Nothing Matters

Help me understand 
why nothing matters.
Repeatedly, I listen to
a joke that is not funny.
Maybe my ears do not
work. Maybe I am drunk,
too drunk, and my mind,
my poor mind is gone. I
could barely hear my own 
thoughts. In my head
I hear dogs barking and
a tarantula dancing and
time beating backward.
I grow tired of sound. If
a tree falls, I cannot hear
it when I see it drop in
front of me. In my head
an orange sunset swallows 
a burning plane whole.
I hear my heart racing.
I pretend my heart has 
stopped. Believe me
that nothing matters.
When I think back, I 
could never find my
footing. The ground
broke my fall. Above
the sky stood witness
all day and all of the night.

Kicking Stones

I will not go along
the road without kicking 
stones that are in the way.
I kicked one so far that
it was not seen again.
I believe it went up
to the clouds. I think it
put a hole in the sun.
I believe it brought down
a satellite. The others
only exploded right
after I kicked them,
too brittle for this world.

Go Nowhere

If I could anywhere, 
I want to go nowhere.
With these eyes as
my windows, I could
see far and wide. 
I could see inside 
myself. I could hear
everything I have 
ever forgotten. I
can see the truth
which is basically 
nothing depending 
on what you believe.
I can see nowhere.
It is where I want to go.

See the Mountains

I was born where I could not
see the mountains from the
street I grew up from birth to
seven years of age. When I
moved across the border, I
saw rivers, places named after
words I did not understand,
and I saw the mountains from
the street where I lived. I had
to relearn the alphabet, to 
learn the new words, the new 
language I would use to fit in,
to get by, to make a life, a
living in this country. On a
bright early morning I saw 
people who came to this
country like me, people who
worked hard to make a living,
to feed their family, being taken
away by masked goons. I could
see the mountains where I
stood. I wondered if I went there,
if I would be safer than living
in suburban or the urban streets.

My Suits

My suits have not been used for years.
They hang in the closet worn by a man
who was more slender in those times
the suit came off the hangar. My body
has transformed over the years, been
on the operating table, cut into to get
the cancer out to allow me to live one
more decade if the fates will allow. In
this daily existence I have measured 
my steps, counted the minutes, and
worked at a mind-drudging job to pay
the bills, care for my family, and help
those less fortunate than me. My suits 
gather dust, speechless, non-judgmental
in the same place I left them. I would
need to shed twenty, thirty, fifty pounds
to wear them well, to button at least
one button, or maybe two. My ties
have suffered from the same neglect.

It’s Time

  
The end 

Of Thanksgiving

Means that

It’s time

To start thinking creatively

About turkey sandwiches.

Taylor Dibbert is a poet in Washington, DC. He’s author of, most recently, “On the Rocks.”

My Mother Tongue

An undying flame in the winds,

Unaffected by the passing years.

Among all the languages of this world,

My mother tongue shall never disappear.

Babur ruled over Hindustan,

Yet his language never died.

He longed for Andijan’s dialect,

Its melons he dearly missed.

Through centuries my Turkic tongue

Was polished like a shining diamond.

It witnessed Mongols, Tsarist Russia,

Yet it never broke, never fell.

— Khasanova Aziza Kumushbek qizi,

Student of Tashkent University of Economics and Pedagogy

MAN’S OVER-REACH AND COSMIC REVENGE
[Philosophy

When nature’s patience is tested beyond the tolerance level, the cosmic forces burst upon humanity in vengeance. The divine forces which love peace, are not known to forgive their betrayers. -Anand

The cosmos is governed by harmony and order, while the human world is characterized by chaos. As soon as a man is born, it is like a bubble which is created by trapping wind in the thin layers of water, and so long as it stays on the body of the water, it causes ripples and disruptions, and finally loses itself to the flowing waters. Thus, the essential feature of the cosmos is harmony and human beings and their passions create ripples and cause disturbance in this reign of peace.

Harmony, the Essential Feature

There is something which likes harmony, peace, and flow and this ‘something’ does not like disruption. There are men, who by their very nature, believe in the cosmic flow. But there are men who have the audacity to prick the cosmic forces with their smartness and annoy nature’s wisdom. All the overtures of man which conflict with nature are judged on merit. This process takes time and it is during this period that men who violate harmony think that, as there is no one to cry foul, there is nothing wrong in it.

