Culture is the shared beliefs, customs, values, and traditions that define a society. It influences the way people think, behave, and interact with one another. From language and art to religion and social norms, culture shapes our identity and helps us understand the world around us. Every community, whether small or large, has its unique cultural practices that connect individuals and create a sense of belonging.
One of the most important aspects of culture is communication. Language, for example, is not only a tool for expressing thoughts but also a way of preserving history and traditions. Art, music, and literature reflect the values, emotions, and creativity of a society, allowing people to share experiences across generations. Festivals and rituals strengthen social bonds and bring people together, promoting unity and cooperation.
Culture also plays a vital role in education and personal development. Learning about different cultures encourages tolerance, empathy, and open-mindedness. It helps individuals appreciate diversity and reduces prejudice. In today’s globalized world, understanding other cultures is essential for international relations, business, and travel. Cultural awareness enables better cooperation and helps prevent misunderstandings between people from different backgrounds.
However, culture is constantly evolving. Globalization, technology, and migration influence traditional practices and introduce new ideas. While this can lead to cultural enrichment, it also presents challenges in preserving heritage and identity. Communities must find a balance between embracing modernity and maintaining their cultural roots.
In conclusion, culture is a fundamental part of human life that shapes our identity, guides our actions, and strengthens communities. By appreciating and respecting different cultures, we can foster a more inclusive and harmonious world. Understanding culture is not just about preserving the past but also about building a better future for everyone.
My name is Jasmina Rashidova, a passionate and ambitious student born on November 23, 2008, in Shakhrisabz district, Kashkadarya Region, Uzbekistan!I currently study at School No. 74. I have earned several educational grants and awards, and I am a finalist of competitions like BBG, FO, and VHG. I actively participate in international Model United Nations (MUN) conferences and lead my own educational channel — @Jr_extraWith a deep interest in leadership, public speaking, and writing, I continue to work hard toward achieving academic excellence and inspiring others in my community. A bright example for this can be about little Jasmine Rashidova — A finalist of StriveHub, LOT’2025, and CAMLP’25.
Welcome, readers, to the first Synchronized Chaos issue of November 2025. First, a few announcements.
This issue was edited by poetTao Yucheng, who has been published several times in Synchronized Chaos and in several other publications.
Contributor Kelly Moyer has launched a blog-style journal, Circle of Salt, a simple blog-style journal for all things esoteric. Potential contributors are invited to send up to three unpublished pieces of magickal poetry (including esoteriku), prose, personal essay, original art, reviews, recipes, tips, etc. to Kelly Sauvage Moyer at unfazedmoon@gmail.com. The web address is https://circleofsaltmag.blogspot.com/.
A sip and see is a meet and greet party popular in the southeastern United States where people enjoy light snacks, drinks, and the chance to meet a newborn baby. In a way, Synchronized Chaos Magazine’s issues are global ‘sips and sees,’ celebrations where we may meet newly emerged bursts of creativity.
As we would when encountering a new baby, Priyanka Neogi revels in life’s joy.
Bill Tope and Doug Hawley’s short story “Evergreen” portrays quiet familial concern, capturing the subtle tension and affection between siblings as they notice their mother’s unusual, tender attachment to her garden.
Mahbub Alam takes joy in nature and the brilliant sunshine. Timothee Bordenave’s essay explores permaculture, advocating livestock grazing on fallow land and urban fruit tree forests. Genevieve Guevara playfully links weather patterns and emotions. Walid Alzoukani revels in how the rain enriches his spirit. Brian Michael Barbeito’s“What is the Meadow and What is Love?” finds love and presence in the quiet endurance of nature. Bekturdiyeva Nozima’s essay examines the urgent need to cultivate ecological consciousness among youth, emphasizing education, family, and practical engagement as keys to a sustainable future. Jack Galmitz’ poetry speaks to cultural memory and our connections with nature. Brian Barbeito’s work reflect the relationship between human beings, nature and animals, which is even more important in the current Internet age.
Paintings from Srijani Dutta reflect hope for the return of spring, drawing on images from an Asian mythological system. Eddie Heaton guides us on a surrealist romp through a colorful universe. Mark Young speculates through found and created poetry on how human art can coexist with science and technology.
