REALISM POETICS

Strictly speaking, politics is illusion. But in relation to poetry, “political” means realism.
--Tom Hibbard, Introduction to Word For/Word

Word For/Word: A Journal of New Writing is out and it's a "Political Poetry" issue edited by Tom Hibbard.

The *realism* poem I got in it, "The American Nightmare," is a poem I writ in March while I was slogging through the nightmarish days of Bogota, awaiting the final adoption decrees for Michael. 'Twas a time when the newspapers were at high dudgeon coverage of the Great Recession. I thank Tom for pushing me to write a poem, and then presenting it in combination with a very apt painting by Joan Sloan:



(Yo, Ron: Message from this 16-percenter: Bad Link on your bloggie post today as regards the issue...)