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Save Me~ By Shahla Khan

10/30/2014

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What difference does it make 
To die of a bullet by Al Nusra
Or starve to death in Somalia?

How is prostitution in Thailand
Better than working at a cloth factory in Bangladesh?

Which one is less painful-
To be raped brutally in New Delhi
Or to be mutilated in Africa?

How is a post graduate working for minimum wage at McDonald’s
Living better than the sport shoe factory workers in China?

How is the massacre of thousands of Egyptians any worse than the victims of 9/11 attack at the WTC?

Who cares how many Space tours you have had?
Who is bothered to count your wealth stored in Swiss banks?
Who wants to see how bright Las Vegas is?
Who cares if you invent a million dollar iPhone?

Can any of your inventions make any changes in my life?
Can your billions save one life from a useless death?
Can your million-dollar phone connect an orphan to his dead mother?
Can your golden Las Vegas brighten the dark lives of the millions of Syrians?

I don’t care which political party does it,
I don’t care what religious banner you carry,
I only care to live life like you do,
I only want breathe what you breathe.

Don’t sell me to older men for some quick cash,
Don’t cover my soil with the blood of innocents,
Don’t bomb Syria because Syria bombed itself,
Don’t employ me as a maid in Dubai.

You create pace makers but you lost your own hearts.
You can afford a trip to the international space station
But you fall short of cash to feed a hungry child in Ethiopia.

You build skyscrapers and billion dollar apartments in Dubai and new York,
But you can’t provide shelter to the homeless woman across the street.

You spend hours on Facebook uploading selfies and self obsessed statuses,
But you cannot spend five minutes with your aging ill old mother.

Not one, all of you are guilty. 
All religions have failed me
All countries have crushed me
All leaders have poisoned me

I’m humanity
Shivering, frail, aching, dying humanity. 
Save me.



Author Bio:
Shahla is a Bosch University (IUKB-Switzerland) graduate with a Master's Degree in International Business Administration and a champion of extraordinary-performance workshops, developing innovative methodologies and results-oriented workshops to help businesses and university students take on greater challenges in life and produce breakthrough results. She is currently ending her doctoral degree in the UK at Cardiff Metropolitan University.

Shahla has authored several articles published internationally and a couple of books that inspire and empower individuals who face challenges in everyday life. Her interviews and articles have been published across international media and is known for her books. She was the recipient of Santandar Scholarship for Research 2013 at Cardiff Metropolitan University. She has also been the proud valedictorian at her graduation at IUKB Switzerland. 

Being intensely in love with the United Nations Organization, her volunteer work with the organization is phenomenal. She was elected as the Chair for Southern region at the United Nations Youth Students Association in 2010-11. She also launched a United Nations society at her university where she served as the President of UNYSA-UWIC for another year. She currently is a member of Green Peace Cardiff and BAWSO Cardiff. 
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A Bug's Life~ By Colleen Wells

10/29/2014

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On a trip to North Carolina one of the largest dragonflies I have ever seen smacks our windshield. It is like a tiny helicopter coming in for a crash landing. The impact tears its enormous wings, giving them the jagged crosshatch design of a broken porch screen.

I watch the dragonfly’s legs move slightly and wonder if it was the wind or the last evidence of life. Rick turns on the wipers, but the insect stays wedged between the windshield and the right wiper for the remainder of the trip. Rick keeps saying, “Don’t look at it.” Our sons are oblivious, sitting in the back playing with their Gameboys.

When we get to Wilmington, our destination, I ask Rick to pull into a subdivision, where I slowly pluck the insect from the windshield, half-hoping it is still alive, vainly wishing that it survived not only the crash, but also the two-hour trip at 70 mph.

I lay the dead dragonfly in the yard and examine it. The coloring is a gorgeous dark metallic green— a color I’ve seen before on fancy cars.

His legs curl in finality. My husband interrupts me, calling out the window, “Come on, you’re embarrassing me.”