Image c/o Jacques Fleury
Federico Wardal highlights the work of holistic physician Dr. Antonello Turco and how his medical practice is a work of art. Nidia Garcia celebrates the creativity and insight of a weaver who tells the story of her people in cloth. Taylor Dibbert shares an amusing anecdote about sartorial fashion choices and lost luggage.
Jacques Fleury’s “The Color Purple” is a vibrant meditation on heritage and symbolism, exploring how shades of purple evoke nobility, spirituality, emotion, and the richness of human experience. Normatova Sevinchoy reflects on the nature of beauty and finds it through elegant simplicity. Kelly Moyer’s films explore the relationship between life and all things through the disposal and dissolution of human-built objects.
Literature and writing are integral parts of human creative culture. Contemporary Uzbek literature blends tradition and modernity, emphasizing national identity and the Uzbek language. Abdulazizova Nigina Faxriddin qizi’s article “Developing Speech Culture of Primary School Students” examines methods to enhance young learners’ oral and written communication, emphasizing interactive strategies, cultural awareness, and the link between speech skills and social participation.
Zuhra Jumanazarova expresses that preserving the literary quality of the Uzbek language is integral to preserving Uzbek culture. Muhayyo Toshpo’latova’s essay explores how contemporary Uzbek literature balances tradition, national identity, and digital-age innovation. Nilufar Yusupova discusses advantages and challenges posed by online education. Masharipova Unsunoy outlines strategies for improving student public speaking competence. Dilafruz Karimova evaluates various methods for teaching English as a second language. Rashidova Lobar’s“Mother Tongue” is a heartfelt tribute to the Uzbek language, celebrating it as the nation’s soul, heritage, and eternal source of pride and unity.
Peter Cherches’ vignettes explore through gentle humor how we make decisions and set up our lives. James Tian reminds the faithful to use their God-given brains, even in church.
Janna Hossam’s essay explores the fleeting nature of achievement and the trap of “fast dopamine,” urging a shift from chasing external validation to finding lasting fulfillment in steady, meaningful growth. Sharifova Saidaxon advocates for balance in the use of social media and online entertainment. O‘rozboyeva Shodiya’s essay “How Social Media Affects Young People” reflects on the dual impact of social media, highlighting its benefits for learning and reading while cautioning against distraction and over-immersion in the virtual world.
Turkan Ergor reflects on how people’s strongest desires and best-laid plans don’t come to fruition. Dr. Ashok Kumar expresses the peace found through surrendering to what we cannot control.
J.T. Whitehead’s Nocturnes are haiku-inspired reflections on art, history, and personal experience, capturing quiet joy and solitude. Christina Chin and Marjorie Pezzoli’s collaborative renga blends fragmented, stark imagery with a conversational, experimental flow, exploring tension, vulnerability, and the raw textures of experience. Derek Dew’s poems “To Come” and “What is Ours” delve into language, memory, and moral stillness, blending abstraction and lyricism to explore identity, silence, and the elusive nature of meaning. Sayani Mukherjee’s “God’s Hands” is a dreamlike meditation on time and memory, shimmering with blue skies and fleeting wishes. Vo Thi Nhu Mai’s “Harbour of the Changing Season” is a tender, reflective meditation on love, loss, and the passage of time, finding beauty and peace in the rhythms of nature and the flow of life.
Duane Vorhees’ poem “ORH” tenderly portrays love as cleansing and transformative, merging identities like rain washing away dust. Amina Kasim Muhammad advocates kindness and humanity. In a similar vein, Maja Milojkovic reflects on the value of a human soul as measured by the person’s compassion and integrity. Ruzimbayeva Quvonchoy Jamoladdin qizi’s essay highlights Uzbekistan’s national values as the enduring heart of the nation, shaping identity, unity, and moral life.
Yodgorova Madina also celebrates traditional Uzbek values such as diligence, hospitality, respect for the elderly, the young, and women, honesty, and compassion and urges modern Uzbeks to pass down those values. Jumanazarova Muxlisa’s essay highlights women as the vital foundation of Uzbek society, shaping history, education, and leadership. In the same vein, Egyptian writer Adham Boghdady’s poem portrays a woman as a radiant, inspiring presence who lights up hearts and the world. Dildora Khojyozova’s essay “Kindness and Humanity in the 21st Century” emphasizes the enduring importance of empathy and compassion amid technological and social change, arguing that true progress depends on how we treat one another.
