Poetry from Chloe Schoenfeld

Daisies

I lean against the window

And tune in to the frequency of the potholes in the road

The glass is cold and suspiciously sticky

The flower falls apart in my hands

Covering the skin in pollen

Grass tickles my sides

I sneeze and almost hit my head on the dinner table

My napkin falls off my lap and onto the carpeted floor

My reflection stares at me from the swirling glass of red wine

A car honks at the empty red light

The stoplight tells me to wait

My alarm sounds and I roll out of bed onto the floor

The sweat on my skin sticks to the wood

I lift my head up and look at the pile of flower petals

Overflowing in the trash can

Poetry from Anna Keiko

East Asian woman with long straight dark hair, hoop earrings, and lipstick. She's wearing a white ruffled blouse and a green lanyard.

Preface

underneath the profoundly asleep earth,

among illusory constructions of reality

in the heavy rhythm that knocks at the gate of history

time dissipates darkness, the dawn breaks

fragments of memories unite into one image

portraying the people from thousands of years ago

they had never seen before

the soul rising from the ruins

lightning stimulates the sleep hormone

the words sprout from the roots of the trees

the branches raise their eyes to the sky

the tears from above soothe the dry throat

insomnia brings about disorder

sleepwalk spreads like clouds

on the edge, people seek faith,

the swan isolates, the sea roars.

the wheel of time loses direction

fierce winds swirl the calm waves

the dark flow of purple rain floods the newly sprouted flowers

the dike is no longer on the shore

the sea is no longer in the sea

the pleasures of life create wings of light

lush branches and leaves grow from rotten logs

postmodernism indicates a bright period

the white sheet inscribed with yellow and red symbols

like barren lands sprinkled with saliva and salt

millennial expressions permeate ink and paper

the profound words awake from the drawers on the walls

the eyes in the tombs frightfully stare

the trembling hand reaches into the library in the afternoon sun

dusk and dawn go on

Profound words asleep

(Unsolved)

the sea removes its veil

mountain ridges create new settlements

humanity is torn apart

the celestial vault is unclear

creation and destruction became fine arts

when humans evolved, the Ice Age was forgotten

people’s desires are infinitely greater

faith and contradiction are overlapping

only the poet’s soul sees the tree flowers

my nostrils perceive the smell of old books.

morning glow covered by clouds and fog

alien guests appear in the magical sky

brains exterminating amongst each other

religion is not a true spiritual devotion

monks’ love affairs give birth to children

Buddhist nuns give birth in misery

nature undergoes a destruction process

discoveries accelerate people’s panic

but you keep your faith that death

brings rebirth,

a bird looking for the forest

June 23, 2017

Profound words asleep

Reading

the scent of ink passes from hand to heart

burning desire stimulates the senses

veins beat inside the rolled sleeves

the solution to this state is like a dream wind that smacks the flesh

I hope that fireflies jump into written words

meditating, we travel through the cosmos

an ark heading to infinity

when the morning light removes the veil

the world shows its true face

hidden dreams pass through the time tunnel

directed to the hut of steel and cement

they run back and forth through the underground

at the spring in the forest, the bone whistle whispers

my dream lifts the billows

Utopia

Foreword: If people continue to destroy the environment,

what will happen to the Earth?

the world evolves continuously, even before our era

the monkey thinks of the empty forest

the sky protests crying

his tears roll down to the ground

making the savages appear

the sun like a magic mirror,

mercury – destructive ultraviolet rays

the constellation is no longer fascinating

it sinks into the sea

the air blooms, the waters rise muttering,

ants dance inside the shells

animals discuss livelihoods

the dinosaur and the elephant sweat working in agriculture

the lion and the tiger are eager to get married and have offspring

the leaves of the trees are like the palms of the sky

butterflies and dragonflies cannot be seen under the sun

thick smoke floats above the clouds

the mountain range is like an infinite fence

we were born in the air

hands raised to the olive tree, interpret the verses of the oracle

the beast is banished to slavery

trees abound in fruits

birds and insects take care of the harvest

stones discuss how to rewrite history

the fish are guarding the corrupt officials

rain and dew create eternal life

the Earth gave life to the Earth.

Rivers

desire – a river

springing from the blood of our ancestors

civilized and primitive behaviors interchange

war, murder, and redemption

genetic mutation

in the Neolithic,

stone and fire offered wisdom

most people lived like puppets

nobody knows if there was a god

men and women crossed the rivers of the high mountains

driven by the flames of desire

their union gave birth to the seas and the land.

