In the summer of 2024, Culture Matters put out a call for poetry and artwork related to Donald Trump and Trumpism. Taking the title from WB Yeats’ ‘Second Coming’, the resulting anthology explores the havoc that a second term would unleash on the US and the wider world. With unjust policies, the demonisation of migrants and people of colour, and attacking anyone that tries to hold his feet to the fire, Trump and Trumpism are mistakes that the US cannot afford to make a second time round.

Co-editors Merryn Williams and Rip Bulkeley and others at Culture Matters have fought hard to make this anthology socially useful, an example of Shelley’s dictum that ‘poets are the legislators of the world’. We hope that readers will find laughter in what are some dark times, and that they will know that our solidarity extends over borders.

The contributors to What Rough Beast go for the jugular – the Mexican wall, white supremacism, replacement theory, racism, COVID, the assault on the Capitol, neo-fascism, and the appalling circus of stupidity, ignorance, narcissism, lies and gibberish that Trump and Trumpism spew out.

What Rough Beast is a rich and varied collection, serious and silly, horrified and horrifying, of understatements and exaggerations, parodies and rants, slapstick and analysis of the moral and intellectual crisis in US politics from which Trumpism draws its power.
- Andy Croft, poet and publisher

What Rough Beast is a collective expression of protest. It is a rejection of Trump and the smug inertia that allowed him to slither into our dimension in the first place. The poems, by turns playful, impassioned, and incendiary, show a determination to resist the necrotised supremacy of Trump, Trumpism, and the seemingly unkillable zombie capitalism he represents. With energy and inventiveness, the poems in What Rough Beast keep on swinging, reminding us that although said beast assumes distorted and outlandish proportions, his is a fallible, human power that can and must be overcome.
- Fran Lock

The book is avalable below as a free, downloadable pdf.