Abbas Yusuf Alhassan’s long poetic piece illustrates the different facets of love as expressed through grief. Elmaya Jabbarova’s poetry intertwines love and grief. RP Verlaine comments on what brings people together and what divides us. Eldar Akhadov ponders the mental distance that inevitably separates everyone.
Turdiyeva Guloyim’s “I’m Tired, Mother!” expresses profound loneliness and disillusionment, lamenting false friendships, cruelty, and the harshness of the world, while yearning for genuine human connection. Kandy Fontaine’s“Nepantla, The Tipping Point, Deep Time: A Conversation Between Worlds” examines the intersections of literature, identity, and planetary change, using the concept of Deep Time to reflect on societal fear, power structures, and the urgent need for transformation. Mirta Liliana Ramirez reminds us that powerful people exist who prey on the vulnerable. Patricia Doyne surveys the sentiments at a San Francisco Bay Area No Kings rally. Aubrey Malaya Lassen’s poem “The Call” confronts misunderstanding and oppression, using vivid animal imagery to explore awareness, resistance, and the refusal of power to recognize truth.
Bill Tope’s “The Gauntlet” is a tense short story following Anais, a Haitian refugee, as she navigates an unsettling encounter with police in a small Ohio town, exploring themes of fear, vulnerability, and power. Ahmed Miqdad’s poem reflects on the horrors of violence and displacement, using stark imagery of blood and silence to evoke grief and loss. Emeniano Acain Somoza Jr. writes of humans eking out existence in the shadows of ageless deities and harsh weather. Stephen Jarrell Williams crafts a slow piece on calm preparations as an apocalypse looms.
J.J. Campbell illustrates the lingering effects of trauma on a person’s life and psyche. Mykyta Ryzhykh’s poem juxtaposes stark, unsettling images with fragile signs of life, capturing the raw and abrupt entry of innocence into harsh reality. Alexa Grospe personifies the pain and terror of stage fright and writers’ block. Philip Butera views life from the panoramic perspective of one nearing death. Ablakulova Dilfuza’s essay “My child, if I leave, you won’t find me again” is a poignant meditation on solitude, aging, and loss, vividly portraying the emotional landscape of a woman left alone, clinging to memories as her world darkens. Adewuyi Taiwo’s short story “A Star Called Priye” explores themes of family secrets, grief, and quiet strength.
Jabborova Vasila comments on how medicine can address psychological changes in some heart transplant patients. Melita Mely Ratkovic’s poem urges the speaker’s friend to heal and love themselves again after trauma. Ramona Yolanda Montiel wishes all her readers simple joys and gentle comfort.
Eva Petropoulou Lianou’s “Miracles” celebrates everyday wonders, human connection, and the light of faith amid darkness. Jeanette Eureka Tiburcio’s poem honors resilience and hope, invoking golden children as symbols of strength, growth, and the enduring light amid adversity.
We hope that this issue serves as a guiding light as you ‘sip and see’ the many forms of human thought and feeling from around the world.
Nepantla, The Tipping Point, Deep Time: A Conversation Between Worlds
By Kandy Fontaine
In an exclusive interview I conducted last year with Weird Fiction master and vertebrate paleontologist Caitlín R. Kiernan, she spoke with haunting clarity about the concept of Deep Time:
“Human history is nothing more than a thin film floating atop the abyss of geologic time… Lovecraft’s god things… creatures that had ‘filtered down from the stars when earth was young.’ … Gothic literature where the phantoms do not haunt castles merely ancient by human standards, but by the standards of the cosmos.”
Kiernan’s words do more than illuminate a literary device—they expose a rupture in perception. Deep Time is not simply a scientific framework; it is a psychic terrain, a confrontation with scale so vast it destabilizes the ego. It is the abyss beneath our myths, our politics, our identities. It is the stage on which cosmic horror unfolds, but also the backdrop against which our most intimate transformations occur.
We are not merely living in historical time. We are drifting in Deep Time, where the boundaries of self and species blur, where the past is not behind us but beneath us, pressing upward through the thin crust of human memory.
