My head is like a ribbon thrown under a train that you can’t stop; that you don’t want to stop. My head: like a ribbon of worm in an apple pie. My head: destroy this pain again and for the first time (like water washing time from hair). Destroy this head: abnormal, sick, vile, purple-marbled, and then winter and snow will begin. Snow always holds a secret: destroy this snow, it carries neither secrets nor questions, trains are like lame swallows, rails are like inflorescences of homeless and suicides peoples hanging from the trees. This head carries no secrets, no questions. Destroy this head: the husks will scatter across meadows and deserts, across bird meadows and across human deserts. Cut off the dead branches, pluck the faded flowers, take out the trash, throw your head under the train.
And then I’ll die. And then you’ll die inside my head.
Ananya S Guha lives in Shillong in Northeast India. His poems have been published in both print and electronic formats, and he has been writing poetry for the last forty years.
AI, the ‘jinn’ which has come out of Aladdin’s Lamp, is no doubt the triumph of human mind. It has opened the flood gates of knowledge, and conquered time and space, and brought mankind to the enviable position of a great victor. But, it is fraught with grave risks because it poses the greatest danger to human mind only. Moreover, it appears the machine has taken all the credit pushing man, for whose benefit it was created, to a secondary position. The master does not trust his own mind, what commands to give. Man is being reduced to a non-entity now, his brain laid aside, and the AI is doing all the work. A washing machine doing the chores of a housewife is a great help. Making chapatis would also do. If the AI assists us, it is acceptable. But, if AI starts feeding us, while we are lying on our bed, it would be a bad day for man. Assistance enhances our powers, but replacement dismantles us. That is nothing short of a disaster for mankind.
The business world has acquired AI as a blessing, and got rid of millions of workers, who are now on the roads, looking for jobs. One major achievement/danger of the modern times is that AI has started making human fakes. In fact, it has created a fake factory, and men are thrilled by its powers to create AI babies, and then, once you give the perfect order, it responds and creates what you want. A young man’s thrill at such creations can be appreciated, but, when older men indulge in these thrills, there is definitely a cause for worry, because, now these fakes will be misused to create an imaginary world, like the world of the celluloid where even murders carry no responsibility.
It is scary to imagine what AI can do although, behind it, we find our own human mind. The ‘Jinn’ is remembered for good deeds, but in case of AI, we are not certain, what is going to happen to mankind. What good it can do, and what good it has done, everything is in a fluid state, and in a state of absolute uncertainty. If AI, like the ‘Jinn’ works on our command, it is for man to realize what command to give. In itself, AI has no existence, nor any power, either to create or to destroy.
If the ‘Jinn’ has come out, I propose certain ideas which can make this ‘Jinn’ perform to perfection, and for the betterment of mankind. I think, as awakened sections of humanity, we should realize where things have gone wrong, and how they can be put back into order.
AI and Social Activism
The AI can be harnessed for social activism. But for this, the scientists who are creating this Ultra-Culture have to be given a Refresher Course in Social Idealism. They need to be told that Science is a welfare discipline, and its powers cannot be used to abridge human happiness in any way. In fact, they need to be given training is Social Ethics emphasising the fact that science cannot be ethically neutral. And this idea has to be injected into the minds of the people working at the helm. Neither entertainment, nor business, should be the ideal of any scientific advancement. It is the wellbeing of humanity, and arming mankind with more and more powers, so that they could improve their living style, ultimately leading to greater happiness of the greater number. For this, we need to have an education which is ethically committed. International Academy of Ethics believes in changing the very Alphabet of human studies, such as E for Ethics, C for Compassion and K for Kindness and so on. And while leaving colleges, the students should be required to give a solemn declaration that they will not allow their knowledge to be misused to bring any harm to cosmic society.
From an Amusement Park to Social Activism
AI is working as most significant defining power in society already. But it is being used as a wilful amusement park where people come for mental acrobatics. But it has to take the next step now, and assume the role of a Social Awakener. And Man must rise up to his role as the Master of this Recreated Universe. AI has to focus on things which were left undone by man while he was busy in marching forward.
The revered river of India, the Ganges, remains polluted, and the Govt has made great efforts to cleanse its waters. Why not we press in AI to start cleaning the rivers of the world?
AI should work to reduce the radiations from electronic towers, or remove their toxicity, so that bird life could be saved.
The AI can help raise underground water levels in states where these are going down.
AI can de-escalate pollution levels in cities like New Delhi, Kolkata etc.
In a state like Punjab and Haryana, where stubble is burnt at the cost of human heath, it can find out some ways to tackle these issues.
AI can run the engines of buses, and cars, and even aeroplanes, and trains, without using any type of fuel. This is a great challenge for AI-ans so that it could usher in a new world order which is based on AI fuel.
