Love
I do not look for you
in the noise of hearts,
nor in seasons crowded with promises.
I love you
as a passerby loves
his only window,
as the earth loves
an honest step.
If you come,
the world becomes less lonely,
and if you leave,
you teach me
that love
is salvation.
In today’s modern financial system, credit cards are becoming a common method of payment for millions of people worldwide. They offer convenience and flexibility, yet there might be some potential risks such as overspending and debt accumulation. Meanwhile I believe that the advantages highly outweigh its disadvantages if proper financial management is taken into account.
On the one hand, credit cards can encourage overspending. Since the money is not physically exchanged, consumers may lose track of their expenses and quickly accumulate debts. It is commonly seen as the greater times of loan amount than users’ monthly income. Another drawback is high interest rates. If the outstanding balance is not paid on time, the interest rates grow rapidly and there may even be fines which can put people’s financial states under pressure. Furthermore, there is a risk of digital crime like fraud and identity theft damaging the privacy. However, with a proper budget planning and sophisticated security systems like two-factor authentication, these issues can be eliminated.
On the other hand, credit cards hold numerous advantages. First of them is convenience. Customers can purchase their daily needs easily by these cards without carrying large amounts of cash, which increase security and decrease the risk of being a victim for theft. Moreover, regular users can get extra benefits and prizes such as cashback, travel points and discounts which can be financially beneficial in the long term. Additionally, cardholders can build a good credit history and increase their credit scores that will ensure them to take secure loans and mortgages in the future. Take an example, my uncle became a successful entrepreneur by taking full advantage of a credit card in a very short period.
In conclusion, even though credit cards may come with some drawbacks like overspending, financial loss (if managed improperly) and digital theft, I solely agree that the advantages such as convenience, accessibility and financial rewards completely outweigh the disadvantages.
My name is Shonazarov Shohjaxon, born on January 17, 2008. I am currently a first-year Economics student at Tashkent State Geological University. I chose this field because I am highly interested in financial systems and economic development.
I am motivated, responsible, and eager to improve my analytical and research skills. I continuously work on developing my English proficiency and academic knowledge to achieve my future goals. My aim is to become a professional economist who contributes to economic growth and financial innovation.
Both Sides Now
The look in the two eyes, green, green—
yet one is saying, Slow down approaching me.
The scar across the bridge of the nose yields
at crest, accounting for some preservation
of innocence lingering on the readier side of my face
when I cover the opposite side with a book
standing in front of a mirror, its LED square,
with a swirled boundary of yin and yang persisting
as I shift the book, looking at my look, this side
then that side, seeing here the careworn singer
cricket of summer, there the burdening ant
in how one brow lifts, the other will not.
The flare of both nostrils, one declaring
Something around here’s gone sour…the other’s wing
wanting to increase its faith in burning
one more lavender candle. The shush cleft
of the upper lip hopelessly wanting to give its secret
away with a grin, the teeter-totter down
side of the mouth from a tick it’s got working
out our monthly budget. All the blame
on either side of me bristles with two-day stubble
counter-patterned to keep my Gillette attentive.
Dad? Is that you? Mom? From how deep, I must
be seeing the bust from an old temple for Janus
in times that modeled inordinate hiving of
our DNA in enchanted unison under
harvest moons. Moon face. Bright eyes—
one with a sagging lid. The one cheek
less buttoned, the sharper one. Is there no truth
in the balance of your scales?—now peering,
without the book, for the wholeness of my one regard,
wanting to un-see this divide
I have so looked into this curious hour, to the open
pores. And oh wrinkles, where is that cream for you?
Radar
Each time I beam in on one in the movies
my own searching nearness dimly flickers.
Time quickens with the needle
sweeping the element in reach
where you had always been. Then one day
your look stilled in mine, just for a bleep,
and you smiled. My eyes batted.
The sea of the world turned opaque,
enveloping, swimming clear in anonymity
where, closer, closer, read and reread
back and forth like a palindrome, singularly
that flash of you pulsed and blossomed
again on the dark instrument of Who’s there?
The slip away? The jolt and tremor? What is
everything? Seeing it come for you?
Skywalk
A pheasant’s flight over a country road
came to mind once when I was in the city
tubed in the glass of a skywalk
looking down at the traffic on the street
on the way from one building’s wide throughways
past pricey boutiques to a Starbucks and ATMs.
Under gray rain, if you knew your way
through the construction labyrinth of downtown,
you didn’t need to open an umbrella.
Mine kept furled neatly in my hand.
My head was full of everything going
into work, with this one suspended glimpse
of the world around me thickening in a drum
of downpour, then hushing at the let-up,
the dark wet street below eye-beamed
with headlights, glowing with tail lights.
Night had fallen clear on my way home.
I had a minute to stop and hover
imagining myself sole in ascent
through a hazy nimbus of the buildings’ lights
up into an utter blind gap of space
where the charts of the stars clustered
to a stunned emptying of the mind before
I came down with my nothing among the commuters.
