Being So Difficult It’s May 7, 2023 And Google Is asking him To look back To four Years ago, To a photo Of the ex, He wishes That Google Would stop being So difficult.
Essay from Zarina Abdulina
Volunteering is not a job, not a hobby, not a passion – it’s a calling!
Help people, communicate with people, invaders, implement the most insignificant ideas, study. It helps not to sit still, but to move forward. Volunteer activity now is exactly what helps a person to remain a person, helps to melt hearts.
For me, volunteering means more than just a word. I think a volunteer is a person for whom there are no limits to the kindness and desire of girls. This is a person who improves every day and fulfills his treasury of good deeds, and even the smallest, but good deed is already good, a volunteer not only fulfills himself, but also helps others to realize themselves. Volunteers gather information for anyone in need, they don’t come back from those in need and help in any way they can.
Now, I am a volunteer coordinator. I myself chose this path, and even if there are small troubles along the way, I will try to overcome them easily.
I believe that everyone has the right to decide their own destiny, we must move our country to a higher level of development, gradually the patriotic spirit of all people must be developed gradually on the rise, on the rise of volunteers doing great work in their regions and the country as a whole. I have been volunteering for only a short time, but I have already learned a lot. I try to cultivate patriotism in myself, love for work, I learn to implement my own health and the health of loved ones, the main desire is to live with my soul and good deeds. I am full of ideas, and I bring them to reality, so I am not going to stop there, but I plan to move on and conquer new heights.
Being a volunteer is an adult, to increase responsibility, to be able to take the necessary words in a working situation.
There are many examples of volunteer activities, and this is wonderful, because anyone can be involved in it without spending any special individuals. Sometimes I get the feeling that it was not me who came to help them, but they came to me. You remember these conversations for a long time, every time you get up in the morning, you think whether you are worthy of this life.
Volunteers do not need to be paid for their services, in most cases, probably because it is not fair. It is dishonest in identifying people around you, in recognizing people, objects you helped, dishonest in identifying yourself, because the best result is the realization of your usefulness to whom you need. Volunteering is a great contribution to the foundation of the future.
When I help others, I show in myself the strength to accomplish feats. I do not have to sit still if I know that my help is needed and I have the time and opportunity to help. I do not ask for anything in return/ Fs a result in return I take wonderful emotions.
ZARINA ABDULINA,
Student (3rd year) of Bashkir State Pedagogical University
named after M.Akmullah
Zarina Abdulina was born on November 20, 2000 in the city of Tashkent in an ordinary family. She was an only child and a support.
After graduating from school in 2016, she entered in academic lyceum at Tashkent State Pedagogical lyceum named after Nizami and graduated with honors. In 2020, she became a student of the Bashkir State Pedagogical University named after M.Akmulla, Faculty of English Pedagogy.
She began her professional career in 2019 at school No. 291 of the Bektemir district, where she proved herself to be a responsible and performing employee, also showed herself as a young journalist in the press service of the khokimiyat of the Bektemir district and was awarded a number of diplomas and thanks.
Zarina Abdulina is actively working in the public education system, making an exemplary contribution to improving the effectiveness of the state youth policy, educating spiritual, talented and creative young people.
Z. Abdulina, having the opportunity to speak fluently in 6 languages of the world at the same time, has recently been helping schools to educate young boys and girls like her and find their place in our society on the basis of the “Ustoz va shogird” project.
Since 2020, the newspaper “Bektemir haqiqati” has been publishing articles in English and Russian in the direction of youth policy in our republic and in the development of socio-economic spheres.
Since 2021, she has become the founder of the “I am a Volunteer” social project in the Bektemir district, and together with her team helps people with disabilities, a boarding school, and low-income families.
Zarina is respected by leaders and officials for her deep knowledge, many years of experience, exactingness, initiative and organization, discipline, exemplary behavior, sincere disposition. Based on her work experience, she honestly and conscientiously performs any work assigned to her. There is one very good expression: “Throwing a boomerang of actions, think about how you will catch the boomerang of consequences.” Doing good to others now, we rely on their help in the future. Well, he always finds his way to the right people and we don’t have to bypass him.
