Advaitam Speaks Literary Vol. 2 - Issue 1
An International Journal of Poetry, Poetics and Visual Arts
An International Journal of Poetry, Poetics and Visual Arts
F OUNDER,P UBLISHER & E DITOR-IN -C HIEF: D EBASISH P ARASHAR New Delhi-World advaitamspeaks@gmail.com
Advaitam Speaks Literary
Advaitam Speaks Literary
Founder, Publisher & Editor-in-Chief: Debasish Parashar E-mail: debasishparashar87@gmail.com advaitamspeaks@gmail.com
Published by Debasish Parashar New Delhi, India.
https://advaitamspeaksliterary.wordpress.com/ Copyright Š2017 The Authors
The contributors named in this book have asserted their moral rights under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act to be identified as the editors and authors of this work.
All rights reserved.
No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, scanning, recording or otherwise) without the prior written permission of both the above-named copyright owners and the publisher.
Typography, Cover Design & Magazine : Cover Art :
Debasish Parashar Alexandr Ivanov
TABLE OF CONTENTS
From the Editor-in-Chief : Debasish Parashar
General Poetry : Darren C. Demaree , Nadija Rebronja, Mark Hudson, Claudine Nash, Kariuki wa Nyamu, Chani Zwibel, Huguette Bertrand, Laura McLaughlin ,Lidia Chiarelli, Michael Lee Johnson, Peter Magliocco, Vladimir Konieczny, Rajnish Mishra, Linda Imbler, Matthew Kausch, Joan McNerney, Deepa Onkar, Ndifreke George, Mendes Biondo, Wafula p'Khisa, Anu Pillai.
Poetry in Translation : Ranco Pablovic, Nenad Trajkovic & Đorđe D. Sibinović.
Visual Arts : Gianpiero Actis
Advaitam Speaks Literary
From The Editor-in-Chief :
We have faith in poetry and visual arts. Advaitam Speaks Literary journal is a baby born out of that simple faith. We have just started our journey and we don’t know many things. We are learning everyday and we shall keep on learning till the end. We don’t strictly adhere to any political ideology, but we believe in listening to everyone. That does not mean that we are indifferent to the socio-political, cultural, sociological and economic changes happening around us. We appreciate everything creative and constructive. We don’t appreciate hate-mongering, although we do appreciate constructive criticism using the powerful tools of poetry and visual arts. We believe that as poets and artists we dream, and we love. Above all, we see and we do.
We are happy to inform our readers that we are celebrating 2018 as the year of IndiaSerbia friendship towards cultural exchange and creativity. We are going to publish at least 3 poets in translation from Serbia (and the region overall) in every issue throughout the year. We are thankful to Danijela Trajkovich for being the cultural ambassador to India from the region for the noble cause of creativity.
We are thankful to our contributors who have shown their faith in us. We are thankful to our readers and well-wishers from different parts of the world. We hope that our enthusiastic contributors and readers accept the Volume 2 Issue 1 of Advaitam Speaks Literary journal with love. Thank you.
Debasish Parashar, Editor-in-Chief, ASL journal.
Advaitam Speaks Literary
Darren C. Demaree
Bio : His poems have appeared, or are scheduled to appear in numerous magazines/journals, including Diode, Meridian, New Letters, Diagram, and the Colorado Review. He is the author of six poetry collections, most recently 'Many Full Hands Applauding Inelegantly' (2016, 8th House Publishing). His seventh collection 'Two Towns Over' was selected as the winner of the Louise Bogan Award by Trio House Press, and is scheduled to be released in March of 2018. He is the Managing Editor of the Best of the Net Anthology and Ovenbird Poetry. He is currently living and writing in Columbus, Ohio with his wife and children. Advaitam Speaks Literary
A Night So Beautiful We Had To Burn Down The Senator’s House #37
Naked, drunk, scavenging for revolutions we put our shoes on
for the gravel on the two-lane & the glass from our own broken bottles.
We had no need to dream. We were protagonists. We had no need to dream.
We had a dark horizon we knew how to paint with the brightest of colors
& we had three bottles left & a lighter, a death certificate & we have no need to dream.
A Night So Beautiful We Had To Burn Down The Senator’s House #38
Beneath my head was a whole body that never could
crumble when I needed it to. So, it moved forward, with every sip
it rallied as if whiskey could be a supper held at 4am.
All of us, bare & full, unaware of our other desires,
a stumbling parade with an idea short of villainy, but short
of nothing else. It would have been different if Ohio had mountains.
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A Night So Beautiful We Had To Burn Down The Senator’s House #39
We found no chariots. We found no gradient. We were delivered
a mile south of the Senator’s old house without our skin showing thin at all.
The world doesn’t end because you’re drunk & naked, holding matches.
Nadija Rebronja
Bio : Nadija Rebronja (Serbia, 1982) is a poet and essayist. She received her PhD in literature at the Faculty of Philosophy, Novi Sad. She was a stipendist of the Institute for Slavistics in Vienna and the Faculty of Philosophy in Granada (Spain). Her poetry has been translated into English, German, Spanish, French, Italian, Turkish, Persian, Arabic, Slovenian and Polish. She has published several books of poetry: A Dance to the Seas (Novi Pazar, 2008) and Flamenco Utopia (Kraljevo, 2014); a scientific study A Dervish or a Man, Life or Death (Belgrade, 2010), selection of poems in Spanish Alfa, Alef, Elif ( Granada, 2011). She works at the State University, Novi Pazar. The poetry from her book Dance to the seas in Italian served as an inspiration for making eight compositions at the conservatory Niccolo Piccini in Bari in 2016, which were later presented at several concerts in Italy, Denmark and USA.