Michael Todd Steffen’s third book, I Saw My Life, is being published by Lily Press (www.lilypress.com) in March 2026. Mike lives in Somerville, Massachusetts. He helps coordinate The Hastings Room Reading Series and frequently publishes articles about new and established poets on the Boston Area Small Press and Poetry Scene website. His poems have appeared in journals, including The Boston Globe, The Dark Horse, Everse Radio,North of Oxford and Ibbetson Street. Boris Dralyuk (managing editor for Nimrod Journal) writes, I have read [Steffen’s] poems with enormous satisfaction. His lines are supple and wear their unmistakable wisdom lightly.
Thought Awakened Through Criticism
Every historical period creates its own literary environment, aesthetic views, and standards. However, evaluating the literary process correctly understanding its essence rather than its surface requires profound thought, independent opinion, and a critical eye. One of the figures of such high intellect in the development of Uzbek literary criticism was Ozod Sharafiddinov. He was an intellectual who viewed literature not merely as a creative product, but as a force that educates the mindset of society.
In the eyes of Ozod Sharafiddinov, literature is not just a tool for aesthetic pleasure; it is an arena that shapes human spirituality and awakens social consciousness. For this reason, in evaluating a work of art, he paid special attention to internal content, ideological depth, and the author’s responsibility rather than external beauty. In his critical activities, the priority was not to belittle or deny the author, but to encourage them to think more deeply.
Although Ozod Sharafiddinov’s literary views were closely linked to his time, he never chose the path of conforming to the era. He sharply criticized artificiality, formality, and stereotyped thinking in the literary process. According to him, true literature is valuable not only for responding to the demands of the times but for its ability to reveal the internal world of a human being. Therefore, he saw the creator as a person responsible first before society, and even more so, before their own conscience.
Ozod Sharafiddinov considered criticism an essential tool for the development of literature. He understood criticism not as passing judgment, but as analysis and dialogue. In his articles, justice is clearly felt alongside sharpness, and objectivity alongside demandingness. It is this very aspect that made his school of criticism unique and enduring.
In today’s era of globalization and rapid information, Ozod Sharafiddinov’s views are crucial for the youth. He valued contemplation over haste and independent thought over imitation. His literary heritage teaches today’s students and young people to look at a work with a critical eye and to feel the responsibility behind every word.
In my opinion, Ozod Sharafiddinov was not a critic who evaluated literature from the outside, but a thinker who lived within it and felt its pain. He approached the literary process not as a spectator, but as an active participant. His ideas continue to serve as an important resource in shaping the literary thinking of young creators and students today.
In conclusion, in the eyes of Ozod Sharafiddinov, time is transient, while literature is an eternal phenomenon. He sought to change the mindset, not the era. Therefore, his literary views remain relevant today and are recognized as the solid foundation of Uzbek literary criticism.
By Nozima Gofurova
3rd-year student at the University of Journalism and Mass Communications of Uzbekistan, specializing in Travel Journalism.
Me, Myself
“Why are all of these people ghosting me?” Steven exclaimed, addressing an empty room.
“People have things to do,” counseled Willy, Steven’s inner self. “They’re busy. They can’t just wait around breathlessly for your emails and then respond accordingly.”
“Why not?” challenged Steven hotly.
“Because, lover, they have lives.”
“I’m sixty-eight years old, an old man,” protested Steven. “Who cares about someone like me experiencing cognitive dissonance? No one.”
“Ginny is the only one who gives a darn,” Willy reminded him. “She may live way the heck over on the other side of the continent, but she cares.”
“But, that’ll turn out to just be a mistake of some kind, probably,” thought Steven dourly.
“Why do you say that?” asked his inner self.
“Because, self,” explained Steven, “Ginny’s never met me in person, only online and on the telephone. She thinks that I’m that character in the pages of my novel, not the flesh and blood person that you see.”
“Well, I can understand your perspective,” remarked self.
“You’re very helpful,” said Steven sarcastically, “and you can’t see anything. You are a non-corporeal side of me, not a separate person.”
“What happens with the passage of time?” asked Willy philosophically.
“You only get older,” snapped Steven crossly. He had decided that no one gave a darn, that indifference, especially with respect to him, was endemic.
Steven hadn’t had a good buzz on for twenty years and was grateful to achieve that state tonight, courtesy some hydrocodone and a beer chaser. He was presently almost incapable of speech and rued the intoxication he had achieved; it made him incapable of expressing his frustration.
Suddenly the land line jangled off the hook.
“Pick up,” urged Willy, hovering like a specter over the phone. “It could be Ginny.”
Moving sluggishly, Steven slapped his hand down on the receiver, jarring it in place. Screwing his features up in concentration, he succeeded in lifting the instrument to his ear. “Hef…hello?” he croaked.
“Ellie?” said a boisterous, up-beat voice on the other end of the line.
Steven scowled. His mother, Ellie, had died nine years before. He wondered, who could this possibly be?
“Ellie? Ellie? Is Ellie there?” the voice badgered him.
Steven took a deep breath and let it out. “Sh…she’s not here,” he managed to utter.