Christopher Bernard reviews Mary Mackey’s book Creativity: Where Poems Begin
The Search for the Source
Creativity:
Where Poems Begin
By Mary Mackey
Marsh Hawk Press
The greatly talented Mary Mackey’s slim but profound and beautifully written book has a slightly disingenuous title. If you are expecting a scholarly exploration of the creative mind such as you will find in Arthur Koestler’s classic work The Act of Creation or Silvano Arieti’s Creativity: The Magic Synthesis, you may be disappointed. Or if you expect something like those works but focused on literary creativity, you may also be.
But what you will get is just as worthwhile. I can see why Mackey did not call her book “My Creativity: Where My Poems Begin,” because, though no sufferer from imposter syndrome, she is too courteous toward her reader to thrust her ego unapologetically into the foreground. Even the most brilliant writer realizes that the world does not revolve entirely around her. But the revised title is an exact description of what we find in these pages.
That Mary Mackey is not better known is a bit of a scandal, because we are in need of her eloquence and originality. But I have long given up on the taste of the public and many of its would-be literary critics – eloquence and originality have been replaced by vulgarity and imitativeness (and aesthetics has long been replaced by politics) as the keys to success in contemporary America, may the gods and the Muses forgive all of us.
Unhappily, even posterity cannot be entirely depended on to have taste, intelligence or judgment. If Darwin rules, we can hardly expect natural selection to be wiser or kinder than we have been. And contemporary culture is beginning to look more and more Darwinian with each passing season. In the meantime, a few lucky readers will benefit from her books. And this is one of the gems among them, and is likely to ignite interest in her other books.
What, after all, is this nebulous thing we call “creativity”? Every time we speak we are engaging in a creative act, as the linguist Noam Chomsky regularly points out. We invent an original response to every event that happens to us – every moment is fresh, novel, unrepeatable, however boringly familiar it might seem to our half-asleep minds and benumbed senses. Every night, every dreamer creates a new universe.
But there is a hierarchy in creativity: though there is clearly a relationship between them, there is also a qualitative difference between this kind of creativity, shared by all sentient beings, and the creative leaps that result in the discovery of relativity, the painting of Les Demoiselles d’Avignon, writing Ulysses, or composing Bob Dylan’s anthems from the ‘60s.
Or writing a book like Mary Mackey’s prize-winning poetry collection The Jaguars That Prowl Our Dreams or her other collections (which include Skin Deep, Sugar Zone, and Travelers With No Ticket Home) and her densely poetic novels such as Immersion, A Grand Passion, and The Valley of Bones.
There is another difference: most successful artists, grateful for their creativity, or merely taking it for granted (and perhaps afraid to look too searchingly into a gift horse’s mouth for fear the horse will bolt at reason’s first cool poke), they revel in its fruits but don’t make a quest to discover its sources. Mackey is not satisfied merely to enjoy her gift; she has decided to try to find out where it comes from, what causes it, how she has become to be so graced.
And the result is this memoir of her creativity.
It has often been said that the most valuable gifts often come in small packages, and many a short book holds more substance than a far weightier tome. The saying surely applies here.
To say that Mackey has found the ultimate source of her phenomenal gift – the source of the Nile, the Higgs boson that transforms chaos into resplendent form – might be going too far, but to say she has come as close as it might be possible to go is, I think, not claiming too much.
Her book is divided into thirteen short chapters, most of them concentrating on moments in her life when she became most aware of the assertively creative currents within her as they broke into consciousness. These include experiences of intoxicating fantasy during the extreme fevers Mackey has had since she was an infant; experiences that drove her mind into visions and ecstasies that became key to how she engages layers of the mind (“preverbal” as she calls them) where the imagination is allowed to dominate consciousness before the mind is caught, and frozen, in a pragmatic net of language and concepts that are required if we are going to successfully negotiate and survive in the world.