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FLAMENCO UTOPIA I don't write poems I only listen to the voices of people and the voices of different cities
hicham, a pharmacist, in the moorish house courtyard
in some other city which is also called granada my name is not hicham and I died in the time of franco watching lorca being shot
holding hand of ar-rukania, a poet who took me to death and told me that the key of life is the rhymes on the wall of alhambra
in this city which is also called granada my name is hicham I'm sitting in the courtyard reading the book of verses on the walls of alhambra I'm not afraid of the walls and I throw away the key of life since the shape of time is a circle and I'm always in granada and it doesn't matter what my name is
(Translated from Bosnian to English by Ivana Maksić)
Advaitam Speaks Literary
Mark Hudson
Bio: Mark Hudson has been internationally published. He has a degree in fiction writing in Columbia College, and has written and taken art classes ever since. His work can be found on Illinoispoets.org.
Fire in the Windy City
My professor told me that he was home in his Rogers Park house watching TV with his wife, a television show about firemen called “Rescue me” with Dennis Leary. There was a scene where the Chicago police department was putting out a fire. Suddenly, my professor and his wife looked out the window, and there was a fire in a building right across the street! There was a bunch of Chicago firefighters there, and they looked like the firemen on TV. The fire originated in the kitchen, and the flames went on the roof. The building was damaged, and the people who lived there have nowhere to go. It will cost millions of dollars to fix. Flames rose from the roof and debris was everywhere, and my professor said if it was windy his building could’ve caught on fire. That is very odd, because in the windy city, it is windy almost daily. Advaitam Speaks Literary
Claudine Nash
Bio: Claudine Nash's collections include The Wild Essential (Kelsay Books, 2017) and Parts per Trillion (Aldrich Press, 2016) as well as the chapbook The Problem with Loving Ghosts (Finishing Line Press, 2014). Her poetry has received numerous literary recognitions including Pushcart Prize nominations and prizes from such publications and organizations as Artists Embassy International, The Song Is..., and Thirty West Publishing House among others. Internationally published, her work has appeared in a wide range of publications including Asimov’s Science Fiction, BlazeVOX, Cloudbank, Haight Ashbury Literary Journal, and Dime Show Review. She is also practicing psychologist. Website: www.claudinenashpoetry.com.
An Open Letter to My True Self
I fed these ideas bricks, allowed them to grow fat and heavy with doubt, render me motionless while your voice rose into the ether. You, who sang of atmosphere, who spun the wind around you.
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I’m ready to toss these weights, silence those unruly notions. Help me trace your whisper back home. Let me hear this song you’ve been humming, teach me how to sing of light.
Oxytocin
Sometimes I awaken with an air rising in me that sounds something like wind climbing,
like silk winding,
like a cradlesong or hum or some mysterious harmony.
It had felt like your voice wrapping itself around me from the inside,
but maybe it’s been mine trying to sing a love song to myself.
Advaitam Speaks Literary
Kariuki wa Nyamu
Bio : Kariuki wa Nyamu, a Kenyan poet, radio playwright, children’s writer, editor, literary critic and teacher, earned a BA in English Language, Literature and Education from Makerere University, Uganda. His poetry won the National Book Trust of Uganda (NABOTU) Literary Awards 2007 and Makerere University Creative Writing Competition 2010. He is published extensively both in print and online. He recently co-authored a Children’s Poetry and Short Story Anthology titled When Children Dare to Dream and won Babishai Niwe 2017 Haiku Prize. He is presently pursuing a Master of Arts in Literature at Kenyatta University, Kenya.
If Love’s Sweet
If love’s sweet then why this ache of heart?
If it’s warm-hearted then why the cold shoulder?
If it’s evocative then why all this emptiness?
Advaitam Speaks Literary
If it’s gratifying then why all this poignancy?
If it’s tranquil then why opt for marital violence?
If it’s full of harmony then why these hills of differences?
If it’s fantastic then why this iniquity?
If it matures then why does ours die down?
If it’s meant to blossom then why do lovers part?
If truth be told, dearie, knowing you was the most catastrophic thing that ever happened in my love life!
But anyway, I’m sure I’ll learn to live without you and in time forget, that you ever existed!
Huguette Bertrand
Bio: Huguette Bertrand is a French-Canadian poet and editor living in Qc, Canada. She has published 37 poetry books. Her poems were also published in many poetry journals and anthologies in Canada, France, Belgium, Libanon, U.S.A., Wales (UK), Romania. India, and on many websites the last 20 years. She took part in poetry readings, book shows, exhibition of her poetry on photos in QuĂŠbec and in France, conduct of workshops in Canada and France. She is the representative of the international movement Immagine & Poesia in Canada and editor of anthologies for this said group. Website :
http://www.espacepoetique.com/poete/poete.html
Wikipedia : https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Huguette_Bertrand Advaitam Speaks Literary
Next Door
The guy next door wrote many words about slaved people residing in his mind
he never stopped writing words behind bars worshiping peace while losing his life
his bursting words were disturbing the standards of his country but he kept writing with his peaceful mind tireless words until his last moments
finally he left behind seeds of peace to persevere on freeways breaking fences of old ideas still sticking in some species to fade away
The Guardian
Lonesome this woman moves along in the grayness of a city carries within a strange happiness she walks
she walks between rumors shakes the ashes of sleeping minds spreads lively words she is the guardian
guardian of untold stories burried in the night strolling between rocks she blows
she blows on embers freeing old days silences reviving the memory of this deserted city
Advaitam Speaks Literary
Chani Zwibel
Bio : Chani Zwibel is a graduate of Agnes Scott College, a poet, wife and dog-mom who was born and raised in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, but now dwells in Marietta, Georgia. She enjoys writing poetry after nature walks and daydreaming.
Sad Moon Goddess
The moon goddess is sad It’s been too long since we danced naked under her silver light The moon goddess is sad It’s been too long since we left her chardonnay in a crystal chalice The moon goddess is sad It’s been too long since we offered her cakes made from milk from the plumpest cows, honey from the richest combs, and wheat ground so fine it’s white as chalk, The moon goddess is sad It’s been too long since we used our mathematics to count the miles and measure the odds, courting her in her element The moon goddess is sad It’s been too long since we visited in our tin -can space ship The moon goddess is sad It’s been too long since our ambassadors in aluminum suits Greeted her dusty surface with tentative footfalls.
