playing god
they mess with nature
gmo food
cannibalism
they now promote publicly
think deep, ask questions
alter our dna
they force the injection
genetic engineering
compliance
sound of the vaccine injured
deafening
pushing the agenda
they suppress the truth
news blackout
An excerpt from Bringing Progress to Paradise: What I Got from Giving to a Mountain Village in Nepal, by Jeff Rasley, published by Midsummer Books, 2023.
We were five ghostly figures in swirling snow, standing atopthe 15,000-foot Zatwra La. Early morning rays of sun crept over and down the flank of the great white peak behind us. Wind blowing from the north made it hard to hear the others. Heather shouted over the hushing wind, “We’ve got to spread out!” But Tom insisted we should stay close together. All our rope was with our porters, who were slogging up the pass an hour or so behind us. Suddenly, Heather yelped and took off running. Tom cursed. Seth bellowed, “Go, run!” And then I heard the low distant roar that mountain climbers dread.
We took off down the pass with Heather in the lead. Judy cried out and fell down. Tom and Seth grabbed her arms, pulling her up, yelling at her, “Run! Run!”
I saw them out of the corner of my eye as I pounded mechanically down the rocky, snow-covered slope, stumbling into and over boulders hidden by snow. My consciousness was a gray crackling static. I knew my ability to think and respond was impaired by altitude sickness. All I felt was an instinctive drive to keep running, to get off this mountain, to survive.
The roar of the avalanche above and behind us was replaced by an eerie whirring sound. Spindrift came over us, stark white and opaque. I could barely see my gloves and boots. But the avalanche had petered out. We fell to our knees gasping. We looked up into a vast whiteness.
~~~~~~~
The avalanche struck when our team was hiking out from base camp after a failed attempt to climb 21,224-foot Mera Peak in the fall of 1999 in the Solu-Khumbu region of Nepal. Fifteen climbing teams spent most of the first week of October stuck in base camp or high camp. With unrelenting snow and terrible visibility, conditions were too tough to make a summit attempt. During my team’s eleven-day trek to the Mera base camp at 16,000 feet, we were rained on every day until we got above 14,000 feet. From then on, it snowed every day.
The trek was surrealistic, over high mountain passes, across rushing glacier-fed streams. We slipped and slid through a muddy bamboo forest and past the remains of a village destroyed the year before by an avalanche. Everything—our gear, boots, clothes—was soaking wet by the time we got above the rain, camping then in snow and ice. Our progress was slowed after that by having to slog through deep snow. After four days enduring heavy snows and blizzard conditions in base camp and high camp, our team gave up. I spent the last day on the mountain in a tent by myself, retching and wretched with altitude sickness and a sinus infection.
Snow continued to fall as our defeated and bedraggled team finally hiked out of base camp. At sunrise on the second day of the hike out, our tents sagged under five inches of new snow that had fallen during the night. Snow continued falling as we ate breakfast, packed gear, and then trudged 2,000 feet up the backside of the 15,000-foot pass called Zatrwa La. This was the last high pass to cross to escape the menace of avalanche from the great white-capped Himalayan peaks and to reach Lukla village, where a Twin Otter airplane was scheduled to fly us back to Katmandu. By the time we postholed up to the crest of the pass, fresh snow was over two feet deep. The conditions were perfect for an avalanche: fresh, deep, and unstable snow.
Barely visible through the falling snow on a ridge above and behind us were splotches of red and yellow—the down parkas of three Nepalese porters from another climbing expedition that was following us out of the mountains. The three Nepalese guys were inching their way across the ridge, slowed by the blowing snow and the heavy loads they were carrying.
When the avalanche struck, my team was on the crest of the Zatwra La trying to decide how to descend the steep 4,000-foot slope. The avalanche came down off a mountain shoulder well above and behind us, but right above the three Nepalese porters. They vanished in the gigantic wave of the avalanche. It wasn’t until we were safely back in Lukla village that we learned the porters had been killed, along with four others who died in a series of avalanches across the Nepal-Tibetan Himalaya that same week of October 1999.
Of those seven deaths, only one garnered international headlines, that of the famous mountaineer Alex Lowe on Shishapangma in Tibet. If the deaths of six Nepalese porters in the avalanches were noted at all, it was as a footnote to the loss of a great Western mountaineer.