These are only a few suggestions which might look like an overkill. But, we should have faith in the human mind. If AI can be used for Deep Fakes and causing fear in human minds, we just need to change its direction, just change its posture, all its powers can be used for the good of mankind too.
DR JERNAIL S ANAND
Dr. Jernail S. Anand, with 200 books to his credit [20 epics] is a Chandigarh-based polymath, and a vital architect of the 21st century ethical literature whose seminal work ‘Lustus: The Prince of Darkness’ challenges the moral complacency of our era. Founding President of the International Academy of Ethics, and Laureate of Charter of Morava [Serbia], Seneca [Italy], Franz Kafka [Germany, Ukraine, Czech Rep] and Maxim Gorky [Russia], his name is inscribed on the Poets’ Rock in Serbia. He is an Honorary Member of the Serbian Writers Association, Belgrade. Anand has built a poetics that unites ethics, Vedic spirituality, social critique, and the philosophy of meaning. Anand presents an articulated perspective on poetry as an instrument of planetary consciousness. A moral philosopher, professor, and international speaker, Anand has devoted much of his research to the ethical dimension of language, to the responsibility of the individual within a globalised society, and to the relationship between matter, consciousness, and transcendence. Email: anandjs55@yahoo.com.
Chidimma Ewelukwa is a Nigerian writer whose work explores memory, belonging, identity, and the quiet tensions of everyday life. She has been published in Writer Monk Literary Magazine.
Yesterday about 9:00 AM I was walking under the Russian olive trees on the north side of our house and noticed something black lying on the ground. I investigated and found it was a baby magpie still alive, half feathered out. He must have blown out of the nest about twenty feet above me in the old Russian olive. I felt helpless. I knew he would die if I left him there, but I couldn’t get him back into the nest because it was so high up and difficult to climb the Russian Olive tree with its thin, spare limbs and haphazard branches. A magpie pair had worked on repairing that two story condotel nest for months. It had a front and back door on the first floor, and this little guy must have got shoved out. Already it was hot and dusty in the high desert, and the little guy didn’t have much of a chance in the baking sun.
I fixed him a small cardboard box lined with grass and tied his home to a low hanging tree limb under the high up magpie nest, hoping the parents would notice. He wasn’t responsive. I felt bad knowing there was little I could do. The fall from the nest must have knocked the wind out of him. He needed to recover. I checked on him during the morning. He wasn’t responsive.
I consulted the Internet and Marta, my animal savvy neighbor, as to what to do. I kept checking on him.
When I checked in the early afternoon he started chirring his head off. I mixed up some food for him garnered from three websites: cat food soaked in water, hard-boiled egg, and cooked oats. He ate it up. Marta came over with a big, two foot long rectangular, open wire cage that I lined with newspaper and fresh cut grass. His new home.
He eats and sleeps. I feed him with a blue plastic tweezers. He’s had two moths and four flies plus his special food. He’s eating more. Then he sleeps. Marta and John think he should be covered. So, I put a hand towel over him for the night. He is still alive. I’ll cover him at night because the nights are cool, and he doesn’t have his siblings for warmth. We take one day at a time. This is a very special experience. The flow of life.
July 5, 2022, Tuesday, 80 degrees, partly sunny
Magpie baby made it through the night. Got some bugs for him today to eat plus his special food: softened cat food, hard-boiled egg, and soft oats. He eats and poops well. Likes his blankie which he sits under sometimes. He’s hopping more.
July 6, 2022, Wednesday, 80 degrees, sunny and breezy
Magpie baby still alive and growing. John caught some moths today for him. I added mashed banana to his special food.
July 8, 2022, Friday, 80 degrees, sunny
Magpie baby still alive and growing, feathering out. Going to town today. Marta will come to feed magpie baby.
July 10, 2022, hot, breezy
Feeding magpie baby. His two siblings are roosting outside their nest. They are all feathering out.
July 11, 2022, Monday, 90s, sunny
Magpie baby spent from 8 AM to 4 PM outside on the limb above her cage. Twice I saw her parent visit and sit on the limb beside her. The second time the parent jumped to the ground, pecked around, and fed her. My heart was thrilled. Bubbie fell off the limb twice. So, after 4 PM feeding I put her back in the cage because we’re going to a picnic in town tonight. She did well today and sits on the branches in the cage now. I say she’s a female because she has four fat siblings who are bigger and are brighter black and white than her. They jump around on the branches outside the nest. So today she became female. I call her Bubbie. The Power is working to help her. Thank you.
July 12, 2022, 99 degrees, breezy, hot
Bubbie, the magpie, did well. Didn’t eat much in afternoon maybe ‘cause of the heat. Put her in the safe house (cage) when we went to town. She hopped over on the limb when I couldn’t reach her and got a bite to eat from the blue, plastic tweezer I use. John found her some moths. I got two flies. Her siblings seemed interested in her getting fed. But they haven’t come to investigate. They watch from above.