The Calculated Dog-Bark

In fact, to understand the nature of cosmic forces, let us take the example of a dog who is lying in its trance on the road. If you are passing by like a gentleman, it will ignore your presence. But if you try to assume some airs, and pass causing unnecessary disruptions and speaking loudly, the dog may take offence at your inordinate actions which disturb his peace. It will issue a calculated bark. But if he finds you are consistent in your non-sensical behaviour, and do not walk like a natural human being, the bark would become a bit shrill and fierce too. That is why there is a proverb: let sleeping dogs lie.

Now apply this logic to the cosmic forces. They are busy in their daily spin. Everything is at the right angle. If there are disruptions, it is only because men create a mess. There are no natural disasters. Every disaster has a human connection. Tempests, earthquakes, whirlwinds, storms, cloudbursts – there are natural activities, but nature is peace loving, not quarrelsome by nature. When nature’s patience is tested beyond the tolerance level, the cosmic forces burst upon humanity in vengeance.

The Dynamics of Peaceful Living

Peace is the result of leading a life which is based on faith in the cosmic wisdom. Men work hard to earn their livelihood without flirting with nature’s order. But men are ancestored by apes, and they believe in smartness, which is not to the liking of cosmic forces. All those who assert their selfish wisdom come to grief. This world is full of people who go on playing foul with nature’s rhythm, and keep building fortunes. But nature quietly registers their pranks, and in time brings them down. The divine forces which love peace, are not known to forgive their betrayers. The pain and suffering that we see in the world is the result of men trying to wage a war with nature’s order, trying to get more than is permitted, finally coming to grief. They are all over-reachers who do not believe patience, and disrupt the cosmic flow.

Everything evolves in time. But those who forced the cart in a particular direction have caused bloodshed on this earth. Gods know in which direction they want to take men. And it is best to attune ourselves to the rhythm of nature and live accordingly. The first thing is to click the ‘forget’ button. And then to unlearn what we have learnt so far and return to that pristine stage of innocence – this is what gods want and this is what we resist so powerfully, leading to pain and suffering in life and the punishment which is waiting for us, in this very world, when we over-reach ourselves.

Dr. Jernail Singh Anand, with an opus of 180 plus books, is Laureate of the Seneca, Charter of Morava, Franz Kafka and Maxim Gorky awards.  His name adorns the Poets’ Rock in Serbia. Anand is a towering literary figure whose work embodies a rare fusion of creativity, intellect, and moral vision. He is not only lone of the most influential voices in contemporary Indian poetry, but a global voice, challenging readers to confront the complexities of existence while offering hope through art and ethics.   

The Play “A SHERLOCK CAROL” Brings a Barrage of Ghostly Mysterious Fun Lyrics Stage

Two prodigious masterworks that pair well as a theater couple. Additional surges of hilarity and plotting make this cup of yuletide merriment a seamless holiday indulgence for all.

A SHERLOCK CAROL

Dec. 14-December 21

Running Time: Two hours plus one 15-minute intermission.

Buy Tickets

View Program

Spotify Playlist: A Sherlock Carol

Moriarity is as dead as dead can be. Sherlock Holmes is despondent. Deprived of his number one opponent, what’s the use of it all? Arrive a fully-fledged Tiny Tim and the cagy bereavement of everyone’s beloved humbug and it’s a jolly literary mash-up with wonders around every corner. This renewed and delightful reimagining of two of the most cherished literary characters is a “Dickens” of a yuletide gumshoe story that’s as “good as gold.” Six actors transfigure before your eyes in a spirited, clever, and jubilant holiday humor that is “elementary” for a celebratory outing sure to pleasure audiences of all ages.

With clever and spooktacular staging that has garnered rave reviews and has been described as impressive by a plethora of theater critics, A Sherlock Carol utilizes the medium of genre blending uniting Doyle and Dickens to scare up light hearted mysterious Christmas fun with rapid fire British accents to boot! The costume changes were swift, smart and operative and the sharp tongued, at times, caustic dialogue which was further animated with a pronounced British accent made for a lively busy never a dull moment type performance. There were so many nuances happening on stage, I felt a pressing need to pay attention to everything because I didn’t want to miss a thing! There was romantic interest drama which brought an understated simmering sensuality that made good adult erotic stimulation and interest. With awe aspiring visual effects along with some characterizational surprises, there was never a dull moment.

