A gentle tone from an angel megaphone

Sanjeev Sethi’s latest full length collection of poetry, Legato without a lisp, is a work of exemplary fullness. A fullness of language and of intention. Comprising a collection of works rendered by a poet sure of his abilities and expression, it comes in its sheer robustness into an era marked by frail superficiality. Legato without a lisp is projected in its fullness to stand apart from the mere apparitions of art, those things that shout but barely speak, that garble as they scream with nothing to say. This is not at all in their company. This is a work solid and tangible.

It begins at the level of the line. Each feeling fully formed as though pulled from some remarkable ether and yet each line comes together, cobbled together with striking unity. Poetry born both together and apart. ‘Menarche left its mark/on your left leg’ – from Adolescence and ‘The meter of mederation fails/to direct my dinghy. A sneeze’ – from Effectuation are two such examples. This language, while transformative in its solidity, is not forceful, not violent but inviting, wise and open in its delivery. At times it almost comes like a sermon, Sethi pronouncing from his pulpit, tome in hand, somehow quiet yet booming. A gentle tone from an angel megaphone. A sound that does not speak with reluctance but with vigour.

All this is not to say that it does not have its moments of playfulness and humour. When the humour does come it comes with wit and with a sense of play that eschews the tired figure of the overly serious and dull artist. In passages such as ‘In Meatspace, we meet slices, too’ – from Rifeness, Sethi shows he’s not afraid to have fun. So too in the exemplary rhythms of the poems. They roll by on the gentle musicality, freely played with but always disciplined enough to not crumble into sing-song emptiness. You never get the manipulative feeling of being dragged into another’s song but feel compelled to sing along with Sethi’s gentle tune. ‘Do you know of anyone who dickers/with destiny? Meet the unsexed who,/like everyone, breathe some/more, and leave without a forwarding/address – from Olio, illustrated Sethi’s mastery of the rhythmic form.    

The poems themselves are concerned with the movements of life, the chronological and the appreciative frozen moments where lyric poetry of this quality is born. At times political, at times gently instructive, at times traversing memory that concretes the past rather than descending into sentimental nostalgia. This shapes a world removed from attempts at the homogeneous universal and into the individual. The abstraction of the personal, the subjective waltz of place and time. One gets the feeling that Sethi has a mind for pondering the small moments of life and taking from them something entirely individual. These are not the rehashed platitudes of the churned out postcard poignancy of so much modern poetry. These stand alone. When Sethi writes lines like ‘Mortality forwards its memo,/through a long-lost friend./Senectitude wrests my mentor/and I am quietened by lines left by him;/as an impulse larger than me/chooses to triturate my ego’ – from Au Revoir, you sense his authorial presence in each utterance. He is not interested in the familiar, only in what he can grasp from life through his art.

Legato without a lisp is a book well worth the time. As an art object, it stands as a physical structure against the tide of so much that withers and falls, weak work created with so little thought apart from the on-trend and the easily consumable. Work that it is made to be quickly exhausted and disappear. Work that has no physicality and cannot stand. Sanjeev Sethi has here created a work that wishes to stand, that demands to be remembered. What more could one ask?

Nathan Anderson is a poet and artist from Mongarlowe, Australia. He is the author of numerous books and has had work appear widely both online and in print. He is a member of the C22 experimental writing collective. You can find him at nathanandersonwriting.home.blog or on Twitter/X/Bluesky @NJApoetry.

How to Drink Yourself Sober

Step Five: Admitted to god, ourselves & another human being

– First confessional

Bless me father for I have sinned. I’m not going to tell

you I don’t buy anything you’re selling. Or twelve years

from now I’ll be driving blackout drunk, arm roped out

the window. You are not going to hear that twenty years

from now I will know the barrel of a gun tastes sour cold

sharp. You’ve no idea that one day she’ll not have to say

a word. The sky will burst in flames, heavens will plunge

into the sea. So, go ahead Father, tell me God’s forgiven

my sins. To go in peace. I have paid my penance by fire

and ash. Been absolved in cinder and smoke. 

How to Drink Yourself Sober

Preamble: The only requirement is a desire to stop drinking

Let it bleed baby, bleed till we’re white. We are pale riders. Ghosts sucking the light 

out of the tunnel, our bones left to blot out the sun. We are sons and daughters waiting

to mourn; ready to set the world on fire.

she calls me by name but I don’t recognize her

voice, the smell of her perfume, soap, shampoo

her body against mine is light:

all legs, long hair and ready

to start a revolution

she starts to say something but I can’t hear

I can only watch,

thinking I’m clever, knowing

she can see right through me

I am that fly on the wall. Yes. A thousand eyes. Unfocused, unclean, unable to swallow

and she knows. Yes she does. It is not to her advantage to forget. She’s watched

every move I make. I know. I know and there is power in knowledge.

