Sunday, March 17, 2024

Winter Editorial 2023-24

In the twenty-seven years of publishing this journal, I don't know that times have ever been so bleak. Amidst our continuing supply of weapons to a genocide the world can see and to a proxy war that could easily go nuclear, we enter into an election year with no possible good outcome; a choice between genocide and WWIII or overt fascism and national breakdown. Yet, we can be neither complicit nor complacent.

We struggle to afford price-gouged groceries and medicines. We struggle against being pushed out of our homes by greedy banks and landlords and then criminalized for being unhoused. Women are struggling for the right of making basic personal life choices. We labor daily under arrogant bosses and struggle to survive a deeply broken, unaffordable medical system even as the Pentagon budget climbs and billions are spent to murder innocent people around the world.

We protest, we organize and we fight back but those at the top and their embedded media downplay or ignore us. Yet we continue because we must.

This collection speaks to the times. It speaks of losses, personal and financial. Poets here rail at the utter corruption of empire and of those of us sacrificed to pad the pockets of the Pentagon and profiteers. There are poems of medical dread, of the difficulties of becoming old, ill and cast aside. There are poems on homelessness, a story on human trafficking and poems on the proliferation of guns and violence in our own country as well as on our export of them around the world.

As it is an election year, we are already beginning to get the Trump-focused poetry that we've been inundated with in the past. As much as we detest the self-obsessed, fascist grifter, we will likely take few of these. Aside from our not-for-profit status, we understand that the problem isn't any one person -- no matter how vile -- but the life-destroying system of corrupt corporate oligarchy that produces and foists such terrible and limited choices on us a like a cynical scripted shell game. What this underscores is the desperate need for systemic change -- for revolution. That requires building a critical mass which includes all of us.

This journal exists as an interactive project but its ultimate goal is outreach in building that critical mass. Our co-workers and neighbors, no matter their views, are our brothers and sisters. Their lives and experiences are reflected in our pages as well. As a cultural venue which focuses on those issues and experiences we can shape attitudes as well as educate perspectives. Thus, we remain apart from the partisan narratives which serve to cultivate division and animosity.

This project depends ultimately on you. This is not limited to strong writing but, by necessity, includes the support that allows us to keep publishing and getting your words out there. As a print on paper journal, those words last. We have over 27 years of issues still circulating and hopefully making a difference.

This is our annual fundraising issue. We understand how tough the times are but anything you can donate makes a difference and helps keep this journal going even as rising prices make it more of a challenge. We thank you in advance for your dedication, generosity, your feedback and your writing.

Tuesday, December 12, 2023

Fall 2023 Editorial

This issue emerges in maddening times. As I write this, the Israeli slaughter of Palestinians, triggered by a brutal uprising of oppressed desperation, continues in Gaza as well as in the occupied West Bank with avid support and weapons supplied by our country's leaders. Tens of thousands, mostly women and children, are already dead with civilian homes, unembedded journalists, and hospitals being prime targets. And the bombs keep dropping. Our corporate embedded media continues to whip up emotion laden nonsense to encourage popular support. Most of us are not buying it. Your editors, as well as progressive Jewish groups, are standing with Palestine against this genocide, joining the call for a end to the nightmare and a long overdue just resolution.

Our country is presently engaged in military actions in 78 countries, spending trillions on weapons for a blood-soaked delusion of competitive hegemony. Meanwhile we struggle just to buy groceries, to pay for price-gouged medicines and rents. Our own corrupt country is increasingly plagued by toxic industrial accidents, police violence, and mass shootings made worse by media hysteria far removed from reality along with the cultivation of divisive partisan rhetoric.

The poems in this collection show how much we have in common as we labor under the scrutiny of bosses, consume toxic food and water, and struggle with bills. Poems in this issue deal with discrimination and homelessness as well as the pride of working in caring professions and the disgust with useless work under bad conditions we do just to survive day to day.

This issue marks the beginning of our 27th year of publishing. An ad that we regularly run for back issues (of which we have plenty) states, "Unfortunately Still Timely." As I sometimes look back at old issues, I was recently struck by how relevant -- even more today -- an issue from Summer 2003 remains. Though this was a great collection we remain proud to have published, it's continuing relevance is more than just disturbing. It is also very discouraging if not demoralizing.

