First of all, published poet and contributor Tao Yucheng is still hosting a poetry contest, open to all readers of Synchronized Chaos Magazine.

Synchronized Chaos Poetry Contest: We seek short, powerful, imaginative, and strange poetry. While we welcome all forms of free verse and subject matter, we prefer concise work that makes an impact.

Guidelines: Submit up to five poems per person to taoyucheng921129@proton.me. Each poem should not exceed one page (ideally half a page or less). All styles and themes welcome. Deadline for submissions will be in early March.

Prizes: First Place: $50 Second Place: $10, payable via online transfer. One Honorable Mention. Selected finalists will be published in Synchronized Chaos Magazine.

Also, past contributor Alexander Kabishev is seeking international poems of four lines each on the theme of friendship for a global anthology. The anthology, Hyperpoem, will be published by Ukiyoto Press and a presentation of the poem will take place in Dubai in August 2026.

Kabishev says the new vision of the project goes beyond commercial frameworks, aiming to become an international cultural and humanitarian movement, with the ambitious goal of reaching one million participants and a symbolic planned duration of one thousand years.

The focus is on promoting international friendship, respect for the identity of all peoples on Earth, and building bridges of understanding between cultures through poetry and its readers.

Please send poems to Alexander at aleksandar.kabishev@yandex.ru

This month’s issue asks the question, “Who Will We Become?” Submissions address introspection, spiritual searching, and moral and relational development and decision-making.

This issue was co-edited by Yucheng Tao.

Sajid Hussain’s metaphysical, ethereal poetry, rich with classical allusions, reminds us of the steady passage of time.

Jamal Garougar’s New Year reflection emphasizes ritual, spirituality, and the practices of patience and peace. Taylor Dibbert expresses his brief but cogent hope for 2026.

Dr. Jernail S. Anand’s spare poetry illustrates the dissolution of human identity. Bill Tope’s short story reflects on memory and grief through the protagonist’s recollection of his late school classmate. Turkan Ergor considers the depth of emotions that can lie within a person’s interior. Sayani Mukherjee’s poem on dreams lives in the space between waking thought and imaginative vision. Stephen Jarrell Williams offers up a series of childhood and adult dreamlike and poetic memories. Alan Catlin’s poem sequence renders dreams into procedural logic: how fear, guilt, memory, and culture behave when narrative supervision collapses. Priyanka Neogi explores silence itself as a creator and witness in her poetry. Duane Vorhees’ rigorous poetic work interrogates structure: individuality, myth, divinity, agency, culture. Tim Bryant analyzes the creative process and development of craft in Virginia Aronson’s poetic book of writerly biographies, Collateral Damage.

Nurbek Norchayev’s spiritual poetry, translated from English to Uzbek by Nodira Ibrahimova, expresses humility and gratitude to God. Timothee Bordenave’s intimate devotional poetry shares his connection to home and to his work and his feelings of gratitude.

Through corrosive imagery and fractured music, Sungrue Han’s poem rejects sacred authority and reclaims the body as a site of sound, resistance, and memory. Shawn Schooley’s poem operates through liturgical residue: what remains after belief has been rehearsed, delayed, or partially evacuated. Slobodan Durovic’s poem is a high-lyric, baroque lament, drawing from South Slavic oral-poetic density, Biblical rhetoric, and mythic self-abasement.

Melita Mely Ratkovic evokes a mystical union between people, the earth, and the cosmos. Jacques Fleury’s work is rich in sensory detail and conveys a profound yearning for freedom and renewal. The author’s use of imagery—“fall leaf,” “morning dew,” “unfurl my wings”—evokes a vivid sense of life’s beauty and the desire to fully experience it. James Tian speaks to care without possession, love through distance and observation. Mesfakus Salahin’s poem evokes a one-sided love that is somewhat tragic, yet as eternal as the formation of the universe, as Mahbub Alam describes a love struggling to exist in a complicated and wounded world. Kristy Ann Raines sings of a long-term, steady, and gallant love.