I have that power. Don’t waste it. Don’t waste it.

How to Drink Yourself Sober

A Design for Living

When she’s five her mother spun a tale 

of an angel who dropped to earth, 

landed in a quarry. 

She fell in love with a mortal, 

asked him to bind her wings tight 

against her back, 

tried unsuccessfully to fit into his world. 

Years later, when he died, she found herself

unable to fly back to heaven. 

In her grief she flung herself into a marble slab 

where she waits, to this day, for god to split it 

in two to be reunited with him.

Alex Stolis lives in Minneapolis; he has had poems published in numerous journals. Two full length collections Pop. 1280, and John Berryman Died Here were released by Cyberwit and available on Amazon. His work has previously appeared or is forthcoming in Piker’s Press, Jasper’s Folly Poetry Journal, Beatnik Cowboy, One Art Poetry, Black Moon Magazine, and Star 82 Review. His chapbook, Postcards from the Knife-Thrower’s Wife, was released by Louisiana Literature Press in 2024, RIP Winston Smith from Alien Buddha Press 2024, and The Hum of Geometry; The Music of Spheres, 2024by Bottlecap Press. 

May the life of youth flourish

I ran for fun

My sweet dream

I laughed out loud

May the life of youth flourish 

Walking with my grandfather

I wandered the gardens

I’m so tired

May the life of youth flourish 

Now it’s fun and excitement 

Laughter is the order of the day 

Picking flowers is a rule 

let the young life bloom 

Days spent with youth 

Light is called mine

They say that every minute will not come back

May the life of youth flourish 

In my mother’s arms 

On a sweet dream leaf 

He brought happiness with flowers 

May the life of youth flourish 

Every minute of my youth 

A sacred treasure for me

I will remember it for the rest of my life 

May the life of youth flourish 

Panjiyeva Dilnavo Shukurvna was born in the village of Khalqabad, Guzor district, Kashkadarya region. She started writing poems from 2007 to 2020. Currently, she has more than 150 poems.

I don’t get used to pain.

What is life?  Yes, many people have been thinking about this word until now, and people answer based on the years of their lives, happy and sad events, truths and injustices, wounds and ointments. 

I will tell you that life is sometimes like a book full of riddles, sometimes it is like a trial road with endless joys and sorrows, a labyrinth from which it is difficult to find a way out.  Yes, there is a human race that is forced to get used to whatever happens in its fate, endure, feel, laugh and cry, and sometimes see the opposite.  In this way, there will be joy and pain.  I am a woman who does not get used to the pains she encountered in her life, and still cannot forget those pains. 

Life, if a person thinks about this word from the beginning to the end of his life, then Life is a Cluster.  Our coming into the world, the joy of our parents, our first step, our first spoken words, our innocent childish laughter, our love, our kindness, and parallel to these, our first fall and the first pain we felt, the first sound we heard, the sticks we ate, the lies we heard, our joy and sorrow and pain.  .  Yes, there are people who have ailments, some get used to these ailments and some don’t. 

Everyone remembers these pains in different forms and situations.  Someone’s pain from childhood, someone’s pain from adolescence, someone’s pain from adulthood and other different situations.  I have a problem with my parents.  There is a saying in our people that “the death of parents is an inheritance”.  I still can’t get used to this pain, I can’t get used to it.  In my life, I have faced various situations, lies, slander, thanks, good and bad.  There are some of them that I have not forgotten, which I still keep in my heart.  Because they happened in a situation I did not expect and by people I did not expect. 

My parents are the most painful pain that I have not been able to find a cure for, even after years have passed.  That they are not in this bright world, that I can’t see them whenever I want, that I can’t get their prayers, their advice at the right time, that I can’t get enough of their scent, that I can’t sleep like the aunt who forgot my pains by resting my head on my mother’s lap, that I can’t stroke her white hair, forgive me, mother, our worries,  I can’t say that our sorrows are old.  This pain is such a pain that it destroys a person from the inside, his pain and longing involuntarily bring tears to his eyes and cause deep sighs.  I still can’t get used to the words of my mother, “Have you come, my child, are you staying late, are you safe, my child, are you healthy, are you in pain, what do you want?”  My father’s sweet words, “My daughter, my daughter, this is my daughter, don’t hurt her, why did you hit her, why did you cry, are you healthy, my child, eat your food, don’t go hungry and study, let me give you the money, whatever you want”  My lost moments and pains that I can’t find even if I spend my wealth and time. 