Advaitam Speaks Literary
Garden Deities
In the garden millipedes rise up with weed’s roots, squiggle and squirm back down to burrow under-earth. They are fleet-footed messengers of arriving Spring.
The first-blooming azaleas form new white flowers like the first evening stars winking out of the gloaming. One rough stone in the path tilts if stepped on. Chill winds roll in. Birds call in warning of coming night and storm. As azaleas prepare to burst, still holding last autumn’s dried brown leaves, daffodils glow luminous yellow, flowery lamps in the sinking light.
The tin wind-mill turns and turns, slowly in the breeze. A crow caws its bird laugh.
Tiny raindrops land near the corners of my eyes like cool fairy kisses. My dampening hair is a warm cloak. Clover pop like green buttons at the feet of queenly daffodils. A wind-blown bloom hampered by a fallen leaf is speared by a stalk growing up from the ground.
As I move forward, I wrap black wool sweater closer. Moist cold wind where stone angel plays a lute. Outside at dusk, I am making a house for pixies or if there were lack of fairies, then the garden-dwelling stone gnomes might have a new place to dwell. I built their bower of rose branches, draped in the cast-off bonnets of daffodils
I created an altar to garden deities, and wished fairies to dwell this close to a suburban street, made safe in a bower of petals. Advaitam Speaks Literary
L. Noelle McLaughlin
Bio: L. Noelle McLaughlin's poetry, short fiction and photography can be found in The Stone Canoe Journal, Thrice Fiction, New Dead Families, The New Mexico Review, Spolia Mag, Lime Hawk Literary Arts Collective, GAMBA zine, Danse Macabre, Sein und Werden, nth position, Unlikely Stories, Haggard and Halloo, Clockwise Cat, The Screech Owl, Sammy and Beckett, and more. She is a ghostwriter for hire living in New Paltz, NY. She blogs at poorhumanbeans.wordpress.com, and tweets very rarely @lnoellemcl.
Lit By One Lamp
The house was so small, it could be lit by one lamp. Not quite a one story, lower than a short story, lesser than a love story. Not that it couldn't have been higher, but the problem was the windows were all outta one direction. The house was like outside the house, like all houses, but also careful. Its floor was pine needles, the corners tumbleweeds. Its countertops ran counterclockwise and resembled horizontal trees. The inhabitant was on her knees. 3am was when she would wake. Wild-eyed was the breakfast she'd take. Sometimes boys would suggest she move, largely owing to the limits of leg room. And she had pretty long legs it was true. Much like you. There was no fridge or stove or shower, but outlets outside delivered the power. She wore a red pouch round her neck tied with twine, and inside it she said was a spell. She wore animal bones in her ears and animal plumes in her hair. She tracked up the path in her underwear. Her eyes were as easy to read as an animal's. She enkindled so, for all of this seethrough. She scattered and spun due to you. Advaitam Speaks Literary
Satellites The thing is that day there were problems with the numbers. Sixty six was pulling all kinds of shit that normally she wouldn’t, and that meant she’d been talking to three. Three always made everything look too many ways at once, and also it made people’s mouths talk in reds. She had to be careful of talking too much ‘cause if she did it outside people might not see the colors correctly, and then they would tell her that she seemed a little sleepy. She didn’t know if she should just show them that she’d easily slept a hundred years, because that could have started the yep yep game where anything she said would make them think the same. Sometimes she would lie her way through an entire day and this is how she would do it: people she could see would talk to her but she would just ignore them like she didn’t hear them. If they said something to see if she remembered hearing them she would just look at them blankly. She did that because that day there were three, and she wasn’t sure where it was one had even went to and really he could have been any of them. She scratched at her skin a little to make herself stop thinking about it. She knew they couldn’t really hurt her as long as the spell dishes were set. But the walls still whispered about satellites when she walked too close to them.
Michael Lee Johnson
Bio: Michael Lee Johnson lived ten years in Canada during the Vietnam era. Today he is a poet, freelance writer, amateur photographer, and small business owner in Itasca, Illinois. Mr. Johnson published in more than 989 publications, his poems have appeared in 34 countries, he edits, publishes 10 different poetry sites. He has been nominated 2 Pushcart Prize awards for poetry 2015 and 2 nominations Best of the Net 2016 and 2017. He also has 136 poetry https://www.youtube.com/user/poetrymanusa/videos.
videos
on
YouTube:
He is the Editor-in-chief of the anthology, Moonlight Dreamers of Yellow Haze: http://www.amazon.com/dp/1530456762 & Dandelion in a Vase of Roses https://www.amazon.com/dp/1545352089
which
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is
now
available
here:
Oh Carol, Poem
You treat me like soiled underwear. I work my way through. I gave up jitterbug dancing, that cha-cha-chá, all my eccentric moves, theatric acting, poetry slams. I seek refuge away old films, nightmares you jumping from my raspberry Geo Chevy Tracker repeat you stunt from my black 2002 S-10 Chevy truck, Schaumburg, IL. I toss tarnished photographs out windows of hell seek new selfies, myself. I’m a rock-in-roll Jesus, a damn good poetry man, talent alone is not enough storage space to strip you away from my skin, distant myself from your ridicule, those harsh words you can’t take back once they are out like Gorilla Glue, as Carl Sandburg spoke about. I’m no John Lennon want to be; body sculptured David Garrett, German violin masterpiece, nor Ace Hardware, Midwest, CEO. All I want to be respected in heart of my bright sun, engaging these shadows endorsing these gray spots in my life.
Send me away from these drum beats that break me in half, jungle thunder jolts dislodging my heart popping my earlobes over the years, scream out goodbye. No more stepping on me cockroach style, swatting me, a captured fly.
