a southbound Amtrak

a southbound Amtrak
passenger and mail train gone
when the windows clear



From an NPR news story some time in the early 1990s. One evening I turned on my car radio and the words in the poem were the first thing I heard. Submitted by John Maruskin.

Sinkhole

One of life's greatest certainties
is that the ground is solid
beneath one's feet

so the sudden appearance
of chasms, however small,
is unsettling.




From British sinkhole spike prompts warning, David Shukman, BBC News. Submitted by Angi Holden.

The burn

Boredom makes us do it, that and the chase.
The sun whitens the grass until it's ripe
to burn and then we light it, watch and wait.

The flames take the land, they come and we run.
Us in our shorts, them in their gear, too
clumsy to run but fast because they're men.

We're laughing and falling, stumbling and rolling
safe if not caught, too young to worry
about the dead birds and black landscape.



From Gawain Barnard's photography exhibition, as previewed on A Fine Beginning: Made in Wales, BBC News In Pictures, 14 March 2014. Words omitted: 'and then' (line 4), 'and' (7), 'from the burn' (8), 'broken land' (9). Submitted by Gabriel Smy.

News of the day

Shutdown ends
default dodged

Dodgers refuse
to go quietly



The front page and sports page headlines from the Times Herald-Record, 17th October 2013. Submitted by J R Solonche.

Synopsis

Cambodian rival parties probe Michelle
Knight held captive for a decade 6 Children;

suicide-attack Doctors treat world
police, standoff merchants press, twist settlement;

pre-Islamic Bahrain filming Al Pachino movie,
Chicago building nears completion in Shanghai;

Giant octopus hunting Puget Sound World;
New York selling Boston, Globe; John Henry

deals to buy Boston, Globe, woman, voices, sons,
New Zealand, botulism, the sun set, a northernmost city;

Hollywood baby abandoned; inmates strike against California
archaeologists looking to begin again might be too late.



From the Twitter stream of the Associated Press, 2 August 2013. Some punctuation altered to recreate the ambiguity of a rolling Twitter feed. Submitted by M.K. Sukach.

May the punishment fit the crime

Man
who

altered
our

TV
habits

forever
dies.



A Yahoo! news headline. Submitted by JR Solonche.