This life is such a time that it passes before we open and close our eyes.  I’ll do it, I’ll do it, I’ll go sooner, but the time we couldn’t separate will come one day, from our inexhaustible wealth with us, from our ointments for a thousand pains, from our counselors who listen to us when we pour out all our pain, from our people who listened to our pain and threw theirs into the well, and gave everything for our joy.  separating from our existence.  This pain remains in our hearts regardless of how old we are, it causes pain.  It creates such a void that no wealth, no sweet words, no gift greetings can fill this void, no world’s riches, gifts, sweet words and attention of people around you can fill it.  Yes, I am a woman who lost her parents in her life and cannot get used to this pain of life.

Beloved, take care that your parents are with you now.  Be a salve for their pains, be ready for their services.  Time is so cruel that you can’t find them at a glance, even if you turn the world upside down, even if you scatter the world’s riches, and you won’t get used to pain like me.

Orinbayeva Lalezar Azadbay was born on April 8, 2003 in Tortkol district of the Republic of Karakalpakstan.  Her nationality is Turkmen, she knows the Turkmen language and Uzbek well. She graduated from the 24th general secondary school with excellent grades.  She graduated from school in 2021, and in the same year she became a student of the “Elementary Education” faculty of Tashkent University of Applied Sciences.  She works at school No. 24, where she graduated, and is a master of her profession. She has been writing articles since she was 20 years old and has students.   The first article is “The role of Makhtimkuli Firoghi in world history”.  She is engaged in journalism and opened a course.  Until now, several scientific and journalistic articles have been published in international journals.  She has participated in many anthologies and almanacs in this regard in Azerbaijan, Turkey, Belarus, Germany, Kenya, and European countries.  She also organized a personal anthology.  In the anthology “CREATORS OF THE YEAR”, a scientific article entitled “METHODICS OF MATHEMATICS TEACHING IN PRIMARY CLASSES” and an article by her students were published. 

Her creative work “Methods Of Attention Of Primary Class Students” was published in the Kenyan anthology “SERENITY A COMPILATION OF ART AND LITERATURE BY WOMEN” and received a certificate.  In the “Blue Sky Stars” anthology, her creative scientific article “EDUCATIONAL METHODS AND TOOLS IN PRIMARY CLASSES” and the articles of her students were published and received a certificate.  A scientific article entitled “THE SUBJECT AND TASKS OF MOTHER LANGUAGE TEACHING METHODOLOGY IN PRIMARY GRADES” was published in the journal of the scientific practical conference “New Seekers” and received a diploma, certificate, letter of acceptance, author’s certificate.  The scientific article titled “METHODS OF ATTENTION OF PRIMARY CLASS STUDENTS” was published and received an international invitation and an international certificate.  The story “JANNATIM ONAM” and the poem “ONAM” were published in the anthology “Tazim to you mother” which took part in the contest “Ship of Knowledge” of Russia and took the honorable 1st place.  The poem “Father and Mother” was published in his personal anthology “Future Scientists”.  The poem “Orzulari Osman Kiz” was published in the anthology “Youth of Uzbekistan” and received a diploma, a statuette, and a book.  In the anthology “Yoshlar Bayozi”, the article “My Profession: How to Be a Primary School Teacher” was published, and she received a diploma, a statuette, and a book.  , certificate, medal holder.  The poem “This is a world full of fakes” was published in the anthology “Uzbek women-girls” and received a certificate.  Currently, her creative works are regularly published in “Kenya Times” magazine and International sites and indexed in Google.  Holder of international certificates.

Reviewed by A. Iwasa

What’s it like to be an antifascist college professor facing termination for “soliciting students for potentially dangerous activities” while military recruiters have free range on your campus?

If you’re generally critical of academics, one thing you’ll have to understand about Josh Fernandez is that he’s hated teachers his whole life.  If you have any doubts, in this book Fernandez will take you back from fighting the community college bureaucracy he works for over their Campus Antifascist Network, Bash Back! and an off campus Antifascist Fighting Club he hosted, to the kindergarten classroom of a certain Mrs. Clark.  Though Clark maybe a changed name or composite character, you’ll get the drift.

Like many anti-authoritarians forged in post-industrial schools and equally dysfunctional families, Fernandez lays it all out going back and forth in time from his adult struggles to his wild upbringing.  Many people say one or both of their parents were crazy, but Fernandez’s biological father actually was.  I’m not trying to imply this an inherently bad thing, just a reality people frequently don’t take for the actual weight of the situation.