The experiences she recounts include the writing of her first poem (in, of all places, geometry class), and the opening lines of her first novel in the austere silence of the Swedish stacks of a university library; her experiences over several years in her twenties of living in the jungles of Central America where she found a place in the physical world that embodied the imaginative exaltations of her fevers; the long creative drought when she was turning herself into a professional scholar and university teacher; her creative breakthrough later on during a period of deep misery; and her exploration of ways to contact the most powerful emotional sources of her creativity that escaped the self-destructive strategies of many poets and artists of the past.
There is a poetry of exaltation and a poetry of serenity – in the past often called “romantic” and “classic”; in the modern world, “modernist/postmodernist” and “conservative,” “authentic” and
“bourgeois.” Mackey, for good reasons, wanted the exaltation of the romantic without paying a price for it in derangement and self-destruction. And her book ends by describing the success with which she found her way to the Holy Grail of poetry: a means of contacting the demons and gods of poetic creation without letting them tear her to pieces. And the result has been the discoveries she has made in the secret places of her mind and graced her readers with over the years.
And yet the final secret remains. We all have dreams, and yet not all our dreams are beautiful, meaningful, or powerful. Indeed most of them are rather banal reconnoiters of the less-interesting corners of our everyday minds. Whereas Mackey’s explorations have yielded, through a combination of courage, determination, relentless work, searching intelligence, and demanding and shaping taste, along with her deep dives into the wordless, conceptless, formless seas of her subconscious – the ocean of childhood from which we all emerged – poetry of a dazzling beauty and rare profundity. And for this we must always be grateful, though still mystified.
Este è um poema criando-se
this is a poem creating itself em um idioma
in a language you don’t understand
think of it as a dancer
whose face is hidden behind a beaded veil
uma bebida prieta a black drink that
lets you hear jaguars speak
a city seen from 20,000 feet
um barhulo/ a noise that wakes you à meia-noite
tropeçando tropeçando stumbling through the
darkness knocking at your door
— “This Is a Poem Creating Itself,” from Sugar Zone
Mary Mackey’s Creativity: Where Poems Begin can be ordered here or from your local bookstore.
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Christopher Bernard is a novelist, poet and essayist as well as critic. His books include the novels A Spy in the Ruins, Voyage to a Phantom City, and Meditations on Love and Catastrophe at The Liars’ Café, and the poetry collections Chien Lunatique, The Rose Shipwreck, and the award-winning The Socialist’s Garden of Verses, as well as collections of short fiction In the American Night and Dangerous Stories for Boys. He is also a co-editor and founder of the semiannual webzine Caveat Lector. His children’s stories If You Ride a Crooked Trolley . . . and The Judgment of Biestia, the opening stories of the Otherwise series, will be published in the fall of 2023.
Creative Nonfiction from Leslie Lisbona
We had always been apartment dwellers. When my parents first arrived in this country, they lived on Amsterdam Avenue in the upper 90s, in a walk-up with other refugees as neighbors. Then they found an apartment in Forest Hills.
When I was born, my parents moved with my brother, sister, and me to a doorman building with a blue lobby in Kew Gardens. This two-bedroom was all I knew. My best friend, Claudia, lived down the hall, and Lucy, my babysitter, lived in an identical apartment below mine. Claudia’s parents worked for the airlines, so she was alone a lot, a latchkey kid. Lucy was the super of the building, and she was home all the time. My mom didn’t work, but she went to Queens College and then graduate school.
Mom played a game of tic-tac-toe with all the beds. Many times we switched rooms and reconfigured furniture to try to make it work. I stayed with my parents in their room till I was five. Then I shared a tiny bedroom with Debi, while Dorian slept on the couch or a vacated bed,
and my parents slept in their room. Once my parents slept in the living room so Dorian could have his own room for a while. Often we had visitors from overseas, and Debi, Dorian and I had to sleep on cots in the living room. This was especially fun for me.
My dad enjoyed apartment life, overheated, with a handyman available at all times. I liked being in a bustling household, sharing beds and being underfoot.