Alexandra David-Neel (V2)
She edits her life from a room made dark against a desert dropping summer sun. A daring traveling Parisian adventurer, ultimate princess turning toad with age-Advaitam Speaks Literary
snow drops of white in her hair, tiny fingers thumb joints osteoarthritis she corrects proofs at 100, pours whiskey, pours over what she wrote scribbles notes directed to the future, applies for a new passport. With this amount of macular degeneration, near, monster of writers' approaches, she wears no spectacles. Her mind teeters between Himalayas, distant Gobi Desert. Running reason through her head for a living, yet dancing with the youthful world of Cinderella, she plunges deeper near death into Tibetan mysticism, trekking across snow covered mountains to Lhasa, Tibet. Nighttime rest, sleepy face, peeking out that window crack into the nest, those quiet villages below tasting a reality beyond her years.
Lidia Chiarelli
Bio: Lidia Chiarelli was born and raised in Turin (Italy), where in 2007, she founded with Aeronwy Thomas the Art-literary Movement: Immagine & Poesia. Lidia’s passion for creative writing has motivated her to write poetry and she has become an award winning poet since 2011. Her writing has been translated into more than 20 languages and published in Poetry Reviews and on web-sites in many countries. After visiting the Museum of Modern Art in New York in 2010, Lidia was inspired to create installations similar to Yoko Ono’s Wish Tree, hanging poems and art cards on the trees. Lidia Chiarelli has exhibited her “Poetry&Art Trees”in Italy and abroad. She is also an appreciated collage artist. http://lidiachiarelli.jimdo.com/
&
https://immaginepoesia.jimdo.com/
Advaitam Speaks Literary
Katherine’s World
“I hate money. But it's the lack of it I hate most.” -Katherine Mansfield
Parma violets lilies and roses elegant women hold fragrant posies singing canaries and enamel tins let this vanity fair begin
Flurry of ash in the winter afternoon in summer cicadas chirp in tune the seasons change and go this is the world of yours we know
Ironic cynical but always wise empty conversations you despise with a light and keen touch the bourgeois behaviour you scorn so much
Smart gardens and sentimental weddings
are your enchanted settings to your little universe take us by the hand become our guide in this dazzling dreamland
(previously published in: Sunset in a Cup, Edizioni Esordienti E book, Moncalieri -ToItaly 2017)
The Tarot Garden
“Painting calmed the chaos that shook my soul.� -Niki de Saint Phalle The path is slow along the Major Arcana Advaitam Speaks Literary
and a kaleidoscope always on the move wraps your wish of the impossible: lights colours water games mosaics myriad small mirrors that reflect multiply reinvent. And you Niki de Saint Phalle are still here and still smile in this magical and unreal place you the last dream maker
(Località Garavicchio, Capalbio – Grosseto Italy) (previously published in: Poème en mer – Poems at sea by Chiarelli, Bertand, Sumikura Éditions En Marge , Québec, Canada 2017)
Vladimir Konieczny
Bio: Vladimir Konieczny is a freelance writer/instructor. He’s also published two books about the pianist Glenn Gould, and is currently working on a graphic novel about him. When not writing, he plays bassoon, clarinet and flute with various groups in and around Vancouver, British Columbia.
Advaitam Speaks Literary
#1 A sparrow alights on my balcony nineteen floors up cocks its head and bluffs me Texas hold’em style. Nothing but a puff of feathers through a beak yet so bold I think.
#2 Cranes stare down on glass and concrete nests, skeletal bodies swaying with every gust, while on the city’s floor, teens linger on darkening corners not far from home, hesitant to leave in case friends remain.
#3 On nights when I grieve, —none of your business— anger balloons my gut until I could squash butterflies. Instead, I smudge their carbon cousins against the smiling moon in my window.
Peter Magliocco
Bio:
Peter Magliocco writes from Las Vegas, Nevada, where he occasionally edits the lit-zine ART:MAG. He has forthcoming poetry in HARBINGER ASYLUM, MIDNIGHT LANE BOUTIQUE, POETRY PACIFIC, ELSIEISY, and elsewhere. His speculative sci-fi novel The Burgher of Virtual Eden is now an ebook available in all the usual places.
Advaitam Speaks Literary
Dreams Swirl in Celibate's Ash
Your favorite film actors usher you into the fantasy regions you inhabit while glimpsing the disappearing bleak vista once shiny with radiant points of propinquity (now simple moldy retinal imprisonment?): I think I saw you while running an errand "no one gets it on while the fish are dying," you quizzically remarked passing me as the little street kids played obliviously & the world continued spinning axial circles the birds of paradise fell onto half-shells of errant turtles escaping gnarly cover you blithely chew the lean fat of existence beneath the lampshade skin of humanity with the hunger of reservoir dogs tonight on your way to get another pack of smokes no one would ever guess you're going far to a place burning down a supernatural lens until your crisp remains feed airy visions
Dancing the Close Encounter
Lady Gaga your legs are long tonight dancing on the dive bar stages to fill the void with pretty pictures for spendthrift pulses inflect meaning to create art out of nothing's shadow
Make the senses gasp for a blow across their star-bound excrescences as rhythm whittles away time's stop & the eyeless of Gaza suddenly see a message clearly not of this world
How your body sways in electric tides in the night sky's frozen canopy as oceans wash back silent waves the dross from deadly signs return to remind us of our polluted airs
Defiled by the neo-technology of men who don't dance or whistle a tune they're taking the stars down 1-by-1 but we play the sweet music anyway as alien gods hear our ringtone calls Advaitam Speaks Literary
Rajnish Mishra
Bio: Rajnish Mishra is a poet, writer, translator and blogger born and brought up in Varanasi, India and now in exile. He loves his city and knows how much it has affected him as a human being and as a poet. His work originates at the point of intersection between his psyche and his city. His work has now started appearing in journals and websites.
The novelty of being wanted no longer
I miss old times and people; open eyes and see change envelope them and me. I miss my little brother calling me to play cricket on the terrace and I, the elder one, reluctant at times, with things more important to do saying no sometimes, and the day we drafted a penciled contract mutually agreed upon; then signed. Its clauses: I would not slobber him in public, I would play terrace-cricket with him every afternoon, and I would not snatch his chocolate, or samosas. I did keep to my part of it for some time, I remember, then, I left. When we met again, he had grown up. Didn’t need any more his playmate of terrace, Didn’t play cricket there anymore. I know how it feels. I know the shock, the pain, the novelty of being wanted no longer.
