{"id":104,"date":"2026-04-07T21:22:44","date_gmt":"2026-04-07T21:22:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/euphemism.illinoisstate.edu\/21-2\/?page_id=104"},"modified":"2026-04-09T17:48:16","modified_gmt":"2026-04-09T17:48:16","slug":"after-the-verdict","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/euphemism.illinoisstate.edu\/21-2\/poetry\/after-the-verdict\/","title":{"rendered":"After the Verdict"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"font-family: 'book antiqua', palatino, serif;font-size: 14pt;color: #003366\">James B. Nicola<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: 'book antiqua', palatino, serif;color: #666699\">When my phone rings now, I do not reply.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: 'book antiqua', palatino, serif;color: #666699\">Not having been there, I won\u2019t even try,<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: 'book antiqua', palatino, serif;color: #666699\">for ill-supported answers are as bad<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: 'book antiqua', palatino, serif;color: #666699\">as lies. En masse, they make a movement mad.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: 'book antiqua', palatino, serif;color: #666699\">You weren\u2019t there either, were you? Then why<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: 'book antiqua', palatino, serif;color: #666699\">answer the question pollsters pose to you<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: 'book antiqua', palatino, serif;color: #666699\">when there were twelve souls, stalwart, tried and true,<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: 'book antiqua', palatino, serif;color: #666699\">who sat and paid attention till they knew?<\/span><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: 'book antiqua', palatino, serif;color: #666699\">Those who report these votes of straw may be<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: 'book antiqua', palatino, serif;color: #666699\">as flammable as straw democracy,<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: 'book antiqua', palatino, serif;color: #666699\">its road to ruination paved with good<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: 'book antiqua', palatino, serif;color: #666699\">intentions. Years hence, what descendants should<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: 'book antiqua', palatino, serif;color: #666699\">be saying this midst acrid, bated sighs,<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: 'book antiqua', palatino, serif;color: #666699\">long after the Republic ups and dies?<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>James B. Nicola When my phone rings now, I do not reply. Not having been there, I won\u2019t even try, for ill-supported answers are as bad as lies. En masse, they make a movement mad. You weren\u2019t there either, were you? Then why answer the question pollsters pose to you when there were twelve souls,&hellip; <\/p>\n<p class=\"toivo-read-more\"><a href=\"https:\/\/euphemism.illinoisstate.edu\/21-2\/poetry\/after-the-verdict\/\" class=\"more-link\">Read more <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">After the Verdict<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":90,"featured_media":0,"parent":21,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-104","page","type-page","status-publish","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/euphemism.illinoisstate.edu\/21-2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/104","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/euphemism.illinoisstate.edu\/21-2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/euphemism.illinoisstate.edu\/21-2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/euphemism.illinoisstate.edu\/21-2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/90"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/euphemism.illinoisstate.edu\/21-2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=104"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/euphemism.illinoisstate.edu\/21-2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/104\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":106,"href":"https:\/\/euphemism.illinoisstate.edu\/21-2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/104\/revisions\/106"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/euphemism.illinoisstate.edu\/21-2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/21"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/euphemism.illinoisstate.edu\/21-2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=104"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}