My mom wanted space. She’s the one who found the house. She had gone to her cousin’s for a card game in Forest Hills. She told me that the card table was by the front window. She looked
up to see a hand-painted “For Rent” sign on the porch of the house directly across the street. She said she excused herself from the game and slipped into her mink coat. She knocked on the door of the stucco house and talked to the owner.
A few days later, my family visited the house. It was old. We went upstairs single file, whispering. “It’s so big,” Debi said. “I love it.” I agreed that it was grand, with so much space. The backyard was big enough for me to do three cartwheels in a row on a diagonal. On the second floor, the bedrooms were all different, and we each called the one that we wanted. Still, I didn’t believe it was really going to happen.
Suddenly, my dad was on board to move. I never thought this would happen, ever. He was seated in an armchair in our apartment living room, and we were surrounding him. My family was animated. My world was starting to tilt.
Wait, I said. I don’t want to leave.
I’ll drive you to P.S. 99 every morning, said my father.
I’ll pick you up in the afternoon, said my mother.
Claudia can sleep over every weekend, said my father.
You can have your own room, said my mother.
We can get a dog, said my brother.
My bare feet were deep in the tan shag rug. I didn’t want my world to change. I wanted Lucy and Claudia in my building. I wanted my school to be across the street. I didn’t want my own room. I didn’t even want my own bed. I only wanted to sleep with Debi in hers. My universe,
the way I had known it for all of my eleven years, would crumble if we moved. I tried to say something, but when I opened my mouth, a sob came out, and once I started, I couldn’t stop.
We moved a few weeks later.
That night, we all went to bed in our separate rooms.
Debi shouted, Goodnight, Les.
Can I sleep in your room? I said.
No, she said
Maybe tomorrow? I asked.
Maybe, she said.
And then it was too quiet, and it was the first time I was alone. Goodnight, John Boy, I said.
My sister giggled. I heard Dorian laughing, too.
Debi said, Goodnight, Elizabeth!
Dorian said, Goodnight, Ma!
Goodnight, Daddy, I said.
Then my father joined in: Goodnight, Billy Bob. More laughter because it was really Jim Bob.
Goodnight, everybody! Mom said.
I stretched and pressed my toes into the wooden frame of my water bed, the smile still on my face, and went to sleep in a room of my own.
Short story from Santiago Burdon
As Sure As The Pope Was Catholic I was watching some news channel in the Social Stigma Bar as usual waiting for my dealer to show. There was a story about the funeral of Pope John Paul l. It was being broadcast from Saint Peter's Basilica in Vatican City. Instantly it captured my interest and I asked the bartender to turn up the volume. He gave me a questioning glare but followed through with my request. Whenever I'm reminded of that place , I become one pissed off recovering Catholic. Let me explain the reason for my animosity. It was during my college years, I majored in debauchery with a minor in celebratory participation well on my way to graduating with a Bachelor's Degree in irresponsibility. I was checking through the class schedule for the upcoming semester. Looking to enroll in classes not requiring any kind of enthusiastic commitment. I was informed there was a World Religion class with exactly that type of prerequisite. The Professor never took attendence or assigned homework. The only test given during the entire semester was a take home exam. It was a course requiring very little effort and was based on a Pass/Fail grading scale. When classes resumed for the semester unfortunately the professor who taught the course had died over the summer and was replaced by some Christian fundamentalist. It was rumored she was part of some religious cult and was rescued by some group her parents hired. She definitely took the subject matter seriously without adopting any of the past professor's methods. As soon as possible I dropped the class and enrolled in a Classical Art and Music Appreciation class taught by a professor who had hung out with Ken Kesey and the Pranksters. It was one of the best classes I have ever experienced. I never missed a single class and got stoned before attending. I was sure the Professor did the same. He blasted the music through giant JBL speakers with the decibel level at maximum. It was so intense it felt as though you were in a concert hall. On a large white movie screen behind him he showed videos of Classic Art pieces while the music blared. These were the first music videos produced long before MTV. It was recommended to have a valid passport when signing up for the course. We were later informed the top fifteen students would be eligible to participate in a class field trip. This year the