The three porters I saw enveloped in the death grip of the avalanche were known to me only as workers for another climbing expedition of Western adventurers. They lost their lives carrying heavy loads while taking a higher, harder shortcut out of base camp to get their employers’ gear to Lukla before the climbers arrived.
~~~~~~~
The arc of this story begins with three being enveloped in an avalanche of death and ends in three being enveloped in an avalanche of love in a village called Basa.
One Way of Surviving a Fall
Okay I’m gonna do it!
Good for you good for you!
Okay I’m gonna try it!
Good for you good for you go on!
Step’d to the wall’s that’s nott’d there take the pledge up-touch; lean in; and—oh—it is not there right on fast through fall down into ? so fast there’s no time to live through it at all let alone “talk about it” and—fall.
Fall done en’ tumblin’ not—as there nothing to strike of the consistency of air or rock or anyplace in between to cause the fall t’ be a tumbling fall and so the landing well, it is really hard to predict if the fall gets survived. You know you see? Do you know? Do you see why don’t you know you were shown earlier and you do not know for one simple reason = you did not apply yourself fully = it is not for our kind to apply ourselves fully = oh yes and why not = because the things in life obtained by applying oneself fully are not for such as us = oh no = oh yes = the things in life obtained by applying oneself are not for us they’re for other people what = why you want to waste those damned ten years of life striving out so far that way that you end up going so far out that way you won’t find an arm attached to yourself long enough to reach back and grab yourself and pull yourself back there up to yourself out there and fuse the two which is what makes for a successful = thought still quite hard = oh yes you will you will feel the fall in any case no pain no gain barf bar/ ba’ b’ = wow they’re to feel that in the morning wish I hadn’t seen that oh well what’s done is done, in any case = may be said after the completion of a successfully survived fall that is your two = one now not only did your arm turn out to be just barely good enough and the two halves of yourself = perfectly aligned at the moment of fusion = you stop and you see that if planet Earth does experience {metaphorically of course as = [ with an entire planetary bag o’ living creatures ] = the explanation that’s just been handed out to you = hilariously bad laughably overly-simplified most stuntedly underdeveloped so let’s not go there = I am parched, where’s my am parched water parched, where’s my where’s my am parched, my top-filled am parched, water; my water’ water my God man; you don’t even know what a water looks like, spit-tooten’, spit-tooten = here is what a water looks like
God damn you ah ah ‘illina ‘illina stil’ down t’ road hipsla-tango = you can tell by my faces I am not fooling around you can tell but in any stroke there they were successfully landed bright-bruised, but happy. In contrast to = drink drink drink drink drink = the other way of falling which = drink drink drink drink drink = is just nearly as best but best’s not enough when in this one = drink drink drink drink drink = the faller’s arm-reachback’s not quite so adequate = drink drink drink drink drink = and thus the falling’s not needed since being parted out into two separate ways is inherently fatal in and of itself = drink drink drink drink drink = so we needn’t to go there not to go there we needn’t = to go spit clash glub bub = drink drink drink drink drink = so then squire-lastly there’s this tickle of a final way out of all possible finals ways to = remember the best way to break a fall is to never have fallen at all [yes sir that’s right] know that wisdom now = drink drink drink drink drink = and know it immediately, private, or you will face the living hell of being put in charge of all the vessels do you know what that means sweetheart fear it fear it do you feel the fear of possibly being put in charge of all the vessels or worse yes than this
= drink drink drink drink drink = sir! And worse yes than that = drink drink drink drink drink = sir! but all’s become so tiny sir how can we do it now it’s gone down so tiny? would be actually being put in charge of all the vessels (oh yah oh yah reality does have a way of stepping out of the theoretically real into the really real area of its-self within which lies all pain suffering malicious cruelty and even some petty thieveries of two or three but what’s a (?? tipt’d-tongue tip’d-tongue) “ “ this blank may be filled with any word desired dab-smack’d so whish would you choose Top-mayor, I mean what’s right what’s wrong BOO just never ever ever blacken the family name
BOO for if the family name gets blackened not only will it set all the neighbors a-buzzing [and thus to shut up all smiley when thou doth enter their earshot] so now my nose’s blown and my inner noisefest’s gone a-quiet {nearly}, here’s what happens = the back-half’s been grabbed ‘nd pulled up’s been = not really aligned perfectly = the two halve will mate jaggedly off center = leap back the observers & if any & out of shrapnel’s range = and the two will clash off-center = being mmmmediately kill-xisted into balls of flames slurries of green red and when present at all, most likely laced with streaky-splatter’d gold {but yes oh yes of gold nonetheless so of probable high-value = let’s take ‘em out Sarge! = the minutes all ‘round here b’ ticking yas yas, they be ticking = and it does all seem to not be there anymore just like YOU if you dare fall that way, Toppie, just like YOU and like YOU old-man Toppie, but here we are no wait the doors need to slip open—there.