Some poems in this issue struggle with whether our protests and resistance even matter in the face of overwhelming odds and the stubbornly deaf power of the corrupt monstrosity of our seemingly insane ruling class. They affirm, based in our own working class history, as well as continuing labor victories, that it absolutely does matter; that we lose when we give in to hopelessness, cynicism or the cultivated division that isolates and disempowers us. Given the impending climate catastrophe, the danger of growing wars and of nuclear war that threatens our existence, we, like Palestinians, have no choice but to struggle for our own survival against the same entrenched, corporate militarized power.

We remain grateful for your support, for the strong words and poetry sent and to be able to continue publishing in spite of rising prices and postal rates. As a poem by Cathy Porter notes, "Poetry can't solve a damn thing/ but readers can/And we must.

Sunday, September 24, 2023

Summer 2023 Editorial

This hottest summer on record comes in a year of continuing climate disasters as oceans heat to record temperatures and fires sweep the world. NOAA measurements show a record growth of heat-trapping methane emissions since 2019-20, While much of the rise in atmospheric methane then and since comes from fracking and from a thawing tundra, it cannot be separated from the disastrous sabotage and destruction of the Nordstream pipeline which released many thousands of tons of it into the atmosphere, exacerbating a feedback loop of increased methane, which in the past has lead to global extinction.

The Nordstream pipeline sabotage is an iconic example of the inseparability of war and climate destruction. Even the horrific flooding in Libya is a direct result, not only of climate chaos, but of the war waged on Libya by the US and NATO and the resulting lack of leadership and infrastructure maintenance that followed. Just as NATO wrought havoc on Libya, it continues to do so in Ukraine. Jens Stoltenberg, NATO Secretary General recently admitted, the Russian invasion was a direct and forewarned result of NATO expansion in the region.

The United States continues to be a juggernaut of global chaos and destruction. Why has this become so? Primarily because the rampant corporate corruption that has made a hollow joke of our representative democracy is driven by an obsession for global control of resources and economic hegemony at any expense. At this point in history, every military action and every war is a war against the planet and against the future of life on earth.

The poets in this collection understand that -- from our own country, wracked by cultivated partisan division, to the global community of nations, our only hope for survival as a species lies in peace, cooperation and unified action on the issues which threaten our survival, from climate action to health.

Poems in this issue also describe both the brutal alienation of being disposable, nameless commodities to the pride as well as identification we can take in our professions. They focus on the crushing and deadly exploitation we face, worse for immigrants and now children, and on the rising unity and fight-back which result. The class unity possible was recently demonstrated by a country music hit "Rich Men North of Richmond" which, while problematic, touches on the seething working class anger at corporate politicians who make our lives more harrowing even as they poison us and destroy the world to enrich themselves even further.

Beyond summer, this is a season of growing, militant working class struggle. The UAW is on strike against greedy corporations. This strike may well spread to other industries and to teachers under attack by the extreme-right. Climate protests against fossil feul profiteers continue as well.

Due to overt and utter corruption, we working and poor find ourselves stuck between an extreme right party looking to attack children, the elderly, the ill, women, the non-binary and minorities, and a corporate "centrist" party pushing to make war on the rest of the world. The insanity of warmongering and ecocide is the direct result of bipartisan corporate dominance.

The union struggles we are seeing must grow to a struggle against deadly corporate domination of our government -- against capitalism itself. Culture must play a major part in inspiring that necessary growth and class unity. We are grateful for the continuing efforts of our best working class poets and writers and for being able to do our part in this vital struggle for life and for authentic, working class democracy.

Wednesday, June 28, 2023

Note to Subcribers

As some have been informed, though we are running behind, the Blue Collar Review is in production and will be out shortly. Our website has been updated. This unfortunate delay is due to difficult diversions from printer issues to whether realted house damage. My wife had cardiac surgery on the 16th and at the same day, a tornadic storm damaged some of the roof of our house and home office. Meanwhile, our printer died halfway though printing this issue. Thanks to reder support, it was replaced with a new one. As a result of added expenses we are extending our annual fund drive. Donations can also be made on our website

Saturday, June 24, 2023

Spring Editorial 2023

As spring turns to summer for the old, the young, the jobless, those with jobs, and the struggling majority of us, these have been mean times. Poems in this issue describe the pride we take in our work as well as the terrifying insecurity and degradation that haunts wage labor.

