Who amongst us is not moved by the courage of the Ukrainian people as they defend their nation from the ruthless Russian onslaught?
My deep empathy and respect was heightened a few days ago when I received a moving email from Vyacheslav Konoval, a Ukrainian poet. Slava (short for Vyacheslav) told me his work “is devoted to the most pressing social problems of our time, such as poverty, ecology, relations between the people and the government.......... and now war.”
In the United States of the 19th century, poetry too played a unique role in our history. It was the American Walt Whitman who believed that the power of poetry and democracy came from an ability to make a unified whole out of dissipated parts.
And so when Slava wrote to me and asked for The Fulcrum to publish a few of his poems I agreed without hesitation, for it is my hope that the imagery of Slava’s words will intimately connect us to the plight of his fellow Ukrainians in a way that other mediums simply cannot do.
Painful condition
Once on Thursday, I woke up weak,
having been covered with a warm quilt,
with a merciless temperature,
I am dying, and I am bleak.
Like a pendulum,
hearing the run of strikes in the clock’s click.
Laying in bed, I had exhausted from the undead,
I am similar to a sickly chick.
Contemplate on the white pills,
that had become the color of capitulation.
Please, God, stop all human ills,
overcome the pains, and be a healthy nation.
Fear of tankers
Sluggish frost on the grass
a crawling caterpillar in the dewdrops,
Serhiy's crew is preparing the papers, a military pass.
Leaving the fore post,
steel power hums on the battlefield,
in the funnels of mortars disappears like a ghost.
A projectile flies, blind,
sows the earth, bang sound, raises the ground,
be careful, defenders, don't lose your mind.
The battery beats
stench and embers crept into the forest,
thank God that the tank has 4 seats.
Enemy tanks hung their noses,
the wind spies on the sounds of the shafts,
our tank is hunt,
we will see, there will be iron roses.
One of our tanks to ten of them,
Is that justice?
The trunks of tanks, the oak stems.
Nightmare of Russians
A green bush crunches,
a rut winding in the field,
the cabin compartment opens,
the machine will fry enemies like delicious lunches.
HIMARS, power even in words,
a storm of night fires,
countries in queues behind the car, buyers.
Six shells fly in a line,
the rocket buzzes sharply,
the night turned into day
in the sky, with tongues of fire, shines.
The occupiers moan and cry,
HIMARS beat equipment and supplies,
nothing more to attack
but You, a Russian soldier, live in a lie.
Bohdana, she is a woman, a defender!
Holy Mother of God,
that gave knowledge with mother’s milk,
to create a wonderful fighting machine,
with a cabin and a crew, their number is odd.
The car has an affectionate name, Bohdana,
as a tribute to the designer’s bride
Bohdana is preparing rockets, is in a hurry,
she confidently leads the gunners as a guide.
Six shots up
kilometers of volleys count in the distance,
the captain looks calmly,
his black coffee is not yet ripe
coffee in a cup.
Bohdana throws shells from a cannon,
like a naughty girl
ready-made artillery stories for the grandson.
Bohdana, the reactive system,
spotted by an enemy howitzer,
the soldiers praise you as the goddess Aphrodite,
I am glad that I became a co-author.
Ukrainian Coolon
Iron needles are falling to the right and to the left,
the master holds the welding machine menacingly,
near his sledgehammer instrument lies, own, without theft,
sad, the equipment of the soldiers is bad, depressing.
Had a business, the master before the war,
boasts an electric car,
grief opened him a new purpose like a front door,
a cut is visible on his hands, and then there is a scar.
A tireless worker gathered a cohort of inventors,
turned workshops and garages into industrial centers,
construction jeeps leave the assembly line,
soldiers say that jeeps are fine.The guys assemble 20 cars in 10 days quickly,
knots, aggregates in machines are prickly,
16 hours per day, garage jeeps assemble,
the thought of volunteering makes my soul tremble.
U.S. President Donald Trump speaks during a“ Steel Across America” event ahead of the 25th anniversary of the Sept. 11th attacks on the Ellipse near the White House on Sept. 8, 2026 in Washington, D.C. President Trump welcomed 9/ 11 first responders to the Tunnel to Towers Foundation’ s“ Steel Across America” event featuring a 16,900- pound, 21- foot steel beam recovered.
For Trump, even 9/11 is an opportunity
There was a reason organizers of the 9/11 ceremony in Manhattan told President Trump he could not speak at this year’s memorial service.
A good one, it turns out.
Because in a speech he gave on Tuesday in Washington, he did exactly what they were presumably worried about — he made it about himself.
According to The New York Times, Trump had wanted a speaking role at the service, but the National Sept. 11 Memorial and Museum, which oversees the site, said no, as they’ve maintained for the past decade-plus that the venue and event should be nonpartisan.
Trump has long used awful tragedies to either puff himself up, trash political opponents, or sell lies to the American people.
He blamed a deadly plane crash at Washington National Airport last year on diversity, equity and inclusion policies. He blamed Puerto Ricans for the devastation they endured after Hurricane Maria in 2017. He reportedly considered withholding disaster relief after the California wildfires based on the way affected regions voted. In an interview on Fox News meant to commemorate the 75th anniversary of D-Day in Normandy, he used the occasion to slam former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi…with graves of the dead behind him.
And now, as we approach the 25th anniversary of what many New Yorkers consider the darkest day in modern history, Trump has done it again.
He told a rambling, nonsensical story — one he’s told before — about going to Ground Zero just after terrorists flew two commercial jets into the twin towers. In the story, which no one has been able to verify, despite multiple attempts, he says firefighters had to carry him out of One Liberty Plaza, also known as the U.S. Steel Building, because they thought it was about to collapse.
As CNN fact checker Daniel Dale notes, there’s no evidence Trump went into this building, especially at a time when NYPD and NYFD had locked down the area. There’s no evidence that building was collapsing — in fact, it was deemed structurally sound and reopened within two months of the attacks. There’s no evidence he was carried out of it by firefighters.
But the lie isn’t even the worst part. Pretend it was all true — why would the leader of our country, and a New Yorker, decide to make that tragic day about himself?
Because that’s who Donald Trump is. He’s a malignant narcissist.
He’s also, incidentally, a terrible and ineffectual president, who’s made ill-fated decisions that he has to keep defending, and there’s nothing he won’t do to make himself look and feel better.
Within the first two minutes of his speech, he was cravenly using 9/11 to justify and promote his dumb war in Iran — two events separated by 25 years and 6,000 miles.
“And I will tell you, we’re right now fighting because we have a certain nation that wanted a nuclear weapon, they were very close to getting it, and now they have no chance at getting it. They will never have a nuclear weapon. Iran will not have a nuclear weapon. And they’ve been punished greatly. As you know, we’ve really taken it to them.”
As a New Yorker who lived through 9/11, still one of the worst days of my life, I’m utterly sickened by Trump’s crass, political, and self-promotional framing of that awful day.
And I’m relieved he won’t be given a platform to do it again on Friday’s anniversary in lower Manhattan.
Because for Trump, everything is his for the taking, and absolutely nothing is sacred.
S.E. Cupp is the host of "S.E. Cupp Unfiltered" on CNN.