Author Bio:
Colleen Wells writes from Bloomington, IN, where she lives with her husband, three children, three dogs, and three cats. She writes about animal welfare and social justice issues and often explores mundane subjects with humor in her work. Colleen writes poetry, essays, and short stories. Her work has appeared in NUVO, ORION The Georgetown Review and the Potomac Review among other publications. Her book, Dinner with Doppelgangers: A True Story of Madness and Recovery is forthcoming from Wordpool Press. www.ColleenWells.com, www.dinnerwithdoppelgangers.com.
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Desert Passage~ By Jane Beal

10/28/2014

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I.

A wooden chair nailed to a tall, headless, branchless tree trunk:
“a vintage piece of Santa Fe whimsy,” my friend says.

Real life looking surreal, suspended above red desert dust
swirling at the cross-roads like two Cochiti women and a boy.

At night, a coyote flees across the street, alone,
briefly illuminated by the headlights of a stranger’s car.


II.

Is my angel sitting in that high chair like a three-year-old,
struck dumb by the memory of my father getting out of the bath?

Is my angel running after the coyote in the dark
while I wrestle with a demon in the air above my bed?

Is my angel tired after thirty-three years of trying to protect
the impossible child, soul screaming, mouth streaming bitter-white?



III.

The monsoon comes. Lightning without thunder,
rain without remorse. Sunflowers bloom in the desert.

The double rainbow appears: a piece of heaven’s ephemera,
the original translucent found-art object in the sky. 

Brewer’s blackbird sings me awake. A hummingbird darts close,
then away. Mariposa wings open, yellow and black, eyes on her back.


IV.

Is my angel in the rain? Does Michael steal the thunder?
Does Gabriel paint the sky?

Will Raphael uproot the sunflowers? Wave them over my head
like a wand and turn me into a blue jay?

I see one now. He sits on a twig, shits white, flies toward me,
and vanishes. Everything disappears into eternity.


V.

Beside a cholla cactus, I sit sheltered by a Cochiti-red blanket,
scraping dry pottery shards against the wounded ground.

I spit in the sand, mix a gritty glue, paste one shard
against another until a broken-faced doll holds all the babies

my angel remembers in pain. I paint her clay storyteller-skin
blue as the turquoise sky, pure as clouds over the badlands.

 
Author Bio:
Jane Beal, PhD is a poet and professional writer. She is the creator of more than a dozen poetry collections, including Sanctuary (Finishing Line Press, 2008) and The Roots of Apples (Lulu Press, 2012), as well as three recording projects: Songs from the Secret Life, Love-Song, and with her brother, saxophonist and composer Andrew Beal, The Jazz Bird. She also writes fiction, creative non-fiction, and works of literary scholarship. To learn more, please visit http://sanctuarypoet.net.
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Land of Oz~ By Niramoy Ganguly

10/27/2014

15 Comments

 
Wake up every morning to the barking dog
Finding the sense of it while on the bog
Everyday is the same and every night alone
This is how my life is to be, the emptiness of home

Telling myself day after day
Happy on my own, this is the way
Don’t need someone to take up my time
Travel around and the world will be mine

Wishful thinking in the Land of Oz
The Tin-man’s heart, I never was
Just a dream and pointless because
I’m better off without Love

There was one at the back of my head
A girl I knew with whom I cared
Couldn’t tell her how I really felt
Cause I didn’t know what it was myself

We never felt that way about us
Even though we could never be apart
Talking the world till the morning wee hours
But I ain’t the guy she normally loves

Wishful thinking in the Land of Oz
The Scarecrow I have come because
Foolish to realize what she was to me
Maybe something thing that could have been

Years went by till I got back to her
Unavailable as I always had feared
Won’t let it stop me this time around
Cause my heart needed to be heard

“I’ve always loved u all of my life
Late it seems, I was too Foolish to realize
Didn’t have the Courage to tell u before
Lost my Heart, many times ago"

Wishful thinking in the Land of Oz
The Cowardly Lion, I’m not any more
Followed my heart down the yellow brick road
At the end, It led me to You

You have always been the one for me
No matter how different we would be
You have always accepted me for me
I was too cold for your love to see

Cant give you the material things like other guys
Nor can I take back the things I have said
I will love you till the end of time
Question is, Will you be Mine?