Then came my daughter demanding, not drafting agreements, that: I play with her every evening, after I return from work. I take her to the park at weekend mornings I don’t force her to learn her tables, Advaitam Speaks Literary
I don’t side with her mother when she’s scolded. No, I did not make the old mistakes this time. I enjoyed her company, played with her, took her to the park most weekend mornings, only sometimes inquired about the table of thirteen and only sometimes sided with her mother, never when she was scolded. I stayed. She grew up. Doesn’t need her old play mate any more, doesn’t play those make-belief games any more. Yes, I know how it feels: no shock, numbed senses, the practice of being wanted no longer.
I sense my grandchildren in future, demands unchanged, Eyes bright and fear, once more, being wanted no longer.
Linda Imbler
Bio: Linda Imbler is the author of the published poetry collection “Big Questions, Little Sleep.” She has also been published by deadsnakes.blogspot.com, behappyzone.com, bluepepper.blogspot.com, buckoffmag.com, Fine Flu Journal, Bunbury Magazine, Blognostics, Nailpolish Stories, Broad River Review Literary Magazine, Mad Swirl, Ascent Aspirations: Friday’s Poems, Unbroken Journal, The Voices Project and GloMag. Another poem is forthcoming in Leaves of Ink. Linda’s short stories have appeared in Fear of Monkeys, Danse Macabre, and Mad Swirl. Online, she can be found at lindaspoetryblog.blogspot.com. This writer, yoga practitioner, and classical guitar player resides in Wichita, Kansas.
Advaitam Speaks Literary
Radio Waves
The radio blurts the story of war, It seems to rage in every corner, I hear the facts of the conflict over and over again. I'm thinking I might need to turn off the news and live in silence because my only other choice is to go below ground where the bombs and the bangs cannot touch me and the end will not much matter to me. Not a concrete shelter with walls that tremble from concussions, Only sweet earth, My mother once more taking me into her arms to demonstrate her profound love for my fragile shell. Bones do not offend her,
so my place in this silent land will be secured. Thank the heavens that radio waves are useless underground.
Calm
No longer windblown, My space now my own, I once parasailed above Key West. It was though no match For the feeling you give Of calm. This calm you present to me.
This calm, not strife, That's now in my life, Advaitam Speaks Literary
This inner peace so sublime, You give this only to me. Lend faith things will turn out well. No energy to hate, We only create, Fill my sails So I need not float on wings of others thoughts, Only thoughts that Are of my true design, You taught me that I have nothing to prove. With calm, It Is me you have changed, To be As the deep of the sea Where no waves can strike, You guide winds around me.
Strum
Speak to us At vibrantly hued close of day, Tremoloed soft notes filter through clear air Ending with a fade.
Speak to us By means of the young, Where a thrum of vibrating hearts are the warmest, And compassion for those smaller and weaker Is so freely expressed.
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Speak to us As we hear waves lapping the shore, The crush of rock created by time, Crescendoes echoing the heights To which man’s soul can soar.
Speak to us by using photographic portraits, Faces laden with all manner of emotion, A totality of feelings captured, Everything reflected in the shutterbug’s lens No visage invisible or unattainable.
Speak through us, Goodness, greatness Lightening of hearts Yours, theirs. Let us be reminded That soft notes still beckon, Warmth towards others still stirs the heart, Our time is so limited, Every face holds a story of a life lived Whether short or long. Our history heard in the strum Of the cosmic musician’s performance. The omniscient hum is there For us to discover.
Joan McNerney
Bio: Joan McNerney’s poetry has been included in numerous literary magazines such as Seven Circle Press, Dinner with the Muse, Moonlight Dreamers of Yellow Haze, Blueline, and Halcyon Days. Three Bright Hills Press Anthologies, several Poppy Road Review Journals, and numerous Kind of A Hurricane Press Publications have accepted her work. Her latest title is Having Lunch with the Sky and she has four Best of the Net nominations.
Advaitam Speaks Literary
Knave
Full of himself flaunting his black leather jacket covered with silver studs.
Bling hangs from his bulging neck. Flashy zircons, deep cologne, tattoos, piercings, purple hair.
Puffed up, he struts across alleys. Headlight eyes scoping each corner searching prey.
Pushing down anything in his way. Sniffing rear doors, sniffing out death.
His hands move like claws through shadows with crooked nails buffed blue.
Lugging a bag of tricks loaded with brass knuckles, chains, zip guns, switchblades, knives.
Opening his cavern mouth, smacking wide lips, he drains a cool cocktail of ruby red blood.
Advaitam Speaks Literary
Matthew Kausch
Bio : Matthew Kausch is a 42 year old married male, father of 3. He works for NYS assisting mentally ill and addicted individuals succeed in the community and improve their quality of life, and under recovery himself. He abused everything at one time or another. People say that lifestyle leads to jails, institutions, and death. He has spent years between mental hospitals and cells, in NY, Conn., Fl., and even QuĂŠbec. And death, he has cheated a few times, once seriously. His parents found him not breathing after a shot. He couldn't be revived at the hospital and had to be placed on a respirator for 3 days. Doctors had to tell his family that they didn't know if he would breathe on his own and how much brain damage he may have from being without oxygen. He could have been a vegetable ! He got an associates degree in addictions and a bachelors degree in human services. He helps others like himself today. He thinks, he wouldn't be here if it wasn't for his wife, whom he met during his last hospitalization. They pulled each other up from the ashes of insanity.