During the intermission, some of the men were buzzing in the men’s room about how the play really “came alive” during the second act which incited a fiery debate in between the sounds of flushing urinals. Even if you’re not familiar with the mysteries of Sherlock Holmes by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle or the campy ubiquitous classic A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens, there is enough context to facilitate your enjoyment of the play as a standalone presentation. The play manages to get philosophical as some thematic elements were clearly rendered with lines like, “You’re not afraid of dying, you’re afraid of living!” Which to me was an eye-opening moment, as was also expressed by my guest sitting next to me; and if anything was a meaningful take away from this disparate play. The great chemistry between the actors made for a seamless light hearted and essentially comical experience that left audiences leaving with childlike smiles on their faces. Sherlock Carol effectively delivered a new campier version of two literary icons; I highly recommend you see this one. Five out of five stars for what it was!

Jacques Fleury is a Boston Globe featured Haitian-American Poet, Educator, Author of four books and literary arts student through Harvard University. His latest publication “You Are Enough: The Journey to Accepting Your Authentic Self” and 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 and Cooch Behar 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.

An Immigrant’s Letter Home: They Say I’m the Problem

Fresh off the boat
Plank splinters sticking in my bottom
Foreign words coating my throat
Accented with spices smuggled in my breath

I am here by mule train and burnt gasoline
Aero plane and broken shoestrings
Paid for everything by commercializing
My entire life into round metal beads
Covered in ghost heads and iconic scenes
I’ve not yet had the chance to see
The way they haunt my pockets

Exchanging, “for an excellent rate,” he says to me
An Uzi armed sentry stamps my history
Of entry in passport holograms
The picture shivers between two sheets of paper
While I wait on a bench to claim a meal voucher waiver
For my wife and two
Because where I come from, that’s just what we do
If there’s enough left over, I might eat too

We spend most of our time here in a whole-way shelter
Rust-stained gate and chain-linked containers
Thankful we’ve earned this destination
Instead of the alternative
Where we can cash out our dream banks for the hopes of better gold
Even though we’re not sure of the accounts we’ve been sold

Everyone here sleeps, eyes clinched into folds
But awake in mind sweat
Soaking in the nightmares of regret
When barreled crabs said, “you all won’t get past”
And, “you’ll never last”
And, “we’ll be seeing you when you come crawling back”

But this was never intended to be a round trip
We have a new home here even though
We’re not aware where exactly here is
Or if it’s built real in stick or brick
But in the hope of the memories
We haven’t started remembering yet

So, I try not to be a burden
At nine o’clock, I walk across the parking lot
To start the job that I’ve created
Washing windshields for tips
And trotting across traffic to get
Another car clean to cover business expenses
Incorporating my skills from an era gone by
Of staying organized
To capitalize my homeland’s handouts
Before they were demoralized

At eleven o’clock, I beat down the tracks
To bus restaurant tables and bust my back
Below minimum wage reimbursement
Where it’s a fact that taxes get held back
In snide murmurs and slant glances
Carving contempt on my appearances
I absorb this as a symbol of respect
As I did before, our towers were wrecked.

At the other eleven o’clock, I slip through the cracks
Of the shelter’s back door slats
And immerse my mind
In language and cultural contexts
Of the people and places I didn’t know existed
In this new condition set

I often wonder why we worried and hesitated
And held our expectations on presidential level aspirations
Instead of holding ourselves as the democratic inspiration
In the nation our ancestors created
We eroded through horror and hatred
Where we poked one another’s eyes
Bled ourselves to death then painted
Our remnants onto dust bound, thin air

At night, I don’t sleep much at all
Remembering what we had before the fall
The collapse of the systems
Freedom and prosperity
Jester dancing in the world’s mockery
Wrapped in tricolor liberty wings

But now, it all seems like a distant dream
I, go sleepless, knowing it isn’t a thing
No more grain waves or sea shines
The Mother of Exiles sank in the shoreline
As another empire lost on its way to find
The cause that made it an envious emblem

Now, they say I’m the problem


Urban Cowboys

this is where we sleep against tonight
paper pallets lining the underpass
tomorrow we follow the sun’s tail
pulling the needle in our compass
towards another city’s concrete stable
wind whisking the stray cat’s mane
from left to right and North to West
without hay filling our bellies
our Coke bottle canteens collect dust
as we close our eyes around headlight fires
resting our feet on empty bed rolls
and wonder, “When will we ever be home?”