With spring comes Worker's Memorial Day. We are always conscious of the inherent danger of the workplace and remember those lost or injured. Most of us know someone injured on the job if it isn't ourselves. Poems by Lyle Estill, John Zedolik and Ada Negri, as translated by Thomas Feeney, describe workplace injuries. We also have in this collection, poems of resistance to the workplace threats of harm and to the unlivable pay and limits placed by government assistance that impact our health, our lives beyond the workplace, and our chances of being injured on the job. And now, as Mary Franke's poem "May Day 2023" informs us, child labor is back.

Though we are not a "prison magazine" we understand that the vast majority of people incarcerated in our brutal prison system are working class and, that beyond neglect and mistreatment, they are also used as slave labor. When a person is imprisoned, entire families are injured as well. We are glad to publish some of the poems and prose we receive from inside the penal system and for the writers to know they are alive and heard in the world beyond the walls and towers.

Interest rates, utilities, groceries, rents and the general cost of living remain artificially high, pushed by price gouging now labeled "greedflation." As billions of dollars continue to flow to the Pentagon and arms industries, assistance for families, food stamps, and Medicare are being cut and we are left to struggle for basics. As a poem by Cathy Porter reminds us, many are forced to choose between food and medicines. Our staff of hard-hit retirees is no exception and has been further impacted by a recent freak storm which damaged our home and office. The unfolding climate catastrphe increasingly threatens our overstrained lives and scarce shelter. If that isn't bad enough, our printer died halfway through doing this issue. Thanks to your support, it was replaced with a new one.

We are in hard times but we have not given up as a journal or as a class. From escalating labor and civil rights struggles to the fight against gender bigotry and climate destructon we continue to fight for our lives against the most reactionary political representatives of the corporatocacy. We fight those who want to kill nutritional assistance, even for children, to cut medical access and to de-fund our hard-earned Social Security upon which the elderly and infirm depend.

As the ecocidal insanity of our ruling class advances us daily toward the twin catastrophes of climate collapse and nuclear war, our only chance is to unite beyond cultivated partisan divisions, ethnic and gender identities, and misbegotten natonalisms for our own common survival. In this regard and in light of our seasonal war-revering holidays, we must replace the obsolete idea of "patriotism" or loyalty to our country, with the planetary consciousness of Matriotism, or loyalty to our earth mother. This requires understanding how interdependent all life on our world is, how inseparable our fate, and how threatened we are by capitalism and competitive nation-state gangsterism.

In our final poem in this collection, Marge Piercy writes, "and so we're changing it almost to something better." As our struggle continues we are grateful for the support which has kept us in print."

Saturday, March 25, 2023

Winter 2022-23 Editorial

This winter has seen our working class and our earth under continuous attack. The crimes of commerce and the insane barbarity of war cannot be disconnected. The sabotage and destruction of a major Russian undersea pipeline by our country, as exposed by noted investigative journalist Sy Hersh, unleashed 75 miles of pressurized methane into our atmosphere; a crime against the earth that dangerously exacerbates an existential climate crisis already on the breaking point. In our own country, due to years of continuous deregulations, we witness numerous train derailings including the historic toxic disaster in the working class neighborhood of East Palestine, Ohio. This disaster is especially notable for the presence of phosgene - or "nerve gas" along with other deadly, long lasting pollutants. We have to ask why? Stewart Acuff's poem, "Sacrifice Zones" gets to the nitty-gritty that we are all living in toxic sacrifice zones for the enrichment of ruling corporations.

And now, due to deregulation, the banks are failing -- again. Unlike the rest of us, buried in debt just to survive, they will be bailed out -- again.

The poems in this issue describe the bleak realities of life for our laboring, and post-laboring class. We are stuck in a broken system of utter corruption ruled by two corporate parties; one devolved into blatant brutal fascism, and the other run by and for major industries and the casino of finance. This now obvious reality is inspiring resistance from peace activists, workers, women and the other-gendered under assault by religious fanatics and connected fascists. The latter assaults have been labeled a "culture war" by our embedded corporate media. Culture matters and we, as poets and writers play a major role in this struggle. Our words matter more than ever.

