I Had a Dream by Anilkumar Kurup

I had a dream, and I was on the precipice
The rocks were keen and steep, I clutched them with my life.
Looked below, dread the abyss deep.
The piece of bread seized ‘tween my tattered fingers,
Because I was ‘fraid to let go the crump
Lest all go hungry and vain..
As I moved down edging,
Afraid of the slide and the fall any moment to come
The ground beneath my feet
ne’er reached me soon.

I had a dream, and I saw the dead
Rotten and dried cadaver of men and women
Hung on the string like meat put to dry
Mummies, beyond reckon, and couldn’t know who they where,
and why?

I had a dream, and I saw the deluge.
Of gushing water that took me down
I gasped in the swirl, knowing not what-
the whirl held for me, down under.

I had a dream, and I saw the dawn
raise me in her arms, coddle me long
I woke up in time,
and saw it was morn.

Anilkumar Kurup is a freelance writer, blogger and has now forayed into screenplays. His first screenplay, “Charlis & I’ based on Dr. Shashi Tharoor’s ( Former Under Secretary, United Nations) short story of the same name will soon be made into a film. He is now into his second screenplay. He also is in collaboration with an associate writing dialogues for the latter’s screenplays.

Four Poems by Vic Meyer


Queen

Rambunctious woman
Your pursuit is unfathomable
Forge your shackles, not into crowns
But into swords
And you will live to see
The world at your feet.



Bullet

No less would I take a bullet for her, she would bear

Witness to a smiling man as she caressed the

Trigger


And blew my mind.



Wildfire

Her lips kissed mine

With thunderous applause

And dressed my mind

In subtle wildfire



Wild eyes

Her wild eyes tamed this heart
Long before I was just someone
She Loved

Vic Meyer is a 22-year-old South African writer living in Paris. An ex-professional rugby union player turned analyst for Stade Français spends every second away from the pitch on writing. He is influenced by the beauty and turmoil in the heart of Africa, and all things to be found there.

A Swim in the Glaire by Dale Stromberg

If you did as I do, I’d call you my foe.

You’re in the labyrinth, looking for the exit. You turn right at one corner, then left at the next. Turn left. Left again. Right. Right again.

Though each wall and each corner look identical, you sense you’re nearing the exit. Right. Left. Left again.

But when you round the next corner, you are face to face with the minotaur.

There’s no escape. Your whole frame trembles. “Please don’t kill me.” You rush the words out. “Don’t eat me.”

“Of course I’m not going to eat you. I just… I didn’t realize you were coming.” The minotaur sits on the ground. “Can we talk? Got a minute?” His horns span more than a meter. They sag downward.

For a while, neither of you speaks.

Finally the minotaur starts. “Are you mad at me?”

“No, of course not. Why?”

“You never come, for one thing.” He sounds pettish. “Everybody hates me.”

“Oh, come on, now.”

He shakes his taurine head. “Sorry. I’ve just been down in the dumps these days.”

“So I gathered.”

The minotaur sighs. “They’re never going to let me out of here. I’m a total monster. Even if I got out, what could I do? Can’t exactly get a job, right? Let alone a girlfriend. Apart from eating people, I don’t have any marketable skills.” He gives his words a bitter twist. “I feel like I don’t have a future. Because I can’t change. It’s like… like wandering through a night with no moon or stars. I’m so depressed.”

You have no idea how to respond.

“And I’m always hungry. Always hungry.”

Your scalp crawls. You start to sweat. “That sounds awful.” You sit stock still, but your eyes dart frantically, searching for an exit.

“I know why you came here,” says the minotaur in soft, measured syllables. He rises to his feet.

“No reason, really. In fact, I’ve got to get moving now.”

“No.”

You giggle. Your entire body goes clammy.

“I told you to stay put. Didn’t I say that?” He snorts sharply. “You never listen to me. It pisses me off. You hear me?”

“Um.”

“It always ends up like this. It’s always my emotions that are stronger. Don’t you know how I feel about you? Won’t you stay here with me?”

“I am here for you.”

“But you’ll leave someday?”

“No, never. I’m here for you, baby. Forever.” You scan desperately for a way out, but escape is impossible. “For as long as you want me.”

“I know why you came here,” repeats the minotaur.

Your blood runs cold.

“Your skin looks so soft. Succulent.”

“You promised. You weren’t going to eat me.”

“Shut the fuck up.”

“But you promised.” You’re on the verge of panic—of tears.

“You knew I was here. I’m always here. And you came, didn’t you? You know what I am. Always a monster. Always hungry. Always depressed. Always in the darkness. Always waiting.”

“This time I just want to go home. Please.”

“You little bitch.”

“I’ll come back. I promise. I just want to go.” Your panic peaks. “Please.”

“You’re just trying to fuck with me.”

