, you could argue, having
Died on Larkin’s lawn, it’s
As famous and immortal as
The muse of Shakespeare’s sonnets.

So does the verse excuse the fact
He didn’t check? It’s ticklish.
A Larkin fan might say it does,
But others might be pricklish.

by Steven Kent

“Nigel Farage has defeated Count Binface to win the Clacton byelection, in a contest boycotted by every other major political party”
—The Guardian

Farage, MP,
Got 63
While Binface ran for kicks
And still got 26.
Yet Britain would be better off
With tin man, not that sleazy toff—
Reform will truly never rest content
Until they make things Right in Parliament.