This is our annual fundraising issue. We're gratified to be told by readers how moved they are and how their lives have been changed by this humble journal over the last quarter century. Each issue, passed from hand to hand or in treasured collections, continues to affect perspectives. Still, we operate on a meager budget and the costs of everything, from postage to paper and supplies, has risen. Your editors, being near destitute retirees, cannot afford to do this without your support. In this issue you will find a donation slip. We are more than grateful for your support, your words and for the community of poets and writers who continue to be a part of this project.

The final poems in this issue are a post-pandemic wake-up call for many of us who have been stunned into depressed isolation by the pandemic, by the growing threat of impending nuclear annihilation, and by an unfolding climate catastrophe. The latter are a product of the fossil thinking of a leadership blinded by corporate loyalties and myopic delusions of global hegemony. Silence and inaction only benefit the vested destroyers of life and of the living world. As our closing poem, "Apology" by Bill Ayres reminds us, only we, those still alive, can turn this reality around. When awakened united and active around common issues, we are the vast majority and can shut this destructive juggernaut of profit obsessed corruption down. Awakening our class brothers and sisters beyond the disempowering divisions cultivated by our ruling class and rebuilding a culture of militant solidarity is the raison d'etre of this journal. We remain dedicated to continuing to publish words and poetry that matter. We thank you in advance for your support and for the immense power of your words.

Saturday, December 24, 2022

Fall 2023 Editorial

Autumn is a time of coming together with family and friends, a time of celebration and of battening down for the rigors of winter. This winter is made harder for us by an economy impacted by pandemic, war, and price gouging.

As corporate politicians gladly dole out another $857 Billion for weapons production and the escalation of a dangerous war, child poverty grows and rent-gouging leaves more of us hungry, homeless, criminalized and disenfranchised. As Senator Ocasio-Cortez recently pointed out regarding the latest weapons spending, $20 Billion could end homelessness, and child poverty could be reduced by half for $90 Billion -- far less than the money spent on weapons and war -- and far more controversial in a corporate oligarchy where business agendas and global hegemony are prioritized and citizen needs come last. Our lives remain endangered in a country saturated with guns. Mass shootings are a near daily occurrence. Our ruling class is more dedicated to our right to kill each other than to our rights to have healthcare, education, homes, or even sick leave in a continuing pandemic.

Who speaks for us? A few labor unions and a handful of elected progressives are not enough. We must speak for ourselves as a class. The poets in this issue do just that.

Some in this collection are nostalgic but, as Adrienne Rich once wrote, "nostalgia is the flip side of amnesia." We must see the past clearly to learn from it, whether on working conditions and labor history or on the realities of racism and sexism which continue to stifle so many lives.

We are living in a time when our systems and our lives are being held hostage by empowered corporate interests. We are divided by corporate parties, that rhetoric aside, agree more than disagree when in comes to priorities that harm us for the benefit of profiteers.

In the next few months our nation will likely be held hostage by overt right Republicans who have stated their intent to block any budget that doesn't include cutting, destroying or privatizing Social Security and Medicare. Center-right Democrats could have raised the debt ceiling to prevent this, but have refused to do so; nor have they stood with workers striking for sick leave they themselves feel entitled to. We, especially the poor and the elderly, must fight for our ability to live as profits for connected corporations such as big insurance, fossil fuel companies, pharmaceutical giants, and military industries reap record profits at our very real expense.

At the same time, we see an escalation in working class fight-back from teachers, railroad workers, students and climate activists. As working people, we know we can trust corporate parties and politicians to screw us. When we are left to choose lesser evils in elections, we are always the losers. We need to be active and united beyond elections. This must include massive protests, labor actions, building a progressive workers' party, and consideration of a national strike.

This journal continues to seek to unify working people around issues that affect us all, and to foster a class perspective which makes unity possible. We recognize the power of culture to shape perspectives and the potential strength of our unified class to disempower the destructive rule of self-serving corporate power. We are more than grateful for the poets and writers who join us in this effort. May this season of coming together shape our struggles in the coming year.

Monday, October 17, 2022

Correction

In the recent issue, the poem "Poets Supporting Nazis" is by Dale Jacobson and waa mis-attributed to Dale Johnson -- an honest typo. It is correct in the contents listing. I love this poem and feel bad about the error.