“Please let me go home.” Tears of terror wet your cheeks.

The minotaur towers over you, his eyes full of rage and hatred. “Fine. Whatever. Get out.”

“I’ll come back.”

“See if I care.”

“I promise.”

You back away and turn a corner. And another. The minotaur’s breath is on your neck—no, that’s an illusion. Turn right. Right. Left. Left again. You stumble into a run, searching for the way out.

But you can’t remember how you got in.

Dale Stromberg studied writing with the novelists Richard Bankowsky and Doug Rice in Sacramento, and lives in Malaysia now with his family.

The Martyr’s Palm by Dale Stromberg

The Martyr’s Palm

Paper-based billing, unlike automatic bank transfer,
compels one to decide whether to do what one must.

At the supermarket, only two cash registers are operating. After evaluating the customers and cashiers, trying to guess which line will move faster, Beatrix Sakakino tentatively chooses the one on the right.

Is the world mist? she wonders. Or am I the mist?

She remembers his hands. His elbows. His substantial shoulders.

If I’m only proud of myself when I’m quiet, why can I never stay quiet?

His skin smelled like tobacco. His breath when asleep was irregular and turbulent.

Am I doing the same old thing for a brand new reason?

She has come to buy milk—that’s her pretext, anyway. The walk from her apartment was refreshing. The year is just warming.

Does another person’s shame give me the right to behave shamefully?

She likes her neighborhood. It’s a quaint street, a mix of tiny shops and modest homes. It all has to end.

Should I hate him? Am I in love with being in love? Is self-destruction really so romantic?

The year will run out. Winter always comes back. And she’s going to leave this neighborhood. She wants to—it’s a great comfort to plan to leave.

Am I just a pocket of lukewarm air?

Sometimes the least painful way to leave somebody is for them to leave you.

Do people really mix their souls together?

A look at the other cashier’s line shows that it’s moving faster than hers. Which gives her a moment longer.

I never have.

Dale Stromberg studied writing with the novelists Richard Bankowsky and Doug Rice in Sacramento, and lives in Malaysia now with his family.

‘There’s No Secret’ by Shehrbano Naqvi

Everyone says you never know until it happens to you. As if once it happens to you, a lightbulb goes off, shedding light on all the dark corners, on all the unanswered questions you had before. 

As if until you lose a leg, you never know how life will go on from that moment onwards. But for those who do, you see them somehow still alive and so it becomes a secret only they have. Like a secret treasure-of-a-consolation prize they get to keep to themselves while others just wonder “how do they do it?”

I thought that whenever I heard about a tragic death. Let me be clear; anyone’s death is saddening. But some are more tragic than others. You see someone’s forty year old father suddenly never wake up from his sleep, and you wonder how they’ll ever move on. Someone’s sister gets hit my drunk driver. Someone’s mother gets cancer. Someone’s brother, someone’s best friend. And yet you see them living their life, somehow having figured it out. They have a secret they don’t let the rest of us in on.

When my brother passed away two months ago, I thought I would be finally be let in. I thought something transforms you on the inside, you go through a radical journey, and you come out a new person on the other end, somehow still alive and breathing and smiling. From the moment I heard of my brother’s hanging, I thought about this. I waited for the lightbulb, for a signal or for some divine intervention that would guide me and tell me what to do next. But nothing came.

Nobody told me there’s no secret.

For the first week, every morning when I would open my eyes, I would remember my brother’s body lying cold in the funeral home. And I would wet my pillow enough for it to be the first wash of the day every day. I thought that maybe I don’t know what to do yet, how to move on from here yet, because I am still in shock. So I waited some more.

I waited till after his funeral. Till after his burial. Till after his memorial. Till a whole month somehow passed, and yet I was still peeking into his room on my way downstairs every single day, waiting for him to pop into my visual, smoking a joint, asking me to join him. But the room just sighed back as I walked past it.

A few days later I met an old school friend who had also lost his sister in an untimely accident a few years ago. That was another tragedy. We were in middle school, and even then my prepubescent-self had looked up at my friend that day in awe and thought, “Look at him. How is he standing up right? How is he so stoic? Surely he must know something we don’t.”

And now here we are, years and tragedies later, looking at each other as if we both are a part of a pathetic club, and we both pity each other’s inadvertent membership. I looked past his sincere smile and saw the hollowness that weighed him down. He knew nothing. Nobody had told him either. He was just here, figuring it out. So was I. There we stood together in silence, hollow, but alive and breathing and smiling at each other.

An Ode to the Galaxy of Smoke is a collection of (unpublished) poems I wrote in honour of my late brother who died of suicide last year. Although I have been expressing myself via writing for over 17 years, my style and connection to it has only strengthened over the past year. Poetry and prose have both been my aids in every journey I have ever been on, and this submission reflects the roles they play in my life, through three different pieces.

