A Letter Written on A Tombstone

Stranger, wait here
Wait for a moment
Once I was like you
My forefather was like you
Now I am here
Many people are here
One day you will come here
Everybody will have to come here
Time will finish everything
It is a unconditional fact
Everybody has to embrace with death
And come here one by one
It is out of the world
The world is not here
Money has no power here
Power is powerless
Politics and politicians can't play games
Landlord can't dominant forcefully 
Nobody can do anything
Caste system has no chance
All are equal 
Because all are dead.
Dead man has no address
The things we need here is good deeds
Only good deeds must help us.
So, please do good deeds as much as possible
Time is knocking at the door
Anytime there will go the bell.

EMBRACE MY SILENCE

Embrace my silence

With your arms of happiness

And wrap my heart

In threads of silk

And don’t let the southern wind

Erase a smile

Of the gifted hope

From the fallen.

Embrace my silence

And you shall hear

A heartbeat

And clatter of longing

In the silence of my infinity.

Embrace my silence

And call me by my name

In this night of suspense

And I shall come

Like a fairy

All in white

To open your eyes,

Which shine

Like burning stars.

Your eyes

Are like white lighthouses

In the fear of my depths.

Your eyes are like eternal diamonds

In the colours

Of glorious life. 

Jasna Gugić was born in Vinkovci, Croatia. She is the Vice-President of the Association of Artists and Writers of the World SAPS; P.L.O.T.S USA the Creative Magazine Ambassador for Croatia, Ambassador in Elite Arab Creative Union of The Royal House – Lebanon, Ambassador of Peace and Peaceful Coexistence – Morocco, Global Ambassador of Literacy and Culture for the Asih Sasami Indonesia Global Writers, and a member of Angeena International, a non-profit organization for peace, humanity, literature, poetry, and culture. She is also co-editor of the anthology, Compassion-Save the World, one poem was written by 130 world poets.

Jasna has published three collections of poems. The first two collections are bilingual: one is Croatian-English and the other is Croatian-Polish. The third collection consists of a single poem translated into sixty languages of the world.

Jasna Gugić is one of the winners of the World Award for Cultural Excellence “César Vallejo” for the year 2020. in the category of culture, awarded by Union Hispanomundial de Escritores (UHE).

She is one of the winners of the World Award for Excellence “Golden Eagle” for the year 2023. in the category of literature, awarded by Union Hispanomundial de Escritores (UHE), in a global alliance with Mil Mentes por Mexico International (MMPMI) and Academia Mundial de Literatura, Historia, Arte y Cultura(AMLHAC) and Global Peace Alliance Award 2023. awarded by Union Hispanomundial de Escritores (UHE) , MIL MENTES por Mexico Internacional, and Academia Mundial de Literatura, Historia, Arte y Cultura(AMLHAC). 

Jasna is a multiple winner of many international awards for poetry and literature and her work has been translated into several world languages. 

She lives and works in Zagreb, Croatia. Her poems have been published in magazines in the USA, Spain, Greece, Italy, Russia, Croatia, India, Syria, Denmark, Brazil, Mexico, Bangladesh, Serbia, Albania, Nigeria, Belgium, China, Chile, Nepal, Pakistan, Korea, Germany, Turkey, etc.