Author Bio:
An engineer by trade who was released from the Indian Army on medical grounds. Had to start his life all over again and forced to let go of a life he always loved.
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Birthday Present~ By Joan McNerney

10/23/2014

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I wanted to bring back the
best gift from the country
for you, just for you.
I wanted to.

Some sky would be nice,
lots of lovely sky with
light fleecy clouds.

So I rushed through
stores and bought the
biggest shiny box and
looked for a perfect bow.

All shades of blue, violet
with red and yellow.
An entire rainbow of
colored ribbons for the
box to put this sky into.

Then on the bus my bow
fell apart.  Somebody
stepped on the box.  It's
all crushed and dirty.

By the time we got to
the city it was late. Did
my sky fly away?
The box is empty now.

I wanted to bring back the
best gift from the country
for you, just for you.
I wanted to.


Author Bio:
Joan McNerney’s poetry has been included in numerous literary magazines such as Seven Circle Press, Dinner with the Muse, Blueline, Spectrum, three Bright Spring Press Anthologies and several Kind of A Hurricane Publications.  She has been nominated three times for Best of the Net.  Four of her books have been published by fine small literary presses. 
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The Twin Paradox~ By Sally Fox Maple

10/22/2014

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Time, tell yourself
tell yourself off
sharp--
snow falling, no sound
that snow deafens it
crystalline paratroopers, never twice the same
but if you were, who would know?
They form the softest blanket
deadly with duration
not so different from us

shining, red orb
looking through it into green needles, piercing
closed veins, we are hanged there together
surrounded by a cheap braided gold border
ends uneven from the glue.
Abraded morals,
portals to agony
I imagined it tenuous
strings pulled to breaking; notes pinched
hope to resonate intact
two hands turning backward, numbers askew
not so different from us

 
Author Bio:
Sally Fox Maple earned her English degree from Florida Atlantic University; she now pursues her Master's in Motion Pictures Screenwriting from the University of Miami. A songwriter, Maple is now singing and performing with heavy metal band Brütal in Boynton Beach, Fl. Maple also plays women's professional football for the South Florida Swift and is known for writing The Endzone Airwaves, a blog that showcased the trials and victories of the unknown heroines on the gridiron across the globe. More can be gleaned from Maple's website, www.sallymaple.com.
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Woman~ By Sonya Groves

10/21/2014

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A woman without artifice
must be destroyed,
stricken from the record,
her gender card revoked.

For what is a woman without
artifice, but an aberration to
her species. Without her
leopard heels and acrylic nails,
how can she be recognized as
the true hunter?

Woman must have artifice.
Her hint of Chanel and
camouflage face paint help
to mask her true intent:
to locate, to stalk, to ensnare
her prey.

Without her artifice I say,
she but be a man on display.


Author Bio:
Sonya Groves is a teacher of English and History in San Antonio. She has published a short story in the Abydos Education Journal and been a conference presenter at the East Carolina University Multi-Cultural Literature Review Conference. Currently she is pursuing her Master’s degree in English at Our Lady of the Lake University.
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Spring to Winter- Lost Girl~ By Ellen Kaplan

10/20/2014

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Mere girl. You sing until
the boys you crave run mad,
not knowing that the siren call
was never meant for them;
You stitch up capes of innocence
As they whip their horses wild.

Dear girl. You sing until
Starlings split the sky.
They trill a dance of hieroglyphs
On your outstretched little finger;
Invite them to the shilly-bee
They’ll surely dance for you! 

Jays tufted in royal hues and
Cardinals caped in persimmon plumes
Robin’s eggs splinter in the dew
Like bits jeweled glass,
All pay homage to the girl you were
And you lay sunstruck and bewildered
on the grass.

Things changed. She cut off her breasts
and launched her ships; she grazed with banished herds.
She joined the world and lost a world,
I know; I watched her go.
She is who I was once,
Before the days got cold.
Now, I dream of music in a different key.
When I remember what it is to be
unruly wild
And cherish hope of churlish loves
Whose spangled locks fly crazed aslant the wind,
I mourn the loss of all those things: of birds and boys,
The pulse of spring
And other girls
as fertile-free as I.