March 16, 2017

微信图片_20241028140554

Anna Keiko (original name: Wang Xianglian) is an internationally renowned poet, writer, editor and painter living in Shanghai. Graduated from East China University of Political Science and Law. The founder, President and editor-in-chief of ACC Shanghai Huifen International Literary Association, the World Poetry promoter, the International Peace Ambassador Outstanding Contribution Award winner. Chinese young literary director. Her poems have been translated into more than 30 languages and published more than 2,000 in more than 500 newspapers and magazines in more than 50 countries. Published 11 books of poetry, (waiting for the bus) poems by the famous composer Tu Bahai into songs. She has been invited to participate in international poetry festivals in more than a dozen countries, Yale University invited her to participate in the International Poetry Symposium for three consecutive years, and Salem University invited her as an international poet’s personal poetry seminar program. She has won 33 International poetry prizes and was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2020.

Essay from Federico Wardal

IMG_5514.jpg

(Older white man with a wide brim hat standing in a museum in front of a tan Egyptian statue. He’s got a gray sport coat and blue button down collared shirt).


“Le Grand Musée de Giza” opening of the world’s largest museum last October 16th 

by Federico Wardal 

——-

The cities of NYC and SF are intimately linked to major events on Egyptian antiquities. News such as the 2023 exhibition on Pharaoh Ramses at the SF De Young Museum curated by the celebrity of the most important exhibitions on ancient civilizations Hon. Renée Dreyfus, an exhibition desired by the legendary archaeologist Prof. Zahi Hawass, have been published in this magazine. 

In 1995 I was the protagonist of the theatrical show : “Garibaldi and Anita: peacemakers without frontiers” at the Cairo Opera House for the Cairo International Festival of Experimental Theatre and after the show I went to visit the famous set designer architect Hussein El-Ezabi in his villa at the pyramids where I met the Arab Global Star Mohammed Sobhi and we talked about the project of Le Grand Musée de Giza.

On 5 January 2002, then-Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak laid the foundation stone of the Grand Egyptian Museum.

In 2006, the 3,200 years old Statue of Ramesses II was relocated from Ramses Square in Cairo to the Grand Egyptian Museum site, near that Giza Plateau. It was moved to the atrium of the museum in January 2018 .

In late August 2008, the design team submitted over 5,000 drawings to the Egyptian Ministry of Culture. Following this, the construction tende was announced in October 2008. Earthmoving has begun to excavate the site for the building. Tendering was due in September 2009, with an estimated completion date of 2013.[15]

On 11 January 2012, a joint venture between Egypt’s Orascom Construction (OC) belongs to Sawiris brothers and the Belgian BESIX was awarded the contract for phase three of the Grand Egyptian Museum (GEM)

In January 2018, Besix and Orascom brought in and installed an 82-ton, 3,200-year-old statue of Ramses II in the Grand Egyptian Museum. It was the first artefact to be installed in the Museum, during construction, due to its size.

On 29 April 2018, a fire broke out near the entrance of the GEM but artifacts were not damaged and the cause of the fire was unknown.

In May 2018, the last of King Tutankhamun‘s chariots was moved to GEM.

In November 2018, the estimate for a full opening was pushed back to last quarter of 2020, according to Tarek Tawfik, GEM’s director.[20] In April 2020, the planned opening of the museum was pushed to 2021 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

In August 2020, two colossal statues discovered in the sunken city of Thonis-Heracleion by the IEASM were set up in the entrance hall of the GEM.

As of May 2024, the museum is scheduled to open “later this year” and Gihan Zaki was appointed head of the Grand Egyptian Museum.

As of 16 October, 2024 the Grand Hall, Grand Staircase, commercial area, 12 public galleries and the exterior gardens are open for tours, while the Tutankhamun gallery and Solar Boat Museum are not yet open to the public.

Soon the entire huge museum will be open to the public. 

Meanwhile, new archaeological discoveries are proceeding intensely under the care of Prof. Zahi Hawass, especially in the Luxor area that will contribute to the GEM while new large exhibitions on the Egypt of the Pharaohs are scheduled in the USA in 2025 with conferences by Prof. Zahi Hawass.

Extremely tall tan Egyptian statue inside a museum with a few visitors looking up at it.
Older white man with curly gray hair, Hussein El Ezaby
The ceiling of the museum with sunlight streaming down to the museum floor.
Face, ears, eyes, nose, mouth, and headdress of an Egyptian statue.

Poetry from Howard Debs

Older white man with a light blue baseball cap and a black tee shirt in front of a leafy bush. His shirt reads "poet, noun, a person who writes poems."