With Backs to the Rules

navigating life in a series of legends
meandering across the foreign out there
most people travel by grasping for the rules

some reach to rules to know where to stand
other lean into rules for strength
the greedy want rules to get ahead
the rebels want rules to overthrow

but instead, there are poets
poets travel with their backs to the rules
in an eternal commission
banished outside Plato’s republic

with one foot on the frontier of the knowable
and the other foot hovering over the faith filled infinite
white-knuckling enough courage to speak of sins
wrestle written love ciphers for translating fringes
in fragments onto the next poet

in messages urging us to leave safety and step outside
and in time, return to spread the possibility
of how poets travel,

with backs to the rules

The New Colossus

(*Note: A series of four blackout poems repeated from, The New Colossus, by Emma Lazarus as written on the base of the U.S. Statue of Liberty.)

Brendan Dawson is an American-born poet and writer based in Italy. Brendan writes from his experiences while living, working, and traveling abroad.  Currently, he is compiling a collection of poetry and short stories from his time serving in the military and journey as an expat.

I AM STILL A CHILD… THERE

I am still a child,

Running after a butterfly

That escapes the light of my hands.

I laugh,

And the fields laugh with me,

While the sun dangles

From the braids of time.

I draw on the soil

A tiny house

Whose windows all open

Onto my little festivals.

I gather pebbles,

As if filling my pocket

With tiny stars

That stay awake with me until sleep.

I ride the wind

And shout:

Hurry…

I want to outrun my shadow.

My knees get dirty with mud,

And I laugh even more,

As if the earth is embracing me,

Whispering:

You grew up… yet you did not grow old.

I run,

And my laughter follows me,

Tangling in the air

Like the strings of a kite

Afraid to fall.

I catch the rainbow,

And swear

I was not dreaming

I was only stretching my hand

A little further

To touch the impossible.

And to this day,

Whenever I close my eyes,

I see that little girl

Running toward me,

Saying:

Come…

The play is not over yet.

BEYOND PRESENCE

There would be no shadow

Had things not remembered their first light,

And I would not write you

Had absence not awakened me

With a sound resembling the soul’s return to itself.

In the space where time does not exist,

The question walks barefoot,

Searching for a meaning

Like a pulse without a body,

Or a dream

Unsure whether it is seen,

Or merely recalls having seen us before.

There,

Where the beginning meets the end,

Silence rises like an ancient sage,

Smiles at our bewilderment,

And says:

“Everything you lose returns,

But in a form you do not recognize.”

I sit within myself,

As if listening to a breath

The soul retrieves from a depth

Beyond life and death,

And beyond the notion that the universe has a face

We see only when we close our hearts.

And in the moment when thought becomes weightless,

And pain turns transparent,

I understand that presence

Is not what we live,

But what passes through us

And leaves its trace,

As if it were the only truth

That never grows old.

 

Taghrid Bou Merhi is a Lebanese–Brazilian poet, translator, editor, and literary figure whose voice has become a bridge between cultures across the Arab world, Latin America, Asia, and Europe. Born in Lebanon and residing in Brazil, she has built a distinguished career marked by linguistic mastery, artistic depth, and a commitment to intercultural dialogue. Fluent in multiple languages, she has translated 49 books and more than two thousand poems, articles, interviews, and critical texts, making her one of the most prolific Arab translators of her generation.

Bou Merhi is the author of twenty-three books spanning poetry, short stories, essays, and children’s literature. Her works—known for their lyrical intensity and philosophical resonance—have been translated into forty-seven languages and included in over two hundred international anthologies. She has participated in nearly fifty global anthologies with poems and reviews, and her contributions frequently appear in international magazines, newspapers, and literary platforms.

Her editorial experience is equally extensive. Bou Merhi serves as President of CIESART Lebanon and holds leading positions in several cultural and literary organizations around the world. She has acted as an international judge for the Walt Whitman competition for three consecutive years and is a prominent officer for international cultural relations in multiple global institutions. She has also served as Deputy Editor-in-Chief of Raseef 81 Magazine and currently works as a contributing editor for Pencraft Literary Magazine.

Throughout her career, Taghrid Bou Merhi has received numerous prestigious international awards honoring both her poetry and her translation achievements, including the Naji Naaman Award, the Nizar Sartawi Translation Award, and the Nian Zhang Cup Prize. Her writing is recognized for its emotional richness, philosophical depth, and unwavering commitment to humanistic values. Today, she continues to promote cultural exchange through her poetry, translations, and global literary engagements.