Her poems have been published in so many world-famous print and electronic magazines, journals, websites, blogs, and anthologies like Spillwords Press – USA, P.L.O.T.S. The Creative Magazine – USA, Mad Swirl – USA ,Inspired – USA Raven Cage – USA, Highland Park Poetry – USA, Setu – USA, Ariel Chart – USA, Dissident Voice – USA, World of Myth Magazine – USA, Cocktail Literary Journal –USA, Synchronized Chaos Magazine – USA, Cajun Mutt Press – USA, Word City Literary Journal – USA, Medusa‟s Kitchen – USA, Sage Cigarettes – USA, Fevers of the Mind – USA,  Atunis Galaxy Poetry – Albania /Belgium, Mokasini – Israel, Lothlorien Poetry Journal – UK, Polis Magazino – Greece, Homo Universalis – Greece, Chinese Language Monthly – 中國語文月刊 – China, Active Muse – India,  Eboquills – Nigeria, Azahar Revista Poetica – Spain, Sindh Courier – Pakistan, Magazine Humanity – Russia, Entre Parentesis – Chile, Daily Asia Bani – Bangladesh, Bharat Vision – Denmark, Litterateur Rw, Dritare E Re – Albania, Literary Yard – India, Gazeta Destinacioni – Albania, Newspaper Lissalba – Albania, Alb- Spirit – Albania, Albania Press – Albania, Alessandria Today – Italy, The Moment International News – Germany, Kavya Kishor English – Bangladesh, PETRUŠKA NASTAMBA, an e-magazine for language, literature, and culture – Serbia, Güncel Sanat magazine – Turkey, Cultural Reverence, a global digital journal of art and literature -India, A Too Powerful Word – Serbia, Magazine Ghorsowar – India, Al-Arabi Today Magazine, Magazine Rainbow, Humayuns Editorial – Bangladesh, Himalaya Diary – Nepal and Agarid br. 24 and 16, Online newspaper NewsNjeju, Korea, Willwash. wordpress blogzine – Nigeria.

POSTCARDS FROM THE ROAD : Venezuela

SEARCHING FOR CARACAS

Between mountains & sea, through jungles, along lagoons, over silted rivers. Sometimes that Caribbean just below my sight, just beyond the vine-draped trees.

*   

Long ago the sea disappeared. & now we enter these mountains heavy-green. Along banks of streams, in the folds of land, hand-built homes. Their families sell coconut milk & candies at roadside stands.

            *        *

I am searching for this city. The shantytowns, the industry, the suburbia that always mark the entry of metropolis.

But all I see is this highway through green.

            *        *       *

Finally nearing the center. Traffic jams the highway of this late afternoon. Yes, the stores, the malls, the houses – but still that verdant range.

            *        *       *       *

When will we arrive? We continue going on & on. The canopy of high-rise apartments, skyscrapers & billboards grimed by time towers above the canopy of trees.

ON THE ROAD AGAIN

Soon we leave the high rises of Caracas

            & enter the forested high rise of

            the mountains. Misting clouds

            dampen the morning highway. The

bus stereo playa salsas. A passenger

            in back sings along off-key.

We wind towards the Maracay lowlands,

over banana-lined streams, past sugar

cane, through small towns. A white dog

chases another across a field along this

road.

By the time we reach the lower lands, the

            slate-grey clouds shatter the cobalt-blue

            sky & bright sun. Valencia Lake ripples

white-capped, dully, deep-blue-deep-

green in a bowl-valley of the sierra.

From Valencia to Barquisimeto, larger cities

            of this country. Will it be endless urban

            scenery now? Or shall I continue to be

dazzled by those emerald mountains,

that sapphire sky draped with bauxite

clouds, these rushing topaz rivers?

Through small towns, past cattle ranches, past

            chicken farms – & yes, the verdant

            mountains …

SANARE TRIO

At the tip of these Andes, the slopes surrounding Sanare neatly parcel into farms & cafetales. Distant mountains, dryer & rougher, fading to ghostly silhouettes in the warming day.

            *

By noon the clouds are descending. The mountains fall into deep shadows. The aroma of roasting coffee wafts on the fresh breeze.

            *        *

This evening bathed with mist, the sun paints these sierra lands indigo-rose.