destination was Rome, Italy and Vatican City which included a tour of Saint Peter's Basilica as well as the Sistine Chapel. The cost had yet to be determined but there were scholarships available through a benevolent benefactor. By some miraculous act of kindness by the Gods I qualified for the trip. I finished at fourteenth in class and was also awarded a scholarship from the University. My folks kicked in a few hundred dollars with some relatives also donating to the cause. Twelve days in Italy was next on my agenda. My grandfather passed a month before the trip leaving me his gold and diamond pinky ring. I cherished the ring and wore it proudly. It was a bit too large for my ring finger and at times slipped off of my hand. There I was in Italy contemplating what type of trouble was on the menu. On our first day we took a tour of the Saint Peter's Basilica while mass was in session. The scantily dressed, attractiveTour Guard asked that we be extremely quiet and speak in a whisper. She began passing out brochures with the history and facts pertaining to the Basilica. As I reached for one of the pamphlets my ring flew off of my finger. It was launched into the area where parishioners were receiving mass. "Goddamn it my ring!" I yelled. Drawing the attention of the entire Cathedral. It pinged on the marble floor with a distinct echo. I could hear it rolling away under the pews. I ran after the ring but I was quickly captured by two Swiss Guards. They pulled me out from underneath the pews by my legs. When I resisted it caused them to become angry. Next they physically carried me out of the Cathedral ejecting me through a side exit which was the office of the Administrator. They guided me inside where I was pushed down with extreme force by my shoulders into a chair. A short, balding wrinkled faced guy sat down behind the desk in front of me. He asked if I spoke Italian in Italian so I acted as though I had no idea what he was talking about. (Actually I knew what he was saying, I was just playing dumb.) I asked him if he understood English in English and he shook his head no. Although he obviously understood my question. He held up a finger signaling for me to wait a minute. Soon a priest sat down taking his place and asked me where I was from in perfect English. He had a strong New York accent. Finally I was granted a chance to explain my dilemma. After I conveyed my tragic story he pretended to appear concerned. But he wasn't a very good actor. I could tell he really didn't care about my unfortunate circumstance in the least.. He informed me they would search for the ring, however if they didn't have success in recovering it, I should file a claim with the Vatican. I filled out the paperwork which was printed in Italian with Father Brooklyn translating the directions. My claim amounted to $3,898.00. It included initial cost, sentimental value and pain and suffering. I gave them my home address and other contact information. I requested that my claim be paid with a cashier's check issued from an international bank. No checks, not even from the Pope himself. He finished explaining my claim had to be approved by their Insurance Adjuster. I would be hearing from them in a month or so. Yay, 'Fat Chance' I thought as we shook hands and said ciao. That took place over six years ago without ever hearing anything from the Catholic Diocese in Vatican City. That's right, they never once attempted to contact me. My efforts at communication with them for any type update proved to be worthless. I was becoming more infuriated with every second watching this news broadcast. I was ready to ask the bartender to change the channel. Just then the camera panned to a close up of the Pope's hands holding a Rosary. I couldn't believe what I was seeing. Right there in living color broadcast to the entire world, there it was! On the Pope's left pinky finger was my grandfather's ring. The Pope was wearing my ring the same one I had lost years ago in the Basilica. There was no mistaking what I was witnessing. As sure as the Pope was Catholic, it was my ring!
Poetry from Tuyet Van Do
pushing the agenda they mess with school curriculum encourage child masturbation seeking truth she asks alexa to explain the purpose of its device poisoning mother earth they manipulate the weather planes spray daily
Poetry from Muhammed Sinan
*Life of Disrepair*
Life is betwixt two door,
Which start and end.
Depends on seconds and hours.
Elation and enmity modify,
Status of living beings.
Expression may change,
Height may grow,
Weight will increase, but
The mind of hopes stay still.
Billionaires gain up
Poors finding way to feed their small fry.
Some people running for secure,
Some one inquiring for bitty space to live.
Patient, Kind, pleasure, euphoric
brand human as humanity. but,
day-by-day it destructing.
Life is a process of,
Dying tragically between two doors.