What?
Regardless of number of hot teas too-accurately drunk, we be.
There. Look!
Jan and Jon turned out from their looking.
Where the hell are we?
In the aftermath of a successfully perfectly harmless fall.
What?
How.
Wonderful!
Party!
= drink drink drink drink drink =
Party!
= drink drink drink drink drink =
Party!
= drink drink drink drink drink =
Party!
= drink drink drink drink drink == drink drink drink drink drink =
Anyone Hungry? Mom pushes herself away from the table with a loud squeak from the chair legs. My body slumps, full from a satisfying meal. I don’t feel like speaking tonight. My mind is already clouded, but I listen to mom, always loud and dramatic. Dad’s breathy laugh drifts through the kitchen as my sister finishes her story, and the hum of the heater turns to warm us all. “Dessert?”, Mom offers, walking back with her homemade peanut butter pie. I can hear Dad smile without looking at his face. Peanut butter pie is his favorite. My mother sits in front of me, closer to the heater, a woman who is always cold no matter the season. She makes a comment about my sister. The word “selfish” slices the air, a knife sharper than what she used to cut our roast beef. Tension rises with the heat in the kitchen. Their voices clash against the ceiling. Dad, complacent to conflict, puts his hands up in a T as if he is a referee. “Time-out, time-out”, he says. I stare at the bottom of the heater. No one hears him. My sister's voice starts to shake. Focus on the hum of the heater. Focus on the floor. Sparks sneak out the edge of the black box. My heart quickens its beating. No one notices a thing, but I see a spark touch the wood floor, see it grow into a flame, stretch its vengeful fingers towards my mom's chair. She screams. I don’t think. The cord is right next to me, so I reach. The hum of the heater stops its singing, and I am left to stare at the black hole tattooed on our kitchen floor.
God's Confession I was sitting alone In a god-forsaken bar the Cosmos Bar in Soi Cowboy Bangkok, Thailand On the lunatic fringes of society Twenty drinks too sober In the ass end of a Friday night booze binge On the bad part of town Over by railroad tracks Heading to hell As fast as I could drank it down Enjoying my lonely drink Drinking by my lonesome self With my partners Jimmy Bean, Jack Daniels, The Walker brother Evan Williams And his old Granddad Just drinking one bourbon, one scotch, and one beer and hanging with Jack Daniel's gentlemen’s club A crazed bum With a thousand-year stare Walks up to me He begins Muttering to himself Nutty nonsense Crazy words In a lunatic's voice He had the look Of one possessed By his demons Only he can see Or hear Possessed by a secret knowledge Only he knew Despite myself I was fascinated By this lunatic's tale So I stopped him And said “Say, crazy little Dude! So what's your game, Anyway?” The short little dude Stopped his insane prattle Starting at me With that thousand-year-old stare Just another washed-up lunatic Too many drugs His mind blown away Down too many rabbit holes Too many bad nights On the wrong side of life An ACID causality From the 60s Been down so long It looks like up to him He looked at me And proclaimed his story He reared up And filled up the room And lifted the bar On his finger And stared down at me From the sky And said “Since you asked I am Allah The Alpha and Omega Ganesh Kali Jupiter Jehovah Shiva Zeus And a billion other names The real deal The original dude of dudes The Sultan of Swing God of hosts And the father of that Jesus dude But no one knows me Any more No one cares They think I am irrelevant They think I am dead They think I am a fairy tale From some olden, ancient time That my work is done I looked at him Carefully now And what did I see An old man With that lunatic look But there was something else He was crazy Sure. Yeah Out there Bat sh… looney tunes But perhaps he was the real deal I mean why not In this materialistic age Why would God not be a wandering lunatic wandering around loose Talking to low lives like me In a bar On the highway to hell So I looked at him And invited him to share His tale of cosmic woe God tells me “Well, it's like this Many a year ago People believed in me But one day They quit believing in me they moved on And they went on without me As they left me My powers got weaker and weaker And so eventually I became What you see today A broken-down drunk Hanging out Looking for a handout Looking for some company Or at least a free dinner” And he laughed and laughed And I looked at him And saw the beginnings of the end And the ends of the beginnings I saw a million planets Flash by Trillions of people Thinking all at once Thoughts filled my head Lights flashed And I knew He was telling the truth But it did not matter In this day and age Of materialism God has no role God is truly dead And so I bought him a drink And walked out of the bar still twenty drinks too sober Profoundly saddened From what I had seen God was dead And we had all conspired To kill him Long live God