Order Up, It’s a Game

I know it’s a game, because I bought it.

I got it for my grandkids when they were young.

They loved it. We played it a lot. A review of the game

says it all: “Order Up puts the ‘short’ back in ‘short-order cook,’

but virtual cooking has never been more engaging”—think about it;

it’s a Monday, a work day, customers are pouring in

placing orders with little time to wait around,

maybe they’ve got a half-hour or so for lunch, it’s called

“fast food” for a reason. I once knew a social media

content creator who got fired because she took too

long a lunch break, she was “stealing” time on company time

they said so this is serious business, wolfing down a Big Mac

and fries is an eating skill essential for the average Jane or Joe.

In other words, this is nothing to play around with, except
in your spare time, on PlayStation. If you’re ever at

a Waffle House or other diner worth its name pay attention to

the cook who’s manning the grill, it’s a culinary operatic ballet:

Adam and Eve on a raft, 86 the Axle grease, BLT hold

the mayo, Blue plate special, Bowl of red, Tube steak deluxe,

synchrony in motion. There’s close to one million short order cooks

employed in the United States according to one recent estimate.

Most don’t have time to play games.

Afterword: “Trump visited a Bucks County McDonald’s to cook some french fries and work the drive-thru” the news headline says it all. In a post-truth world, deepfake, simulated, virtual has become an accepted stand in for real. If only Orwell was yet among us, he’d have a field day!

News source: Donald Trump works at McDonald’s in Feasterville, Bucks County https://www.inquirer.com/politics/election/donald-trump-mcdonalds-bucks-pennsylvania-20241020.html

Additional news coverage: McDonald’s issues statement after Trump campaign stop at Pa. location

Howard Richard Debs is a recipient of the 2015 Anna Davidson Rosenberg Poetry Awards. His essays, fiction and poetry appear internationally; his art and photography will be found in select publications, including Rattle online as “Ekphrastic Challenge” artist and guest editor. His book Gallery: A Collection of Pictures and Words is a 2017 Best Book Awards and 2018 Book Excellence Awards recipient. His chapbook Political is the 2021 American Writing Awards winner in poetry. He is co-editor of New Voices: Contemporary Writers Confronting the Holocaust a winner of the 2023 International Book Awards. He is listed in the Poets & Writers Directory: https://www.pw.org/content/howard_debs

Poetry from J.D. Nelson

Four One-line Haiku

pinpoints of light in the foothills I’m down here with a lantern

car alarm car alarm car alarm last night of summer

most of the Big Dipper first night of autumn

in the hills above the city approximations

bio/graf

J. D. Nelson is the author of eleven print chapbooks and e-books of poetry, including *purgatorio* (wlovolw, 2024). His first full-length collection is *in ghostly onehead* (Post-Asemic Press, 2022). Visit his website, MadVerse.com, for more information and links to his published work. Nelson lives in Boulder, Colorado, USA.

Collaborative Poetry from Sarang Bhand, Christina Chin, and Marjorie Pezzoli

Submission: Synchronized Chaos: Rengay 
           By Marjorie Pezzoli,  Christina Chin  & Sarang Bhand
_______________________________________________________


1
Sanctuary 

curtains drawn
fireplace crackles          
chrysanthemums drop petals     Marjorie Pezzoli 
 

then a heron forewarns 
the birds of hurricane             	  Christina Chin  

                       
uprooted children 
from faraway land
sleeping under sky                     Sarang Bhand 


mist settles in
soft gray clouds 
blue skies soon                          Marjorie Pezzoli 


looking up to sky in hope
bowing down to earth in faith       Sarang Bhand 


in the air
aroma of coffee and chai
grandma's tea table                     Christina Chin


2
Mountain Top

adjusting  
to long night
new time zone                          Christina Chin
 

the earth spins 
eucalyptus bark peels             Marjorie Pezzoli 


changing sky
at every mile 
long road trip                           Sarang Bhand 


unsolicited—
passenger giving 
directions                                Christina Chin


a scenic detour 
much needed break                Sarang Bhand 


sky show 
brilliant production 
no tickets needed                   Marjorie Pezzoli 






3
Windswept     

rising sun
that you sent 
to my side                               Sarang Bhand 


mist rises
evergreen branches               Marjorie Pezzoli 


roadblock ahead 
fastening a neck collar 
pretending to sleep                Christina Chin


stuck in traffic
together we catch
figments of time                      Sarang Bhand 


a house on an island 
king tide                                  Christina Chin


steadfast evergreen 
branches waltz with wind
she dreams about clouds       Marjorie Pezzoli