Poets Supporting Nazis


It could be someone named Victoria Nuland
did not orchestrate a coup in Ukraine in 2014
for someone named Obama, the murderer of Libya.

It could be Obama's henchwoman never said
"fuck the EU" when deciding Ukraine's new government
after she and her Nazis dumped the old one.
And then she didn't give them cookies.

It could be no threats were made,
no assassinations were ordered,
water was not shut down to Crimea
the same as Israel does to Palestinians

and no collective punishment happened,
fifty souls were not burned alive by Nazis in Odessa,
the people of Donbas were not shelled for eight years,
and they did not die, and a comedian strutting tyrant
did not make all parties except Nazis illegal.

It could be the United States of Liars did not lie
despite all previous tradition of lying well.

It could be the U.S. did not break its word,
and NATO did not expand from 17 nations to 30
up to Russia's border with its missiles and bombs.

It could be that these U.S. poets really cared
about the peoples of Ukraine dying
(though not those of Donbas or Crimea,
where math also died) and they were not
poor historians who blamed Stalin, 68 years dead,
or the Red Army that no longer existed,
the one that defeated Nazis in World War II.

It could be these poets cared enough about words,
they protested loudly, or even a little,
when Ukraine outlawed Russian music and books
though a third of its people speak their own
Russian tongue. No more Tolstoy, Pushkin,
Dostoyevsky. It could be these poets
did not ignore that the U.S. is an empire
that starts wars in defense of greater wealth
for the empire, and that it started this one in 2014,
and these poets were not dizzy in praising Nazis
because they were told Nazis were heroes
and were not Nazis, even though the Nazis
said they were. O yeah. It could be
they condemned Obama's murder of Libya.

It could be.
But it wasn't.

-- Dale Jacobson

Sunday, September 18, 2022

Summer Editorial 2022

This summer has been marked by fires, floods, severe drought, famine and pestilence, by escalating global social conflict and war. None of these can be separated from each other and all are connected by and to an economic system of exploitation and global competition for control of resources. In our own country and others, social stresses and rising citizen demands have given rise to fascist, as well as progressive movements.

Fascism is the defensive reaction of corporate oligarchy to rising citizen demands for inclusion and for citizen interests when they challenge corporate profits and dominance. It is the brutal rule of corporate power using hyper-nationalism, fear, religion, disinformation, division and hatreds to rally popular support among the less informed.

Due to U.S. expansion of the conflict in Ukraine we now find ourselves closer to nuclear annihilation than any time since the Cuban missile crisis. The Ukraine leadership, a result of U.S. meddling, is proudly and overtly fascist. Russia's leadership under Putin is also a corrupt, neo-Tsarist variety of fascism. The US/NATO stoking of a proxy war in this nuclearized region is the height of myopic arrogance that further endangers the world with no hope for a positive outcome. This deadly conflict must end, not be made any worse.

American workers are struggling with price-gouging, poverty, stagnant wages, the least accessible healthcare in the developed world, pandemic levels of gun violence, continuing institutional racism, and growing attacks on women's rights. We are appalled that addressing public-health and safety issues are seen as questionable expenses while repeated record-breaking money for war and weapons sales continues without question.

U.S. funding of war and aggressive actions are not limited to Ukraine as we see from recent visits and $1.8 Billion in weapons sales to Taiwan in violation of agreements with China, drone attacks in Somalia, and continued arming and funding of Israeli apartheid and Saudi aggression. These are the fascist priorities of an aggressor state vested in endless war; as Martin Luther King opined, the greatest purveyor of violence on the planet.

The contributors in this summer issue understand the growing threat of competitive corporate dominance, of fascism and war, especially in this time of climate emergency. Close to 80% of working people support universal healthcare, climate action, voting rights, and women's reproductive freedom. These priorities are subverted by corporate media and politicians funded by big business interests whose priorities are legislated at the expense of our freedoms, our health, and the future of life on earth.

Democracy, unlike fascism, is defined by authentic public participation. Getting there from here is a continuing struggle upon which our rights and existence depend. The majority of us understand the level of rot and corruption that cripples democracy, sickening our country and world for the enrichment of a few like an insatiable parasite. We must actively stand against war and oppression and for priorities of sustenance. We must vote and we must work to unite our progressive majority in the struggle to end military aggression, war and criminally corrupt, globally destructive corporate dictatorship. This issue completes twenty-five years of publication. We are grateful to be able to continue doing our part to demonstrate and encourage a mindset of social and class solidarity necessary to our struggle for a livable world and for authentic democracy.