My biography

Lorraine Caputo is a wandering troubadour whose writings appear in over 500 journals on six continents, and 24 collections – including In the Jaguar Valley (dancing girl press, 2023) and Santa Marta Ayres (Origami Poems Project, 2024). She also authors travel narratives, articles and guidebooks. Her writing has been honored by the Parliamentary Poet Laureate of Canada (2011) and nominated for the Best of the Net and the Pushcart Prize. Caputo has done literary readings from Alaska to the Patagonia. She journeys through Latin America with her faithful knapsack Rocinante, listening to the voices of the pueblos and Earth. Follow her adventures at www.facebook.com/lorrainecaputo.wanderer or http://latinamericawanderer.wordpress.com.

Leda and the Swan by W. B. Yeats

Critically examine the postmodern reading of Leda and the Swan by William Butler Yeats.

(Black and white pencil drawing of a naked human entwined with a winged bird and her egg)

Leda’s virgin femininity is at stake by the perilous encroachment of anthropomorphic Zeus. The masculinized possession upon the staggering girl by caressing her frail thighs symbolizes helplessness. This helplessness manifests emblematic relinquishment of virginity to the amorous conquest of Zeus. Love and war are supposedly antithetical paradoxes and fruits in reproduction of offsprings and therefore vindictive of the polarization between supernatural immortality and mortal beings or bonded and free.. 

Seduction and rape of Leda the Queen of Sparta, by the God of Heavens and King of the Olympics, in disguise of Swan in Greek, mythologizes the fantastical narration of Helen of Troy and the cloned brothers Castor and Pollux.  Orgasm and ejaculation implicates shudder in the loins with impregnation of Leda by Swan while engendering the broken wall, burning roof and tower alike architectural landmarks and milestones. Later this climatic Homeric allusion pontificates toward Agamemnon’s bereavement. Historical cycle of Helen’s and Clytemnestra’s seeds are planted and fertilized by Leda. Rhetorical questions become justifiable with the explanatory statements: “The feathered glory from her loosening thighs?/ But feel the strange heart beating where it lies?” Herein, succumbent of Leda’s virginity to the supremacy of the mightier and loftiest God has been decreed as consummation of sexual gratification. Allegorically  colonial hegemonic culture of England reigning with superpower supremacy over colonized Ireland has been satirically implicated. 

William Butler Yeats examines the consequences of the rape intimating the eventual defeat of Troy and triumph of Greece and the restoration of Western history. These mythic puns and sublime images are a testament to the legacy of Celtic Anglo Irish poetic cult amidst the traumatic outbreak of World War I, inviting readers toward imaginary resistance to oppression. “He holds her helpless breasts upon his breasts” furthermore implicates the political turmoil of historical Irish landscapes as implied metaphorically in Leda’s succumbing to the temptation of Zeus’s busty demeanor. The invasion of Ireland by Britain is allegorically manifested by this dialectic. Yeats revisits mythological fiction through fragmentation of Leda and this case spotlights metaphorical fragmentation of a country, nation, tribe and culture. 

The act of Leda and the Swan is a bright marbled sculpture of apopsiopesis that is constantly resurrected from the microcosmic everyday acts, released from the ravages of delusory time. “Did she put on his knowledge with his power /Before the indifferent beak could let her drop?” These lines succinctly projects the rebellious spirit of the nationalistic freedom movement and the aftereffects of post revolution in accord with the domain of England’s imperial regime. Ireland’s defeminization and emasculation afterthoughts foreshadowed by the rhetorical questions indeed. 

Further Reading

Textual/Sexual Politics in Yeats’s “Leda and the Swan”, William Johnsen, Yeats and Postmodernism, Leonard Orr, Sycrause University Press. 

