Monthly Archives: October 2026

Poetry Drawer: Hangovers: History of Spanking: Late Night Martini Talk: Legions of Angels: Cornucopia by Vern Fein

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Hangovers

A world-wide experience–
Perhaps cave dwellers
quaffed remedies like mastodon blood
for the pain of sloshing down boozes.
The Roman poet Pliny–ate fried canaries,
raw owls eggs – but died of fumes from Pompeii.
Birds may be the key – the Assyrians
in the time of the cruel Sennacherib,
who was certainly a drunk, chewed
ground bird beaks mixed with myrrh.
In medieval times, maybe even the monks
slurped raw eels and cracked bitter almonds.
Placidly the Chinese sipped green tea – and still do.
Maybe the worst, Mongolians recovered with pickled sheep’s eyes.
But the Japanese only pickled savoury plums.
The good old Wild West – Prairie oysters, raw egg yolks
Worcestershire sauce, Tabasco sauce, salt, and pepper.
A football player I knew slugged down five yolks daily
before he was thrown off the team.
You might want to avoid Puerto Rican bars,
cuz of their preventive deodorant—
lemon slices under armpits.
Bloody Marys are quite common now,
but Hemingway downed Bloody Beer.
I’m sure there are many more, maybe you have a favourite?

But if you’re a lush, a souse, a binger,
no matter– none of them work.
So you’re sitting at your special bar
or home with your favourite elixirs.
You know, you know, damn well you know–
The best and only cure is to cork the bottle.
Good luck!

History of Spanking

Mrs. Furness, my second grade teacher,
long dead now, told my mother,
“If I believed in geniuses, he is one.”
Made me her pet, skinny me, buck teeth,
owl glasses, unruly cowlick,
left in charge of the class
when Mrs. F. went to the Ladies Room.

Watched over her desk, stopped
kids from messing around.
Janie did, despite my protests,
stuck out her tongue.
Class clown, tipped over
the inkwell on all the papers,
fled to her desk just in time.

“Who did this!.” screeched Mrs. F.
“Who did this!,” spit my name.

I was mute. Janie and the class
prayed I would not tattle.

What would the kids do?
Push me off the monkey bars?
Flip me off the Teeter-Totter?
Refuse to play?
Billy once spit on Stuart.

Mrs. F., arms akimbo, glared:
“Either you tell who
or I call your Father.”
Terror squeaked out, ”Janie.”

She dragged her up front,
flashed her ruler, whipped her,
ripped her dress,
sent her to the office,
the class yelled, cried, glared.

It is said: Spare the rod, spoil the child.
And they spanked, switched
and whipped, even beat
until Dr. Spock—the Dr. Seuss for butts—
said: Wrong thing to do.

In Texas, they allow paddling again.
Triumphant Mrs. F., arms akimbo,
smiles down from above.

Late Night Martini Talk

In 1981, a noted editor,
martini under a small lamp,
yawned, turned the manuscript over,
snapped off the light,
Took the last sip, tongued the olive,
went to bed, after signing
the letter informing
Gabriel Marquez his story
submitted to the New Yorker
would not be accepted.

Marquez won the Nobel Prize in ’82.
I suspect that same editor
is now quietly sipping a martini
by that same lamp, intoning,“I fucking
rejected, Gabriel Marquez,”
nodding, “I fucking…”

My story was rejected by said mag
last year. I suspect martinis ahead
for another poor fool.

Legions of Angels

Though many think Him deranged,
insane—healed lepers, walked on water,
dispelled demons, raised his friend
from the dead, then, the same for Him,
most would not call Jesus a liar.
Intimate with attending angels ,
famished and broken in the desert
when they rushed to minister to Him

He responded to Pilate—
If He asked the Father,
God would send forth
twelve legions of angels,
(approximately 5,000 x 12 = 60,000),
to rescue Him right then and there,
eschew the blood and pain and death
of the old rugged Cross—
was He scared or out of His mind?

Instead, if He spoke Truth—
indeed, when released to return,
He will be joined by those angelic Beings—
horses charging from the sky,
brandishing swords and fire.
Understand the difference
between Truth and falsehood,
between reality and illusion
and know that a great cloud of witnesses
will burst forth with legions and legions
of angels and others—soon.

