The Needle's Eye

Pope Francis is preaching Marxism?

Oh my!

Does that make him a Commie?

And aren't Commies bad?

My oh my!

Doesn't Francis preach the spirit of Jesus?

Oh dear!

Could Jesus have been a Commie?

Dear oh dear!

That would make Jesus bad—

But wait! Who said it?

Uh-huh.

A very rich man.

Who lives in a very rich house.

Who is paid very many millions each year

to speak what's in his mind.

Of course.

And what's in his mind?

©Darrell Petska

Pope is preaching 'pure Marxism'

Darrell Petska retired recently after more than 30 years as an editor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. His poetry appears in a variety of online and print publications.

Sunday review

Monday, confusingly enough, stated with David Mellor's poem "It's Black Friday" which is a cry against the sort of aggressive consumerism that engulfs people from time to time. David gives a message in the poem that is eloquently summed up by this extract.

And that one day

You are “passionate”

About  something

Other than

you.

Tuesday's poem was "end of the bird shooting season" by Philip Johnson which centred on the announcement that Amazon made that it will soon have drones delivering books. I may be wrong but I think Philip welcomes this addition to target richness. Amazon appears to be trying to prove the saying of sales flying out the door.

Laura Taylor provided Wednesday's poem "McGarrigle's Glasgow" which is a wonderful memorial of a poet killed in the helicopter crash in Glasgow. It has some great imagery in it for example

"in the midst of McGarrigle’s Glasgow -

the artists and players, singers and sculptors,

poets and prophets and pipers and drummers

remember the heat of your heart;"

Abi contributed Thursdays poem Knit One, Slip One, Pass the Slipped Stitch Over about Casey Jenkins who is probably not going to be appearing on the Knitting Channel any time soon. "Boring the bloody pants off the rest of us" is very nice word play.

Friday's poem "A Lost Generation" by Mari Maxwell would be one of the more confronting poems I have read on Poetry24 but with absolutely every right to be like that. The incident it describes is extremely shocking. Mari manages to retell horrifc events without pulling punches and yet we don't feel so revolted that we blot it out. It's very well written. The comments for the poem will repay your reading of them too.

Have a good week, may the news muse visit and convince you to send in the results.