I wear a floppy straw hat when I go to feed her. Today she was sitting on a limb about the same height as the top of my hat. She decided to jump over on top of my hat and turn around. As luck would have it, I had my iPhone with me and snapped a photo of us, her on top my hat like that’s where she belonged. I will always treasure that photo.
July 14, 2022, my best friend’s birthday, hot, sunny
Baby magpie rejoined the wild today. She flew by herself past the pump house, past the garage and chicken coop. She’s sleeping tonight in the west Russian olive trees on the far side of our fenced property on the west side of our garage where two of her siblings are. One looks like her, so I think she is a female like Bubbie. I fed her the last time about 6 PM. At 8 PM I went out and stopped about mid garage. She was on the ground but made her way up to the limb about midway where another sibling was sitting. Parent magpie visited that one and may have fed Bubbie. So tonight she spends in the trees reunited with her family. I felt so grateful and happy. Bless her, bless her, bless her.
July 15, 2022, Friday, hot sunny, 94 degrees
Bubbie the magpie made it through the night with her five siblings in the west Russian Olive tree that grows along the wood and barb wire fence with a line of other Russian Olives. At 9 AM, noon, and 6 PM I checked on her. She hopped out on a branch to be fed. The other five are in the tree, on the fence, on the ground. Bubbie seems to like being on the ground. I think she’s looking for bugs. She was hungry tonight at 6 PM, not as much the other times. Hopefully, she’s getting something from the parents.
July 17, 2022, Sunday 6 AM, 47 degrees, sunny
Friday evening when I fed Bubbie at 6 PM I teared up. I somehow knew I would be the last time. I told her I loved her and asked blessings upon her life. After I worried I shouldn’t have fed her, that her parents wouldn’t, and that she’d still be dependent on me.
Saturday I avoided going to the western Russian Olive trees. I didn’t want her to see me. Yes, all the magpie family was still there. I could hear them. About 7 PM I took the watering can filled with water to replenish the big bird water saucer on the ground by the picnic table that sits under a Russian Olive. I stopped by the garage because the magpies were on the table and taking a bath in the water pan on the ground. I was thrilled.
I only counted three magpies at first. Two were sitting on the barb wire fence under the Russian Olives. My worry was back that Bubbie wasn’t with them. But then I counted six. I was thrilled and gratified again. I waited until everyone had had a bath then walked with the water can, food container, and red plate to the picnic table. Three magpies were there and looked at me. One came forward with the magpie greeting, a loud squawk. It was Bubbie! She didn’t open her mouth to be fed. She watched me fill the water pan on the table. Then I put on the picnic table the red food plate and placed some of her food on it. She looked but didn’t eat.
I talked to her but didn’t reach out. She watched. Then I left. After the parent came several times to the picnic table and fed Bubbie at least once. She likes bugs better. She took a splashy bath in the water pan on the table as did one of her fat siblings.
I watched sitting in a chair by the cat nip growing along the garage wall well back from the magpie drama. I was petting Midnight, our black long hair cat, as I watched the magpies. She jumped down and went to investigate something on the ground. I did, too. It was a tiny, featherless baby sparrow that had fallen out of the bird house high on the garage wall. It was still alive but felt cool to the touch, so I put it into the hole in the bird house. This time I could reach the nest.
July 17, 2022. Sunday. Hot. Hot. Hot. 98 degrees.
July 26, 2022, Hit 102 degrees. Heat Advisory
Early morning I’m out filling bird water pans by the picnic table under the elm tree. No magpies this morning or evening. The family of California quail are grateful for these offerings.
July 27, 2022 8:30 AM Heat advisory.
No magpies this morning, last evening or yesterday morning.
July 28
No magpies
July 31
Water to bird pans morning and evening.
The magpies are gone. I think they come to nest in the Russian Olives in the early spring and then are gone by summer. I wonder where they go. Maybe to the basalt cliffs to the north of our place, since it’s cooler there. I miss them. They will always be my favorite bird.
I have a photo of Bubbie sitting on my garden hat on my head. I keep it on my nightstand. She hopped up on it one day when I was feeding her, and she was on the limb across from me. We were pals. We will be forever friends. What a special experience to share one’s life with a baby magpie.
September 2022
We pack the truck to go cross country to Pennsylvania for a long sojourn. I’m walking around in the yard. A lone magpie flies to our Russian Olives, calling. I watch. It’s unusual for a magpie to be here this late in the year. She flies back and forth in the Russian Olives, calling. This continues for several hours. Then she’s gone. I like to think it was Bubbie, come to say goodbye.