Saturday, June 25, 2022

Spring 2022 Editorial

For many decades our country has been engaged in one war or another to feed our weapons-based economy and to expand U.S. corporate hegemony. We have trained foreign nationals, along with our own soldiers, in torture and murder methods. They have perpetrated terrible violence around the world. The violence we do elsewhere, the culture of violence we are sold, and the minds scarred by it have come home with a vengeance.

As spring turns to summer this collection looks back on a season of violence. Our country continues to supply weapons of war to Ukraine and to fund the Pentagon at record levels even as funding for citizen needs is challenged as too costly. Yet we are less safe. Medical care remains unaffordable for many. Prices are rising and mass shootings have become a near daily event.

As working people, we continue to suffer the daunting violence of poverty, terror of landlords, bill collectors, and the added trauma of rising prices on rent, groceries and essentials. We, whose hands make and repair the physical world, we who create the wealth we rarely see have little or no representation or voice in decisions that affect our daily lives. This reality fosters disempowering cynicism as well as anger often twisted against our real interests by corporate politicians and media.

With our ability to live increasingly threatened by the realities of climate collapse and economic hardship made worse by corruption and war, a rise in citizen activism is upon us. Progressive forces like the Poor People's Campaign, organized labor, women's rights, climate action groups and demands for sane gun control are growing -- as are the extreme-right forces of violent reaction.

Poems in this collection focus on poverty, labor struggles, and on the devaluing of, and impact on, children in our corrupt corporate oligarchy. Children suffer inordinately from the criminal irresponsibility of political opportunism and arrogant class disregard. Poems like "Torta" by Hector Jimenez, "The Milk of Dreams" by Mary Franke, and "Children of the Estate" by Paul Barron speak of the hunger and abuse children experience.

Violence driven by bigotry is a continuing foundational American reality as described in "American Pestilence" by Stewart Acuff and "Narrow was the Way" by Marge Piercy. The scapegoating and targeting of people based on perceived differences is meant to divide us, diverting the focus of our frustration and rage from those who perpetrate vicious, unrelenting injustice upon us to our class brothers and sisters. Added to the targets of hate are Trans and gender non-binary people. As a class, our struggle demands transcending such prejudices and creating our own justice rooted in our common issues and interests.

Working class literature exists to make us more aware of the commonality or our shared class experience and to strengthen the social solidarity we need to have a voice and to create authentic democracy. We are happy to be able to present fresh voices in this issue and hope to see the continuing growth of our readership. We are deeply grateful for the support of the community of readers and contributors which has allowed us to continue publishing. Together, out of our unique genius and the fruits of our connected experience, we can inspire the construction of a just and livable future that is ours.

Tuesday, March 22, 2022

Winter 2021-22 issue Editorial

As with climate change, capitalism is inseparable from war, a barbarous crime always inflicted on our working class. The horror in Ukraine is largely a result of 8 years of U.S. meddling and efforts to expand NATO, an aggressive, U.S.-led military bloc, to Russia's border in spite of previous agreements and warnings. Though this does not and cannot justify Russia's monstrous actions, our further involvement may quickly escalate to global nuclear annihilation. We, living at Ground Zero, hope to survive long enough to get this issue out.

Many of us are having terrifying flashbacks to the cold war. People in places like Baghdad, Panama City, Beirut, Belgrade, Afghanistan, Gaza and elsewhere are reliving the visceral terror of being bombed. Unlike Ukrainian victims ubiquitous our media, we did not see such coverage of them.

As working people, the inevitable targets of every ruling class dispute, we stand against war and the escalation of war. The horrors inflicted on Ukraine, Yemen and elsewhere make clear the barbarity of military solutions and the necessity of abolishing nuclear weapons. The UN Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons, already ratified by 86 countries, demonstrates that this is possible. Our security and survival as a species requires global cooperation and an end to corporate nation-states fighting for control of resources, especially oil and gas -- again.