The Tipping Point
We are at a tipping point in planetary history. The forces of what Hunter S. Thompson called “old and evil” have rebelled against the inevitable progress that comes with mutation and sudden shifts in consciousness. These forces are not abstract—they are embodied in regimes, in cultural gatekeepers, in the machinery of repression that clings to outdated notions of power, gender, and identity.
As a transfemme author, I have had to negotiate multiple spaces—some of which rejected me outright, others that claimed radicality but recoiled when I didn’t fit their aesthetic mold. The question isn’t whether I’m “better” than those gatekeepers. If Caitlín R. Kiernan—a writer of staggering intellect and vision—entrusted me to curate a literary tribute to her work, the answer is already clear.
What strikes me most about the current despotic regime that has nested itself in the White House is not just its corruption, but its fear. Fear of mutation. Fear of multiplicity. Fear of people like me and Kiernan, who embody a future they cannot control. They cling to an ignoble and outdated concept of masculinity while covering up for systemic abuse and moral rot. These things are not separate issues. They are symptoms of a deeper refusal to evolve.
Imaginary Crimes and the Politics of Projection
Among the most risible accusations leveled against Caitlín R. Kiernan are claims that she is a white supremacist and a transphobe. These are not critiques—they are projections, often made by individuals who have not engaged with her work, her life, or her legacy in any meaningful way.
Kiernan is a transfeminine author whose fiction has consistently challenged normative boundaries of gender, species, and time. Her protagonists are often liminal beings—neither fully human nor fully alien, neither male nor female, but something else entirely. Her work is not just inclusive; it is expansive, offering readers a vision of consciousness that transcends binary thinking.
To accuse Kiernan of transphobia is to ignore the lived reality of her identity and the radical empathy embedded in her narratives. To accuse her of white supremacy is to flatten the complexity of her Southern Gothic heritage, her critique of American mythologies, and her deep engagement with the monstrous as metaphor.
These accusations are not just false—they are symptomatic of a cultural moment in which nuance is sacrificed for outrage, and where the politics of purity often mask deeper insecurities. They are part of a broader pattern of imaginary crimes, invented to discredit voices that refuse to conform to the aesthetic or ideological expectations of the moment.
Kiernan’s work is difficult. It is unsettling. It does not offer easy answers or moral clarity. But that is precisely its power. It invites us into nepantla—the space between worlds—where transformation is possible, but never comfortable.
Nepantla: Walking Between Worlds
What many critics lack—especially those who’ve passionately excoriated Kiernan for imaginary crimes—is a nuanced understanding of nepantla, a Nahuatl term popularized by Gloria Anzaldúa. Nepantla is the space between worlds, the liminal zone where transformation occurs. It is not a place of comfort. It is a place of friction, of contradiction, of becoming.
To live in nepantla is to be a walker between worlds. It is to inhabit the gulfs of Deep Time while navigating the immediacy of cultural violence. It is to be trans, bi, straight, neurodivergent, nonbinary—not as fixed categories, but as fluid rotations on an axis. This is not chaos. It is rhizomatic, as Deleuze and Guattari described in A Thousand Plateaus—a network of overlapping consciousness, not a hierarchy.
Sexual identity, gender, and orientation are not static. They are dynamic systems, evolving in response to pressure, trauma, joy, and revelation. We are not fixed points. We are constellations.
Beyond Speciesism
To walk in Deep Time is to recognize that speciesism—the belief in human supremacy—is a delusion. We are not above the plants, the fungi, the microbial intelligences. We are among them. Our pleasure, our delight, our grief—they are not uniquely human. They are part of a larger ecology of being.
We must evolve. We must embrace mutation. We must see ourselves not as rulers of the earth, but as beings in Deep Time, destined to be recycled, reimagined, and reborn. This is not a metaphor. It is a biological and spiritual imperative.
Let us explore the manifold species of pleasure and delight. Let us decenter ourselves in the fullness of being aware that consciousness is multiple and overlapping. Let us maintain our grip on logic, even as we dissolve the boundaries of identity. Let us walk between worlds—not as exiles, but as architects of the future.
This is the work. This is the walk. Between worlds, across gulfs of time, toward a future that is not merely inclusive—but expansive.