Editor’s note: Two poems from ‘Ode to the Galaxy of Smoke’ were published on December 13.

Poetry from ‘An Ode to the Galaxy of Smoke’ by Shehrbano Naqvi


maybe

maybe.

maybe there is another home for us. a home a lot like this but instead of a rich blue canopy above it’s a deep glistening golden, like fresh marmalade generously spread over so that every thunderstorm is a saccharine shower.

where grass can grow higher than skyscrapers so that children run barefoot in the summer between their towering emerald blades, singing to the tune of the wind out loud, and the rivers always go upstream because this world doesn’t know the word ‘down’.

a home where stars sizzle out loud instead of shining bright and the sun sings itself to rest and the moon toots his own horn and men and women walk with their hands flat on the ground but birds stand amongst them tall and proud, and on the stoop of a six-dimensonial house shaded by tall grass blades from the sugary rain, maybe in this world you aren’t underground, but sitting on this stoop with me as I rest my pig-tailed head on your dainty shoulders sleepily. maybe that home still feels familiar, because in our home here, the sun has gone down too early and the stars are clouded by confusion and the grass around your tombstone has also somehow died already.

but maybe there’s another home for us.


The Day You Died

The day you died
I made a list
to remember you by
writing down all
that made you, you

Bitter powdered cocoa smell
stirred in with laced tobacco
crescent-like half a smile
loud, cackling, hyena laugh
tall, lanky, binding hugs
flushed hot chocolate skin
the grooves of your glasses
indenting your stubby nose
purpled lips from years of smoking

The day you died
I made a list
to hold all that
you were
but tonight
it feels too light

The teeth violently grind
and I line the green crystals
just like you taught me
neatly in the paper’s fold
licking the line
rounding it into a tube
lighting one end
and exhaling the other
holding the list foolishly
thinking it can hold all of you

The day you died
I scrambled to capture you
shoving you on paper
before you slipped away

The mint plays on my tongue
and the smoke settles deep
I think of bedtime stories
with angels on our shoulders
and godmothers all watching
and late loved ones as stars
away from this world
and out of my reach –
my palm crumples the list
only to let it float right down

The day you died
I thought of how
I could keep you
in this world with me
when all you wanted
to do was leave

But the last of the smoke
pushes out with resistance
I stub the end out on the list
till the blank canvas in the dark
glows eerily from the center
with a scattering of ambers
kissing and igniting the paper
and for a second I wonder
if the sequins of stars above
are the millions of cigarettes
you stub through the sky every night
just to keep us in your sight

‘An Ode to the Galaxy of Smoke’ is a collection of (unpublished) poems I wrote in honour of my late brother who died of suicide last year. Although I have been expressing myself via writing for over 17 years, my style and connection to it has only strengthened over the past year. Poetry and prose have both been my aids in every journey I have ever been on, and this submission reflects the roles they play in my life, through three different pieces.

Editor’s Note: The short story from this collection, “There’s No Secret” is scheduled for publication on December 15.

Frightened by Steve Meador

The mustangs closed the distance between us rapidly. Against the wind the tail of each was straight, pointing at the clods and dust behind. Manes were flagging wildly. In the short time I had I put my camera in its pack, checked to make sure the GPS was activated on my cell–my wife makes me do that–then placed it in the pack, zipped it up and tossed it to the side a few feet. What they say is true, about thinking about your life when death may be imminent. I thought of my family and my transgressions and the things I would change if I had a do-over. It was quick-fire thought and clear. I heard the approaching horses, but my mind had images of other life matters. I did not think about the good I have done. I don’t know if that is normal. I don’t know if a person is supposed to plead, to level the scales of good and bad, or tip it to the good. It did not matter, at the time. It seemed that in the wild there is no place for worrying about what comes next, after the end. There is only the current, the instant where you are bare before the universe. It had been a long day, full of hours that were unremarkable, no longer available. It was dusk when the mustangs came, galloping across a range that has been grazed nearly bare. The quake from their hooves stronger with each stride. I turned to stone, to granite, in hope they would pass, but they did not. The group stopped and sniffed and nuzzled me. They were tame. They liked the smell and licked my leather jacket to get a taste of it. I have no photo of the happening to download, only stiff, hot coffee from the thermos in my truck, the shame of fearing friendly beasts and the realization that my age is sprinting ahead of me. Faster than the gallop of the mustangs.

Steve Meador has three books of poetry published, the full length “Throwing Percy from the Cherry Tree” and two chapbooks, A Good Sharp Knife and Pack Your Bags. His work appears regularly in print or online journals, resulting in numerous nominations for awards. However, he has yet to see his name at or near the top of any list, so, he continues to sell homes, in the Tampa area, for a living.