The poets in this issue have had enough: enough on the job abuse, enough commercialism and the commodification and extortion of our most basic needs, enough of racism, sexism, xenophobia, militarism and of the murderous, lying hypocrisy of corrupt corporate oligarchy feeding on destruction and disaster. Poems in this issue confront cultural discrimination as well as wrestling with our unchosen places and complicity in the web of racism that defines U.S. society. This includes the struggle against cultural arrogance that seeks to oppress other languages and those who speak them. Other poems speak of the accumulated loneliness and difficulties of the pandemic and question what the "new normal" will be. Especially relevant is a long poem by Davida Kilgore titled, Normal is Just a Setting on the Dryer, which gets to the root of our deeper national disease. Also prominent are poems and prose on the poisoning of poor and Black communities for profit by fossil fuel corporations in Louisiana's "cancer ally" and their power over elected legislators.

These are the kind of poems, the kind of collection, that you will likely not find in other literary magazines and journals, though we wish that were not the case. This is a not-for-profit collective effort funded by our subscribers and supporters. Our staff subsists with difficulty on Social Security. We couldn't afford to do this on our own. This is made more difficult as our copy-editor and spouse of Al, our editor, is recovering from a recent mild but significant stroke. As the price of everything, including postal rates, continues to rise, your support is even more important. This is our fundraising issue and we more than appreciate your support as well as your writing and your input.

A hard winter bears the promise of spring. Let us work for an end to war and against the continuing destruction of our world by the profiteering gangsterism of corporate state power and the blind, murderous, bigoted nationalism they promote to justify their existence and their crimes at our expense. Let us together continue to shape a culture of sanity, of empathy and of solidarity toward the creation of a better world.

Tuesday, December 28, 2021

Fall 2021 Editorial

This collection emerges in a time when every system, from healthcare to education, from the Post Office to the Congress, is broken and dysfunctional and everyone knows it. Yet we live day to day with the pretense of a functional society. This condition has been called "hyper-normalization" and has preceded collapse or revolution. The pandemic continues to take a heavy toll with over 800,000 dead in the U.S. and hospitals overwhelmed. The rise of viral variants from the unvaccinated and from globally uneven access to vaccines underscores how deeply connected we all are on this small world. We breathe each others' breaths even as we labor for the same companies.

The deaths of so many workers has impacted the supply chains for production and shipping of goods. The deadly demands of employers have set off many labor actions and strikes with continuing attempts to organize Amazon and Starbucks. There were strikes at Kelloggs and John Deere with victories won against "2 Tier" exploitation of newer hires.

As congressional corporate representatives hold back already compromised spending on needed climate action, healthcare expansion, and support for child care, a record $770 Billion was given to the Pentagon without argument, debate or terrified warnings of inflation. Weapons and endless aggression remain the bipartisan priority.

We also face the continuing rise of fascism. Heavily armed and organized fanatics, some of whom were involved in the January coup attempt, are driven by disinformation media which few other countries would tolerate and which would not have been allowed in our own country before media deregulation which began in the 1980's. The Biden administration and corporate democrats are unwilling to pull the plug on this brainwashing program of cultivated fascist incitement to insurrection by reactivating historic limits on media. The problem for them is not the rise of fascism which serves and strengthens corporate power. More concerning for them is maintaining public confidence in the pretense of continuing functional government because, like Wall Street, corporate rule is a confidence game. It would collapse without public confidence in its legitimate authority -- which daily wanes.

A large majority of us oppose fascism war and corruption. Most of us support living wages, progress on climate mediation, child care support, universal medical access and labor rights. Many find our voice and discover our power when united in labor struggles and in organizing on issues which affect us. It is in such struggles where we learn that corporate power blocks every attempt to enact the needed changes we demand. No government run by vested interests is capable of serving public interests if they conflict with corporate profits. Such change can and must come from us; from an awakened working class, active and united in our own interests. That is why so much effort is made to keep us divided.

The poets in this collection see through the phony shilling of corporate embedded media and the deadly global aggression of an empire obsessed with and dependent on military might and endless war. Herein are poems of struggle, from tenant actions, civil disobedience and resistance, to racism militarism, war, and the legal misogyny of anti-choicers threatening a return to past oppressions. Only together do we have any chance of a livable future. Our words have power. Thet can serve as inspiration and outreach but that requires people seeing them. If you can, pass this journal around or leave it where others can find it.