(Brown clay sculpture of a naked person whose arms and legs are entwined with a winged bird)

-------------------------------------------------------
turn down the lights
 

these are the nights

i should drink myself

to death

 

that's the problem with

starting out drinking

at a young age

 

it takes so damn much

anymore to even get

close to the end

 

it ain't worth it

 

play some music

 

turn down the lights

 

remember the last one

that ever wanted to

kiss you

 

if she only had a way

to get out of that shitty

marriage

 

who knows

 

soon the scotch will

switch to gin

 

that is what the inner

child likes to call

torture

 

iron sharpens iron

 

the shotgun in the

corner has dust on it

 

i suppose that says

more than even i

believe it does
----------------------------------------------------------
all hope is lost
 

there is a darkness around me

some days

 

a pain that lingers in the background

like an awkward kid at the prom

 

but as that pain lingers

especially as i have grown

older

 

every fucking twist and turn

 

the poems start to be written

in blood

 

all hope is lost in a fucking

sewer miles away

 

no one ever loved me and

i am painfully aware of it

 

on most days, i don't even

bother to fight off the demons

anymore

 

what's the point

 

death has been on my mind

for over forty fucking years

now

 

longer than some of my friends

ever lived

 

will it be a mirror or a spoon

 

laughing at the moon or loading

the bullets into a homemade gun

 

i still hide the knives in the bushes

just for old times' sake

 

last time anyone actually cared
---------------------------------------------------------
not your blood
 

trembling hands

covered in blood

 

not your blood

 

love rushes in

when reality

fades away

 

a final breath

amid chaos

and mayhem

 

you always knew

he wanted death

to be one hell of

a story to tell
-------------------------------------------------------------
eyes that would haunt a ghost
 

broken neon scattered

across the sky in another

one of my broken dreams

 

she always has brown hair

brown skin, a great ass

and eyes that would haunt

a ghost

 

somehow, she is in love

with me, an overweight

poet with a wicked tongue

 

if you know what i mean

 

hand in hand in the rain

 

laughing at nothing at all

 

her kisses are like a lovers

lament

 

often, she will try to kill

me in these dreams

 

on a rare night, we make

love in a parking lot

outside of some shitty

bar

 

i had a friend ask me

if i ever was in love

 

i told her your guess

is as good as mine
-------------------------------------------------------
welcome to love with a poet
 

she tasted like cherry cream soda

 

curves in all the right places

 

how much is this going to cost me

 

well, eventually your life

 

she showed her hand, hoping

for a ring

 

i was fresh out of ideas and excuses

to say no

 

i put a rubber band on her ring finger

 

she laughed

 

i said welcome to love with a poet

 

we might have lasted another month

or so

 

eventually, the laughs were glasses

being thrown against walls

 

fists into bricks

 

you know

 

the typical white trash utopia break

up shit on a saturday night in the sticks

 

i still think of her

 

i still have the scars


J.J. Campbell (1976 - ?) is slowly dying in the suburbs, realizing that the story only gets sadder from here. He's been widely published over the years, most recently at Mad Swirl, Horror Sleaze Trash, The Beatnik Cowboy, The Rye Whiskey Review and Disturb the Universe Magazine. His most recent chapbook, Altered States of The Unflinching Souls, with Casey Renee Kiser, was published in August. You can find him most days on his mildly entertaining blog, evil delights. (https://evildelights.blogspot.com)

Are you free

It is not about country or religion

It is not about who are you

Or who I am

It is not about your experience

It is not about who you like or not

It is all about injustice

Unknown person behind the curtains that take decisions

It is all about manipulation and violence

It is all about no ethics

People want to earn money fast

It is all about a fake world

And if you do not stay soft ..

If you don’t keep the inner child

your soul will be lost….

EVA Petropoulou Eva Lianou Petropoulou

Eva Lianou Petropoulou (Greece)

She is an awarded author and poet from Greece with more than 25 years in the literary field published more that 10 books. Her poems are translated in more than 25 languages. She is President of creativity and art of Mil Mentes Por Mexico Association. She represents Greece as a media partner and is a member of IAE India. She’s part of the Global Federation of Leadership and High Intelligence A.C. and an official candidate for the Nobel Peace Prize. She is a World Ambassador of the International Academy of Ethics in India and an Ambassador of Group Poetry as well as a member of several literary groups.