You’ll steadily follow Fernandez down what seems to me the well trodden paths of juvenile delinquency, but I think they’re largely the only ways to have any agency when you’re 12-15 years old or so in our society.

Skate boarding and punk rock fandom start to balance things out a bit for Fernandez, along with some relatively healthy family life aspects as a well intentioned step father enters his life.

The adult narratives move around in time also, back in time in the case of the day of Trump’s selection by the Electoral College when Fernandez attended a comically bad conference on diversity and education that day in 2016.

The youthful account contains a first hand telling of the show a Nazi stabbed Aragorn from Little Black Cart at.  I was shocked to read Aragorn’s roommate at the time, Paul, died the next day from a Nazi inflicted stab wound at that show.

A lot of young people seem to think this kind of brawling is all fun and games, and need to know these sort of stories.  Aragorn told me once he considered this part of his life to have been a waste of time, though I didn’t know any of the specifics until after he died.

The Hands that Crafted the Bomb is full of brutal truth that frequently borders on Too Much Information.  Though some accounts like this strike me as bragging or bravado, I’m strongly under the impression that Fernandez is just being painfully honest.  From the lows of physically fighting his bio father to trying speed, to the highs of becoming a father himself or punching bigots in the face; all the cards are laid out, good and bad alike.  Frankly, if Fernandez or his editors held anything back, I DO NOT want to know what it is!

Eventually working out in general, running in particular, college and 12 Step Meetings come into play as Fernandez gets it together in a somewhat conventional manner, without selling out.  But staying sober (and possibly employed or sane even) continues to be a daily struggle.

By Part 13, a part of the Investigation narrative at his work named “How to Say ‘Fuck You,'” Fernandez recounts one of the more recent and infamous antifa action in California, and a talk he had with Aragorn at the time.  Like talking with me around then, he told Fernandez it was a “Waste of time.”  Knowing what I know now about Aragorn’s youthful antifascism, it’s a conversation I wish I could have been a part of.

Later Fernandez ponders the bitter irony of being threatened with heavy charges for militant antifascism, when really people should be getting awards for it.

I don’t want to spoil it all for you, so please pick it up if you find this at all interesting.  I’ve sometimes wondered if hooliganism is simply baked into the coming of age of most young men.  If it is, I suppose at least some of us got on the right side of the barricades back in the ’90s and it was nice to read a lengthy, personal, and perhaps most importantly self critical account of someone who stayed true to their youthful, antifascist roots.

You can read more about Aragorn here: https://crimethinc.com/2021/02/13/remembering-aragorn-a-poem-and-a-zine

You can order Josh Fernandez’ book from PM Press here.

Dream Swept

So tired

as night sets in

laying back

my head on the pillow

alone

in my room

my last dollar

gone

and I tell myself

tomorrow will be better

when I walk down the highway

and hitch a ride

to the city in the sky.

Saint

Beautiful lady

wind soft in your hair

looking to the sky

clouds like puffs from your lips

believing in yourself

like your mother said

kindness to everyone

will keep you safe

even the thunder protecting you

rain washing all sin away.

Heavenly

At night

where does the music come from

far

floating in sleep

notes whispering

from when you were a child

the meaning

in everything

your heart guiding

thoughts of love

a majestic hum

from God

above.

A Migratory Bird

Man flies like birds

Man soars higher and higher

Man with his spirit raises more than we count

The light of the stars twinkling in the sky

Birds have their wing power

Man with intelligence overcomes all

I fly to thee, my loving star

A relation with the moon and the ocean

Always playing a charm of tide and ebb

In this salty flow of tide overflows a new life

Spread the glow on the face

The eyes like the rosy petals

Touches both of the hearts.

Chapainawabganj,  Bangladesh

30 September, 2024

Md. Mahbubul Alam is from Bangladesh. His writer name is Mahbub John in Bangladesh. He is a Senior Teacher (English) of Harimohan Government High School, Chapainawabganj, Bangladesh. Chapainawabganj is a district town of Bangladesh. He is an MA in English Literature from Rajshahi College under National University. He has published three books of poems in Bangla. He writes mainly poems but other branches of literature such as prose, article, essay etc. also have been published in national and local newspapers, magazines, little magazines. He has achieved three times the Best Teacher Certificate and Crest in National Education Week in the District Wise Competition in Chapainawabganj District. He has gained many literary awards from home and abroad. His English writings have been published in Synchronized Chaos for seven years.