Cornucopia

You can’t slip and fall on sunshine.
Wagon trains never go East.
Weeds don’t know they’re weeds.
I didn’t know flowers went to Heaven.
Nailing my heart to the roof of my mind.
Bull in a china shop and you are the china.
Shoving toothpicks into the cuticle of your soul.
Sludge of a different colour.
My life is so much thinner than thick.
I was annoyed at the moon.
There is no punctuation in dreams.
Eventually it is naked and sags.
The comedic timing of an owl.
Everything has a penultimate day,
even The End Of The World.

Vern Fein is a retired teacher and community organiser of outreaches to those in need who has decided to write now because Vern has the time and strong inclination to do so. Vern has published a number of poems and short non-fiction pieces.

Books from the Pantry: Flavours by Lori Levy and Neil Leadbeater reviewed by Simon Fletcher

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The cover suggests that ‘here be lemons’ and good company and a sunny clime. All well and good. A slice of Mediterranean life, perhaps. But there are two names on the cover. How is this going to work?

In fact it works very well and the two poets in question Lori Levy, Los Angeles-based but with a second home in Israel, and Neil Leadbeater, a West Midlander who lives in Edinburgh, combine to produce a delightful three-course meal.

Course one is from Lori whose work repays re-reading as I didn’t appreciate the scope or depth of her work on a first perusal. She writes about favourite foods, cookies, for instance, in ‘Mint Milano’:

chocolate mint Milano, a favourite in my family
for five generations. Each bite I take
is a journey back in time to Nana Ceil in New Jersey,
to her humor, her stories, the gold fillings in her teeth.

And then, she takes us forward in this land of familial passion:

They may laugh, but my youngest son heads to the kitchen
when he comes to visit – straight to the cabinet with the treasures,
for he, too, has inherited the mint Milano gene.

Lori writes inspiringly of ‘tilapia, fresh salads, shakshuka, kebabs’ while ‘At the Supermarket in Los Angeles’ and one feels this deep connection with family, over time and in many places. It’s the ‘flavour’ of the food that connects.

Neil Leadbeater is slightly less passionate, as one might expect, and considers, among other things, where food comes from and who grows it. He writes about the farmers, in ‘Grease-banding the Apple Trees’ his own family:

In the last days, we made our way to the trees-
disrobed them of their hay-bands, those coarse bits of
sackcloth that had caught the caterpillar codlin moths
and foxed them at their own game.

He also writes about one of England’s most celebrated cheeses in ‘The Double Gloucesters’, where, at the agricultural show:

Hard-pressed to declare
a winner, judges could not
praise enough their rich
nutty mellow flavours,
their apricot
Lady’s bedstraw yellow,
that mix of milk and cream.

The third course, ‘Dialogue Poems’, is no less rewarding with Lori speculating about what they might do:

If you bring a red-cheeked apple
from the Vale of Evesham,
I promise to come with a slice
of banana cake with pineapple cream.

Neil responds with an act of poetic theft, holding in mind William Carlos Williams’ glorious ‘This is Just to Say’:

I stole downstairs
in the middle of the night
and opened a line from
one of your poems…
took out the passion fruit
and ate it whole.

No forgiveness is required, Neil. It made me smile and it’s a fun and witty envoi to the whole collection. Here are two poets obviously and deliciously enjoying each other’s company. Their focus is ‘food’ and its complex histories but it’s all about the people, for food crosses borders and generations, with love, something we all hunger for at this time. Highly recommended.

Flavours by Lori Levy and Neil Leadbeater is published by Cyberwit.net

Simon Fletcher lives in the Oswestry Hills, Shropshire. He is a widely published and travelled poet who was short-listed for the Michael Marks Environmental Poet of the Year in 2022 and nominated for the Forward Prize (best single poem) in 2024. He’s performed his poetry across Britain, in Pakistan, Germany, Norway, and on BBC Radio. Simon runs poetry writing workshops in green spaces/places and MCs monthly live literature events. He’s also the manager of Offa’s Press. Simon’s pamphlet Wild Orchids, and the Offa’s Press books he has edited, are available at the Offa’s Press shop. Find out more about Simon at www.simonfletcherwriter.com