Author Bio:
Ellen W. Kaplan is Professor of Acting and Directing, Co-Director of Jewish Studies at Smith College, a Fulbright Scholar (Costa Rica), and a Fulbright Senior Scholar (Hong Kong).  She has performed and directed internationally: in Israel where she also taught at Tel Aviv University; in China where she directed an English language version of The Wilderness which then toured in the US and elsewhere.  Other recent directing includes plays by prisoners performed at the Kennedy Center in Washington DC. Her own plays include Sarajevo Phoenix, based on interviews with women in Bosnia, which will perform in Bucharest in 2014; Soul of the City, a finalist for the Massachusetts Playwriting Fellowship (2009), and With Dream Awakened Eyes, a one-woman show based on the work of Charlotte Salomon. Her play about living in Israel during the 2nd Intifada, Pulling Apart, a finalist for the O’Neill Playwrights Conference, was produced in New Haven and received a Moss Hart Award.  She is working on a new play, The Time That’s Left Us, about inmates on death row, and Livy in the Garden, a play which she began this summer at the renowned Sewanee Writers’ Conference.  
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just my luck~ By Bridgette Bianca

10/16/2014

2 Comments

 
it was you
who tossed out
babyiloveyous
and ipromisethistimes
like loose change
nickel and diming affection
tossing out pennies instead of thoughts
but i blame myself
for stooping to collect them
knowing they’d never add up


Author Bio:
While working in her middle school’s library, Bridgette Bianca met her best friend - a book of poetry written by a teenage girl in Harlem almost two decades before. She checked out A Screaming Whisper by Vanessa Howard so much she committed it to memory, down to the spacing of the text. That book held her hand until she was ready to write her own poems. Now, she writes poetry and hopes it can keep someone else company. Bridgette Bianca is a native of Los Angeles where she teaches English at the college level. She received her Bachelor of Arts in English from Howard University and her Master of Fine Arts in Writing from Otis College of Art & Design. 
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Speak Not Silently~ By A.C. Fernandez

10/15/2014

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I am the eyes which look upon you,
yet you cannot see my soul.
I am the memory which casts
its dark shadow, its veil across your face
yet you cannot remove it, no matter
how great the measure of your effort.
I am the face in the crowd, the one
who is unrecognizable to many
aside from the others who share
a commonality in their journey.
A simple glance is all that is needed
to translate a thousand words,
foreign to those who cannot
comprehend my language.
I am silent in my suffering.
I am silent in my pain.
I speak only to those from whom
I have been given permission,
for it is in my lack of safety,
I remain silent.
I am hidden in the musty closet
of my mind’s eye, choking on
the twisted hangers of humankind’s
continued perpetration.
I am bleeding, and I am raw.
I am tired, and I am broken.
Speak not silently.
It is for one such as I
you choose to raise your voice.
One who cannot speak for herself.
One who has suffered such as you.
Stand upon the highest point
and hear it echo across the world.
Let not mankind ignore your message.
Speak not silently.
For in your truths, I shall be set free.
I shall learn, through your courage,
how to whisper by way of a dry
cracked vocalization, initially incoherent.
Someday, perhaps, I shall join you
on that high, high peak, and our echoes
shall resound together.
For, you chose to speak not silently.
Instead you screamed for me.


*Author Notes: Written with great respect to those who have battled silence in any measure... When one hand is raised to another to destroy the soul... The fight to regain the voice... A true battle indeed…


Author Bio:
A.C. Fernandez resides in Texas, although she previously resided in numerous locations such as Spain, Germany, Illinois, and New Mexico. She has been fortunate to experience a wide variety of cultural dynamics and uses them in her writings. She creates her pieces out of the deepest respect for the experiences of female violation of any manner or form. It is vital for her to acknowledge domestic, sexual, psychological, and physical abuse in her prolific works. Her voice is strong and straightforward, withholding nothing to express what has been branded in her mind for many years. This approach may be startling to some, but know, it is real and well written. She researches crime and all it entails, and has done so thoughout her lifetime. She has worked as a counselor, case manager, and a psychiatric nursing assistant. More often than not, her clients were individuals who experienced or perpetuated sexual violence against women. Her life has been a blur of darkness... She finds a way back to solace through her writings... Privacy and peace are her primary needs far beyond food, shelter, and clothing... 
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