About Kandy Fontaine: Kandy Fontaine is the transfemme alter ego of author Alex S. Johnson, first manifest in the story “The Clown Dies at the End,” published in truncated form in 2015 in Imperial Youth Review. Their short stories, poetry and essays extensively explore liminal states. Forthcoming from Fontaine/Johnson as of this writing is the first issue of Black Diadem: Magazine of the Fantastique, which reproduces the Kiernan interview in full alongside “Ballad of a Catamite Revolver,” a story written by Kiernan for her Sirenia newsletter. Next year Fontaine helms The Language of Ruins: A Literary Tribute to Caitlin R. Kiernan, at her request.
the African deities who gave birth to our humanity!
it is said to evoke visions of nobility, royalty, wisdom
creativity, spirituality, mystery magicality
a colorful synthesis of soothing blue and spirited red!
becking forth recollections of powerful deities
it’s paler shades suggest romantic allusions
and a state of peaceful composure
while its darker shades shift
to suggest a state of dejection and spiritual elevation
its rich darker shade signify wealth luxury grandeur power
but it is double sided in that it can betoken melancholy
and frustration when applied superfluously
I suspect for some men it can denote
some feminine qualities… rightfully regulating
the dominant notions of masculinity
while its violet shade can symbolize passion, ambition
creativity and mourning in some aspects of cultural identity
it can accentuates one’s individuality in a crowd
replete with antiquated notions of conformity
its blending of red and blue can birth
deliberate intrinsic serenity and stability
it is a celebrated historical scarcity
purple pigment extracted from seal mollusks
enhanced its costly rarity attainable only to the aristocracy…
But now the color purple has been reclaimed
and integrated into our everyday commonality
and individuality attainable to anyone who
deems themselves fit for royalty!–
Jacques FleuryJacques Fleury’s book You Are Enough: The Journey Towards Understanding Your Authentic Self
Jacques Fleury is a Boston Globe featured Haitian American Poet, Educator, Author of four books and literary arts student at Harvard University online. His latest publication “You Are Enough: The Journey to Accepting Your Authentic Self” & other titles are available at all Boston Public Libraries, the University of Massachusetts Healey Library, University of Wyoming, Askews and Holts Library Services in the United Kingdom, The Harvard Book Store, The Grolier Poetry Bookshop, Amazon etc… He has been published in prestigious publications such as Spirit of Change Magazine, Wilderness House Literary Review, Muddy River Poetry Review, Litterateur Redefining World anthologies out of India, Poets Reading the News, the Cornell University Press anthology Class Lives: Stories from Our Economic Divide, Boston Area Small Press and Poetry Scene among others…Visit him at: http://www.authorsden.com/jacquesfleury.-
It knows the difference between words and feelings,
it hears the silence of the heart
when it trembles under the weight of guilt.
It is no ordinary clock —
it is God’s measure of goodness,
a secret guardian of sincerity.
Every thought, every intention,
every shadow in one’s gaze
leaves a trace upon its glass.
When you love purely, it shines,
when you envy, a gear breaks within it.
It does not tick “tick-tock,”
but whispers:
“were you truthful,”
“have you touched souls,”
“were you truly you.”
Its time does not pass,
it judges.
And while the world turns in false seconds,
that clock — unseen, eternal — quietly measures souls, not days.
Maja Milojković was born in Zaječar and divides her life between Serbia and Denmark. In Serbia, she serves as the deputy editor-in-chief at the publishing house Sfairos in Belgrade. She is also the founder and vice president of the Rtanj and Mesečev Poets’ Circle, which counts 800 members, and the editor-in-chief of the international e-magazine Area Felix, a bilingual Serbian-English publication. She writes literary reviews, and as a poet, she is represented in numerous domestic and international literary magazines, anthologies, and electronic media. Some of her poems are also available on the YouTube platform.
Maja Milojković has won many international awards. She is an active member of various associations and organizations advocating for peace in the world, animal protection, and the fight against racism. She is the author of two books: Mesečev krug (Moon Circle) and Drveće Želje (Trees of Desire). She is one of the founders of the first mixed-gender club Area Felix from Zaječar, Serbia, and is currently a member of the same club. She is a member of the literary club Zlatno Pero from Knjaževac, and the association of writers and artists Gorski Vidici from Podgorica, Montenegro.