bomb threat bomb threat in the next town over at a parts factory they normally happen at a high school someone wants to get out of a quiz but at a factory the only thing i can think of is today must have been drug test day opioids are still mighty popular out here in the sticks ------------------------------------------------------- been tricked so many times before some angel will surely want to love me one of these days i just hope i am still breathing when that moment arrives been tricked so many times before all the options on the dark side of life have become ever more appealing my patience is wearing thin these days i wouldn't say i have lost hope, just that it does an incredible job playing hide and seek ------------------------------------------------------------ before desperation becomes... pretty quiet outside aside from the cars and occasional trucks driving by this is the eerie quiet before the shit hits the fan before arguments are ended in gunfire before desperation becomes the saddest note written in blood found on the floor among dirty underwear and a nearly empty bottle of jack ------------------------------------------------------ a morphine drip you always wanted a morphine drip for christmas thought that would be the perfect gift that kept on giving the times have changed drug dealers seem to not mind killing off their own customers chasing that elusive high, you should be willing to die for it every junkie has told me that i'm not chasing that high not even chasing perfection simply a stubborn prick that wants to die on his own terms bruises fresh on the arms and legs ---------------------------------------------- burden the spanish princess believes she is too much of a burden for me and no matter how much i argue that this is not the case she won't change her mind i shouldn't feel like i lost something that i never had, but i do but heartache at this point of my life doesn't sting as much as when i was younger i'm guessing because the finish line is in view and i know i won't have to deal with any of this much longer
J.J. Campbell (1976 – ?) is trapped in suburbia, slowly losing hope. He’s been widely published over the years, most recently at just good poems, The Beatnik Cowboy, Horror Sleaze Trash, The Black Shamrock and The Rye Whiskey Review. You can find him most days on his mildly entertaining blog, evil delights. (https://evildelights.blogspot.com)
Spring Sprawls Across the Fence of the Reality The river and the wind bring Spring in your house; the leaves and the gravel announce a stranger; your curtains rise and fall; one cuckoo blurs the boundary of singularity; you turn in your bed; on your South side lies your lover whom you have gybed towards sleep; all of his flesh and his mind at its puerility's height hold the railing of a ship leaving the port of reality. Those leaves talk with the stranger. So much exist outside one's perception, love outside your windows, patience across the fence of waiting. You stream on the bed, reflections of the stars on your chest. You breathe, and it rains in the city. Have You Seen That Patch of Green The wind within bleeds on the blades of my dreams. This is the patch of the wild blooms I carry, held between the house I desire and the one I own. Today summer liquifies the red. The prayers sway. An arrow of the birds free in the cage of my mind's geosphere flies. Waiting The clock unwinds silence; in the embrace of our pillows we sleep off twelve gongs; snow swirls to settle on our tropical forty degree Celsius land; a singular apparition holds its crow mien and fettle. The mango tree writhes underneath its unaccustomed white sheath. Patience waits outside, leaves its footprints on the snow although in the morning we see nothing except some wet roads, cars, greenery and feathers, nothing that can make us believe in the myths. The String Why the road and the pavements look wet? Rain remains absent in this plain for awhile. Do we sweat this much? Oh so wet! The kite whisperer friend lets it be a white stingray in the almost-white blue. "Report back; bring back the messages of the clouds." The news from the sky sounds fake; we misread it. "If you misinterpret something fake," hope says, "what you perceive might be true." The boys reels and pulls the string. Sometimes the thin line cuts the skin. The asphalt glistens. Do we bleed that much?
Kushal Poddar, the author of ‘Postmarked Quarantine’ has eight books to his credit. He is a journalist, father, and the editor of ‘Words Surfacing’. His works have been translated into twelve languages.
Twitter- https://twitter.com/Kushalpoe