Harlem 1994-2004 by Shaina Phenix

Harlem, does it fester like a sore or sugar over like a syrupy sweet?

Monday through Friday is Harlem after Langston Hughes. A school teacher
questions, what happens to a dream deferred? We quick         rising suns and gap
teeth begging for dictionaries. There are bones fading in the cement
on Lenox Avenue. We are stray bullet bodies praying the safe
arrival of dream despite our sable skins. Us girls fall in love

with the first woman since our mamas and argue about whether
it is pronounced An-jill-o or On-ja-loo, who laugh like she got gold
mines diggin’ in her backyard. We are spread chests and small hips, we think us
women for the first time. Phenomenal in peter pan collars and
pleated skirts, milk mouths, and box braids. Saturday night is 101 West

131st Street, my mother smells of sweetened rum, spritz, maryjane, and
lavender perfume. Us with bellies full of oodles of noodles and oil-damp
pork chops. Lil Kim reminds the women         not to worry
about a man, cause he      aint worried          about them. The women say
amen, stomp their heels into the floor, and squat. Thighs gaping, and tongues hang

from the painted lips. They rap as if Kim be kin or a god. When they leave,
pile into taxi cabs for the club. Us girls are in the mirrors—small
thighs gaping and kool aid tongues hang from our lips, rapping or praying.
Sunday morning is Antioch Baptist Church and Sarah is
a testimony-throat, she a biscuit and molasses ballad. Lord do it

for me – then, a riot of black hands wind amongst the stained glass windows.
You’ve read the story about the blind man and one day he heard Jesus
was passing by. He said, lay your hand on me. The holy spirit is
a plague. Here, a collection plate of praise, prophetic patois heavy
feet on blood themed rugs and we restart. Bullet bodies budding allay.

Shaina Phenix is a poet, educator, and Virginia Tech MFA poetry candidate from Harlem, New York. Before pursuing her MFA she taught middle and high school humanities for two years.

Evening by Elsa Bonstein

There was a night when friends were near
and, Oh Christ, we laughed as the jokes were told.
Funny quick lines of turned-around wit,
long rambling stories of salesmen weary and maidens willing.

We drank beers and smoked cigarettes, one after another
and the laughs were like that, easy, one after another.

Later, the talk turned sad, someone would lose a mother,
a child was ill and the Flanagans would be transferred to Saudi Arabia.

When the evening was over, we remarked upon the fun.
Nothing was done or undone, the world remained the same,
but God, did we laugh that night.

Elsa Bonstein is the only child of Finnish immigrants. She grew up on a farm in rural Maryland where she devoured books in between farm chores. She dreamed of becoming a poet someday. It’s never too late to late to try.

Brunch by Gale Acuff

I wish Miss Hooker could marry Jesus
and that they’d adopt me so I’d be
the son of the Son of God, she’s my Sun
-day School teacher is Miss Hooker but she’s
25 and Jesus is so old He’s
immortal, maybe even God’s own age
if in fact He’s God to boot, some folks be
-lieve that though I’m not always sure what we
hold to in our church, at least what I hold,
I only think about religion one
day out of every seven and if
I thought about it every day of
the week I guess I’d be dead, my body
anyway, my soul would be in Heaven
or, more likely, Hell, I sin a good deal
for just ten years old. Then there’s the matter

of my parents, they’d have to give me up
for adoption, though I suspect Jesus
could force ’em to, which is kosher with me,
my folks don’t even come to church, they sleep
late and sometimes when I return for lunch
they’re still in bed and they’re not too pretty
when they finally come forth, Lazarus
-like you might say, smelling musty and slur
-ring their speech and frowning and sounding un
-grateful they they’re not really dead. Maybe
Miss Hooker and Jesus could have other

children, not adopted like me but from
their own bodies so I could have brothers
and sisters even though they’re not really
related to me but then again may
-be they are, Love thy neighbor as thyself
and all that Bible-jazz, maybe even
Miss Hooker’s related to me, not my
mother or sister or aunt or cousin but
if there truly is a human family
the maybe we’re a lot closer than I
realized, and I’d like to marry her
myself although I wouldn’t cut Jesus
out for anything but I guess in Sun
-day School I learned today, at least I figured,
all by my lonesome that if everyone’s kin
then it’s okay to marry someone of
your own flesh. Or something like that. Maybe
my confusion is the Crucifixion’s
purpose, not that I’m not still bewildered
but if I have to die, which I do, then
I won’t have to die for being baffled.
So I made lunch for me and Mother and
Father but for them it’s what they call brunch.
And it satisfied–they cleaned their headless
plates. When they went back to bed, I joined them.

Gale Acuff has had hundreds of poems published in several countries and is the author of three books of poetry. He has taught university English in the US, China, and Palestine.