WW123
Young soldiers Deserted from above
Dug in Trench after trench Miles of barbed wire Germ guns Gas masks Lead the landlord Too young the soldier Squeezing the life from silver religious medals Hard earth Bloodied mud “forward!� cried from the rear Out of the trench Into the fight Into the light
Young soldiers Deserted from above
I keep my girl In a bag Advaitam Speaks Literary
Under my car seat In the glove box In an empty cigarette pack
Glass pipes & needles Honey holes & fevers
Pigs Black cloaked pick pockets Only god shall judge
One foot on the moon The madcap laughs
Religion fashionable In this trap
Plastic pals Let’s do it again
Remember: forever?
Attrition Balance Chained down in the sunken garden The last dragon weeps Conspire my love Walk on Coming down the mountain Am I demon? He asks‌ Yes, I am. Stoking fires Beneath cell bunks Awaiting another arrival The line backed up King of broken promises Holding all the answers to all the unwritten questions Forbidden knowledge Bittersweet As cruel as mother nature For mother nature holds no sin Remember the Holy Ghost All teeth Balance Attrition
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Mendes Biondo
Bio : Mendes Biondo is an Italian journalist and writer. He published his works on emagazines all around the world. He is the Editor-in-chief of the cultural blog RAMINGO! along with Elena Bello. More info here:https://ramingoblog.com/.
Penelope
do not leave me penelope hold fast my hand lead me through the streets of ithaca and corinth samo and athens lead me in persia among tall ebony eunuchs maimed trees sterile ephebes
caress my hair with your hand full of fragrant oils incenses balms
facinate me with your language so familiar so tough so musical
do not die penelope Advaitam Speaks Literary
do not leave me on the cross to dangle like a thief
tell me the stories that you know do not die do not leave
I betrayed with wood and iron I moved away from my seasands from your spinning wheel
still weave for me penelope I will not leave you alone I will not betray more elena and medea and electra and daphne
do not leave me penelope do not die!
the world is cold without your presence that tells me about ithaca
We Rolled In The Bed
we rolled in the bed you were a grain of grapes with all the pulp out and the blankets smelled of grass
we ate each others without hunger only for the taste of biting our pulps
we ran along the lawn we swam in the rivers we flew over the mountains we crawled under the sands
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we have been fire we have been water
we have been the sex of the flowers the lascivious curves of grass we kneaded each other with our hands we left the meat raising
then we slept and also the wind were dormant
it rested the call of the coquette lulling the sleeping of the lark
Your Rain
your rain has wet my forest drop after drop it nourished the trees the leaves the roots the mushrooms
your warm rain opens the seeds with a caress also in a snowy winter
your rain and only yours is the one I invoke in spring nights
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Deepa Onkar
Bio: Deepa Onkar has degrees in Mathematics and English Literature from the Universities of Chennai and Hyderabad, India. She has worked as a teacher educator in the Krishnamurti schools in India, and as a journalist (The Hindu) in Chennai, India. Poetry to her is as much a puzzle involving words and philosophical ideas, as it is an art. She believes that poetry can be found at the heart of any situation or experience. She enjoys travel, and currently lives between India and the United Kingdom.
A walk
For long I have stopped going to the woods where poets walk, tired of their wanton ways with words, with the paths they eke out of the wilderness to make the moss's secrets sensible to understand the silvery trails of the nights creatures.
But one day when the poets disappear I may go back to that dark centre of the assembly of trees: when rebellion's fire no longer clings to my hair just so I could chance upon shy foxes again, listen to crow-pheasants' calls reverberating through the air. I’ll wait for the trickle of sunset from mahogany leaves matted overhead. I may go back to walk in silence, listen to my soft footfall behind me in the fading light.
Advaitam Speaks Literary
Ndifreke George (N’some)
Bio: Ndifreke George (N’some) writes everything. His works have appeared on; Social Justice Poetry, The Poets’ Community, The Antartica Journal, Tuck Magazine, Blankpaperz, Medium, Poems and Poetry, Aphelion Webzine, The Parousia Magazine, Literary yard, Kalahari Review, Praxis Magazine, and Bravearts Africa. You’re sure to find him studying, scribbling at a corner or listening to music. Even in his busy schedule, he finds time to play and have fun as part of learning. A Geophysics graduate based in Lagos, Nigeria, he loves nature.
When Sorry Is Not Enough
When sorry is not the enough Forgive the mind but blame the heart. It sure needs time to recuperate.
When sorry is not enough, the injury is subcutaneous and sure must have come, from the friend who kisses and cuddles.
When sorry is not enough, the eyes must have bled; enemies were masked in faces of friends, and love was wrongly reciprocated.
But sorry will always be enough if it prostrates at the feet of time. If it comes from that same lips that bite, now willing to kiss again.
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A Love To Hate
How could this be? Cassandra and I ̶ so close. No better pair could ever be. We strutted through the verdant of nature’s cool, green armpit; Climbed through the mountain to the moon we sat dangling our feet down the earth; whispered our dreams to the hopeful twinkling stars right in our hands and let it fly along with the butterfly of beautiful wishes ̶ our courier to heaven.
We touched the future with our bare hands showered it with please-come-true kisses and enjoyed the coldness of the foggy cloud. We sat hand-in-hand, talked heart-to-heart, and showed love mouth-to-mouth. What else could have missed? Except a golden ring to say no more. But when she hurried away with the wind to its nest in the east, I saw her gift beside me— a beautiful paper with red and pink. My heart throbbed and I melted like helpless paraffin wax before the judgment of hell. She had only come to invite me for her wedding. It was the bell clonk calling for the guests that called her away to her anxious groom. She’ll never be mine ̶ not at all. Happily ever after has eluded me.
Advaitam Speaks Literary
Wafula p'Khisa
Bio: Wafula p'Khisa is a poet, writer and teacher from Kenya. He studied English, Literature & Education at Moi University. His work has been published in The Seattle Star, The Legendary (issue 48), The Beacon, Scarlet Leaf Review, Antarctica Journal, PoemHunter.com, Aubade Magazine (issue 1), NYSAI Press, AfricanWriter.com, Best 'New' African Poets 2015 Anthology, VoicesNet.com, The Pendulum, Mgv2 Magazine and the Best 'New' African Poets 2016 Anthology.