“That’s okay,” the voice replied. “This message is for any resident at this phone number.” Then the voice went on to tell Steven how bright his shirts could be, should he only use Gorilla Wax stain remover in his laundry. And the message went on and on.
Finally Steven found his voice again. “Look, my mother died nearly ten years ago,” he said.
After a measured beat, the salesman continued. “How many boxes of Gorilla Wax can I put you down for?”
Steven and Willy both had had enough. Steven slammed down the phone, had another beer and passed out.
When Steven woke up at 4am, he panicked before realizing it was Saturday and he didn’t have to go to work.
Willy had a suggestion on how to spend the day. “Listen loser, I’ve got a long shot suggestion for you. Call up every girl that you ever dated, wanted to date, or made you horny. If you call up ten and with each one you have a 10% chance of success, you still have some chance of getting a date. I forgot how to calculate it, but you have some chance.”
Steven liked the idea. He made a list of ten. Of the ten calls, three didn’t go through and had no forwarding number, and the next four consisted of:
“You disgusted me then and you still do.”
“I married your best friend.”
“I’m married to a woman.”
“Who the hell are you? Leave me alone!”
Next, Steven phoned Ginny. When she picked up, Steven explained his mental confusion, his loneliness and told Ginny he wanted to meet in person at last.
There was an awkward pause on the line and then Ginny came clean. She explained that she was happily married and only vicariously grooved on Steven, based on the lurid descriptions contained in his novel. She hoped he understood, and abruptly hung up.
The tenth call was a winner, or so he thought. June still lived in the area, was unmarried and happy to hear from him. She invited him over. He showed up on her doorstep in thirteen minutes flat.
“Come in Steven,” said the woman. He could still recognize her as the girl he knew so many years ago, although at the time she was a skinny, pimply-faced girl, whereas now she was a beautiful, full-figured woman. He didn’t even notice she was missing a leg for almost a full minute. He stared.
June was used to the double-take. The next thing she said was “Right, I’m not the leggy beauty you remember.”
After a silent pause, they both burst out laughing, breaking the ice.
Willy started to give Steven advice, but he told Willy to back off, he would try to handle this himself.
Oddly, a puzzled June accepted Steven’s explanation of Willy’s presence.
Steven and June did the standard history conversation: Steven’s 40-year insurance career and his two divorces; June’s car accident that cost her a leg, 20 years ago. But, she got a fat insurance settlement which meant she could live out the rest of her life without working. She had become something of a recluse after the accident.
When they got into specifics, they discovered that Steven’s insurance company gave June her payout.
June asked “Want to see my other leg?” A puzzled Steven said okay.
June went to the closet and brought out her prosthesis. “Want to feel it?” She asked.
“Sure.”
Willy whispered something only Steven could hear. Steven said, “How does that compare to your good leg?”
June pulled up her dress and said, “you tell me.”
Steven had no discrimination against the disabled, and June was not put off by a two-time loser. Steven stayed the night, and the spectral pervert Willy was a happy onlooker.
Steven and June were wed in a civil ceremony, with Willy standing up for the groom. There are no happily ever afters, but the two of them–three, if you count Willy–did a respectable impression of one.
Are Cherries in Bloom?
Voice cracks, words tumble,
Would you be my friend?
She asks her in parking lot
of Heaven’s Garden.
Face flushes. Eyes squint.
A smile appears in corner
of her lips painted in rose,
deep center of magnolia.
She offers her a kind hand.
A conversation of streams
flowing, palm trees swaying
with breeze. Cherries to suckle.
Jerrice J Baptiste is a visual artist, poet, author of nine books. Her watercolor drawings on paper have been accepted or forthcoming in Synchronized Chaos, Las Laguna Art Gallery exhibit in California, MER, Spirit Fire Review, Jerry Jazz Musician Magazine. She’s presented her art work at The Omega Institute in Rhinebeck, NY in 2025. She’s been featured as a solo artist at The Mountain Top Library in Tannersville, NY in 2025 & 2026. Her most recent poetry book called Coral in the Diaspora is published by Abode Press in 2024. Her poetry has been published in numerous magazines and journals, Artemis Journal, The Yale Review, Mantis, Kosmos Journal and hundreds of others.
Thirst for Love
I will leave this city
I won’l leave you
Give me some time
I will find myself.
I will leave this air
I won’t leave your scent
The scent will intoxicate
My ignorant little soul.
I will leave the water of this river
I won’t leave your face
I will be alone day and night
A loving poet in the words of poetry.
I will leave this sky
I won’t leave your house
My sky is huge
The storm of heart will stop there.
I will leave the love of the earth
I won’t leave your path
I will walk with the stars
I will definitely look for you.
I will leave this body
l won’t escape your touch
I will wait in the grave
Where you will be true.
No one can stop me
In the way of love
Boat will arrive in the river of time
To take me away.
We will meet in a garden
Like flowers on the same stem
Becoming the water of a river
We will wet both banks.
Look at this chest
In the sword of your love
My love is alive
In the truth of your Love.