You Never Said You Love Me
The world knows I'm innocent and the life you bleed, and water you shed aren't consequences of my undoing. But I plead guilty-- I've been blind, really blind and deaf to notice not endless comings and goings; and read wild desires written all over your rare face to listen not to your emotional chants, whispered into the corridor of my ear by the wind if someone's to pay for ruining a beautiful dream I'll be first on the hangman's menu of death! I fail to comprehend this sudden change of tune, I fail to comprehend kabisa! that when you came and went, came and went, forever it was your unforgiving emotions pushing to perch onto feeble branches of my heart and its gates couldn't let them in-they were still bleeding from recent heartbreaks perhaps.
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I never doubted your smile-- it's genuine like a man's natural suit But how could I tell that your lips longed to be kissed? How could I tell that you craved my hands to navigate through the valleys and hills of your geographical endowments? How could I see tears, when you safely concealed them in a rare infectious laughter? If I knew how to read the silent code of love, l wouldn't have left you in the wilderness I wouldn't have left you lonely and unwanted, dying within
A Great Harvest You found us saner, sober and serious with dreams, debts and damsels to attend to; then blew your trumpet and the village suddenly broke into an ecstatic, violent dance... We throw stones; and called names We drank dead; and twisted necks to follow the rhythm. The eyeball of the sky had just retired behind the curtains of clouds, leaving the sky screaming its bowels out, and sweeping off the map desolate homesteads the beastly army worms had reduced the miserable crop; threatening unga and sugar to withdraw their pretty faces from shelves but you didn't want to address this! Nobody sang of the scandalous storms blowing our granaries atop the hills beyond nobody sang of the swelling tumbocracy ailing our graduates, and drawing many into darkness even the muted voices of dissent were traded in shallow whispers truth, with its weird, puzzled look; is a strange guest at a feast of lies! You'd only come to offer earth children a sacramental taste of milk and honey lying abundantly in the world you dream for us we thus lined up-- on markets and village footpaths like a silly hen dancing to a cock's seduction song for a Christmas cocktail!
Anitha Devi Pillai
Bio : Anitha Devi Pillai (PhD) is an applied linguist and teacher educator at National Institute of Education (NTU, Singapore) where she teaches courses on writing pedagogy and writing. She has predominantly researched and published several research papers based on empirical data on writing and literacy practices and contributed articles to local newspapers. In her spare time, Anitha loves to incessantly doodle poetry and short stories on whatever captures her fancy at that point in time. Most of her musings generally have had only one audience: her rather discerning and hard-to-please teenage son, who is convinced that he is her guide, mentor and father in this lifetime. Advaitam Speaks Literary
As I wait to embrace her
You know she's arriving soon with her gifts: hidden lessons, choices, decisions and, unborn memories. Apologies, tears or regrets will not cloud her. At least not this time, you think. Let celebrations and laughter shroud her. I wait with you to embrace the midnight's child to watch her arrive to joyous shouts, stolen kisses, and unrehearsed dance. Hope and love in the air. If I could choose, I will choose to live this year in the moment she arrives.
SERBIAN POETRY IN TRANSLATION
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Translation From Serbian By Danijela Trajković :
Bio: Danijela Trajković is a writer and translator from Vranje in Serbia. She has published a number of short stories and reviews and has just completed a post-graduate thesis on social and gender roles in Wuthering Heights.
Ranko Pavlović
Bio: Ranko Pavlović (1943) is a writer, poet, essayist, literary critic and playwright. He writes for children and adults. His poems and short stories were translated into Italian, Polish, Hungarian, English, Romanian, German, Dutch and other languages. He has published seventeen collections of poems (Bones and Shadows, Core, Hunting, The Powder of a Poet, Monk Sonnets, Between Two Blanks ...), sixteen collections of short stories, five novels, two collection of essays, a book of litaerary criticism and ten radio dramas for adults, eighteen collections of short stories for children, six collections of poems for the youngest, a novel for young people, a dozen texts for children's theaters and about twenty radio plays for children. He has won many awards. He received The Ivo Andric Academy Award for Lifetime Achievement. He recently received The Gordana Todorovic Award for the best manuscript. He lives and works in Banja Luka, Republika Srpska. https://sr.wikipedia.org/srel/%D0%A0%D0%B0%D0%BD%D0%BA%D0%BE_%D0%9F%D0%B0%D0%B2%D 0%BB%D0%BE%D0%B2%D0%B8%D1%9B
Advaitam Speaks Literary
Fragrances
A long ago the bread I eat has not smelt of my mother's hands. Nor crust on it is pinkish like my mother's face when she used to come back from the source breathless with two wooden water buckets on the carrying pole. A long ago the milk I drink has not smelt of my mother’s soul and hands which used to cherish the cow's udder talking to it with love in order to take out more milk for the hungry mouths of her nestlings sittinig by wood-burning stove. A long ago the apple, wearing kitschy makeup, the cheap porcelain sculpture, they bring me on the plate, together with the rostfrei knife,
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has not smelt of my mother's breast. Only some fine soil, which I sprinkle from hand in hand, smells of my mother.
The Essence of the Stone
The fact that the stone is unaware of its own essence does not mean that it does not exist. After all, who claims that stone has no awareness of its existence? And who has ever tried to penetrate into the being of stone? Into the beat of its heart? Into the core of its mind? The fact that we are unable to recognize the essence of things defends our opinion that the stone has no heart, it's our fault, the stone does not concern it. Have you ever, you, who think that you're in the centre of the cosmos and that have learned the essence of life, have you ever asked yourself if the stone in your gallbladder or in your kidney has its essence and, if so, whether it is its or your essence? Oh, you, who moan when the stone moves in your gallbladder or kidney do you ever wonder what does hurt it?
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Monument
In the park alone. Oh, I feel like life is monotonous now! There in the tavern my company has been emptying glasses, and sometimes somebody mentions me, and I'm afraid the lady with a fox fur around her neck is going to take for a walk her puppy tonight again, and it will, just when passes by my pedestal, get its back leg up to reheat with the urine the letters that testify to my glory. Oh, how sad this night is full of frozen moon! While my company plays preferans underground, painted with shine that can’t be extinguished, loneliness and cold break my bronze heart.
Nenad Trajkovic
Bio: Nenad Trajkovic (Pirot, Serbia, 1982) is a Serbian poet, essayist, literary critic and traslator. He graduated from Faculty of Law, University of Kragujevac, Serbia. He has published three collections of poetry, Traces (2008), I'm Taking You to the Museum (2011), and Wind From The Tongue (2016, for which he got The Rade Tomic Prize). His works are published in every major literary magazines and national newspapers. His work has been widely published and translated into English, German, French, Polish, Macedonian, Slovakian, Russian and Bulgarian. He has translated and edited collection of poetry The Hero Of The Forgotten Class by Zvonko Taneski, from Macedonian into Serbian. In 2013 he received the award given by the Bulgarian publisher Melnik. In 2015 he received the award Rade Tomic for the best poetry manuscript in Serbia. Most recently he has been included in Eight Centuries of Serbian Poetry / Von A bis Z (2017) translated and edited by Johann Lavundi. He is a founder and editor of an international literary manifestation Pisanija. He lives and works in Vranje, Southern Serbia. http://mrnenad.wixsite.com/nenadtrajkovic/home-cfat https://sr.wikipedia.org/srel/%D0%9D%D0%B5%D0%BD%D0%B0%D0%B4_%D0%A2%D1%80%D0%B0%D1 %98%D0%BA%D0%BE%D0%B2%D0%B8%D1%9B_(%D0%BF%D0%B5%D1%81% D0%BD%D0%B8%D0%BA) Advaitam Speaks Literary
Homicide
when you wanted to kill you were bleeding from pupils and fear jealousy hatred or revenge created a complete picture about a cold abandoned body severe breathing caused by panic and blush of shame on your cheeks fearing their own thoughts look for repentance before God for it is a sin to think that everything would be fine now when you wanted to kill your malice went before you like a cub in front of its mother carrying all the pride of itself and that picture of taking someone else's life over and over and over again brings you from 5 to 40 years of imprisonment depending on material evidences and the skills of your defense attorney
Actori incumbit probatio Advaitam Speaks Literary
Facilitating The Taking Of Narcotics
in downtown can be sensed the smells of mary jane snow birds b. j.’s miss emma pure love joy adam or eve coming from the ruined house while blowing or sniffing in full high in downtown the police knows the dealers as the whole city knows them does not buy any goods from them although some policeman can feel the flash they say good night quietly to each other because it's good to have a knowledge of the underground in downtown the court after the trail was finished a multiple convicted jankees was found guilty punished by fine of 250 euros in downtown the public prosecutor offers settlement nagotiations
bona hereditaria
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Discrimination
i think it took 14 papers to be collected in the same number of buildings as well with the approximate number of offices and the triple number of employees only the order to choose is left by connecting the closest points on google map look for the nearest coffee break cafeteria while the window with sex offers pops out and you go
but after the third building of the tenth line and half the day you realize duration is a constant and perfect phenomenon when from this unconstitutional part because you do not have enough money you delete the first three letters
nullum crimen nulla poena sine lege
Djordje D. Sibinović
Bio : Djordje D. Sibinović was born in Šabac, Serbia, in 1964. He is a Doctor of Law. Lives in Belgrade. Poetry collections he published: Throne (Presto, 1994), Fruits (Plodovi, 1998), Something Confidential (Nešto poverljivo, 2004), White Houses Settlement (Naselje belih kuća, 2012), Pernik Poetry (Pernik poezije, 2013), Thousands of Characters (Hiljadu karaktera, 2013), Poems, full of love (Pesme pune ljubavi, 2014), Anthology of Comparative Dreams (Antologija uporednih snova, 2015), Pencil, William Shakespeare (Olovka Vilijam Šekspir, 2018). He has received several significant awards for poetry. He also published a couple of essay books and a novel. Translated into several languages.
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Twilight
I talked to one doctor why am I sad? in the twilight to the dark ... the family is gathering day dies darkness is born life begins for which you need inner light not to get lost ... so you're sad if you were then alone. I watched him dull ... I thought about beethoven and moon sonata. I'll see you tomorrow doctor ...
Therapy
six kilometers fast walking waiting for a heart patient every day. my case is special. first I think of the worst then I stagnate expecting a sudden stroke ... speed-up brings joy of new birth without illness. I'm home sweat and disappointed how short everything lasts ...
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Conspiracy
I found out from confidential sources that the writers in heaven in secret change their written books and at night lay them on library shelves instead of the old versions... new generation readers do not know originals the old ones do not read for the second time ... I read fitzgerald and realized that nights are no longer mild and that dick diver did’t marry nicole ...
VISUAL ARTS
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Gianpiero Actis
Bio: Gianpiero Actis was born in Ivrea, Torino, Italy.Since the ‘80s he has created works using different techniques: oil, acrylic colours, collage.In 2007 Gianpiero Actis founded the art-literary Movement Immagine & Poesia with Aeronwy Thomas (Dylan Thomas’daughter) . His work “Beams of Ice” - linked to a poem by Aeronwy Thomas - was chosen for the banner and the pennants of Winter Universiade –Torino 2007. In 2008 his solo exhibition “The colour of saying” at the Dylan Thomas Centre, Swansea, G.B., was very successful: these paintings are now part of the Dylan Thomas Centre Collection. In 2009 he was invited to exhibit in Luxor , Egypt, (Academy of Fine Arts). In Monte Carlo (Principality of Monaco) a permanent exhibition of his works can be seen in the Hall of Hotel Olympia. He has received nomination for 2014 and 2015 Mario Merz Prize, Italy. http://gianpieroactis.jimdo.com/
Tribute to Basquiat
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Tribute to Kandinskij
Tribute to Lichtenstein
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Tribute to Mirรณ
Tribute to Picasso
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