Lan Xin evokes and links a personal love with collective care for all of humanity. Ri Hossain expresses his hope for a gentler world by imagining changed fairy tales. Critic Kujtim Hajdari points out the gentle, humane sensibility of Eva Petropoulou Lianou’s poetry. Brian Barbeito’s lyric, understated travel essay passes through a variety of places and memories. Anna Keiko’s short poem shares her wish for a simple life close to nature. Christina Chin revels in nature through sensual, textured haikus.

Doniyorov Shakhzod describes the need for healthy and humane raising of livestock animals. g emil reutter hits us on the nose with cold weather and frigid social attitudes towards the suffering of the poor and working classes. Patricia Doyne lampoons authoritarian tendencies in the American government. Eva Petropoulou Lianou reminds us that we cannot truly enjoy freedom without a moral, peaceful, and just society. Sarvinoz Giyosova brings these types of choices down to a personal level through an allegory about different parts of one person’s psychology.

Dr. Jernail S. Anand critiques societal mores that have shifted to permit hypocrisy and the pursuit of appearances and wealth at all costs. Inomova Kamola Rasuljon qizi highlights the social and medical effects and implications of influenza and its prevention. Sandip Saha’s work provides a mixture of direct critique of policies that exploit people and the environment and more personal narratives of life experiences and kindness. Gustavo Gac-Artigas pays tribute to Renee Nicole Good, recently murdered by law enforcement officers in the USA.

Dr. Ahmed Al-Qaysi expresses his deep and poetic love for a small child. Abduqahhorova Gulhayo shares her tender love for her dedicated and caring father. Qurolboyeva Shoxista Olimboy qizi highlights the connection between strong families and a strong public and national Uzbek culture. Ismoilova Jasmina Shavkatjon qizi’s essay offers a clear, balanced meditation on women in Uzbekistan and elsewhere as both moral architects and active agents of social progress, grounding its argument in universal human values rather than abstraction.

Dilafruz Muhammadjonova and Hilola Khudoyberdiyeva outline the contributions of Bekhbudiy and other Uzbek Jadids, historical leaders who advocated for greater democracy and education. Soibjonova Mohinsa melds the poetic and the academic voices with her essay about the role of love of homeland in Uzbek cultural consciousness. Dildora Xojyazova outlines and showcases historical and tourist sites in Uzbekistan. Zinnura Yuldoshaliyeva explicates the value of studying and understanding history. Rakhmanaliyeva Marjona Bakhodirjon qizi’s essay suggests interactive and playful approaches to primary school education. Uzbek student Ostanaqulov Xojiakba outlines his academic and professional accomplishments.

Aziza Joʻrayeva’s essay discusses the strengths and recent improvements in Uzbekistan’s educational system. Saminjon Khakimov reminds us of the importance of curiosity and continued learning. Uzoqova Gulzoda discusses the importance of literature and continuing education to aspiring professionals. Toychiyeva Madinaxon Sherquzi qizi highlights the value of independent, student-directed educational methods in motivating people to learn. Erkinova Shahrizoda Lazizovna discusses the diverse and complex impacts of social media on young adults.

Alex S. Johnson highlights the creative energy and independence of musician Tairrie B. Murphy. Greg Wallace’s surrealist poetry assembles itself as a bricolage of crafts and objects. Noah Berlatsky’s piece operates almost entirely through phonetic abrasion and semantic sabotage, resisting formal logic and evoking weedy growth. Fiza Amir’s short story highlights the level of history and love a creative artist can have for their materials. Mark Blickley sends up the trailer to his drama Paleo: The Fat-Free Musical. Mark Young’s work is a triptych of linguistic play, consumer absurdity, and newsfeed dread, unified by an intelligence that distrusts nostalgia, coherence, and scale. J.J. Campbell’s poetry’s power comes from the refusal to dress things up, from humor as insulation against pain. On the other end of the emotional spectrum, Taghrid Bou Merhi’s essay offers a lucid, philosophically grounded meditation on laughter as both a humane force and a disruptive instrument, tracing its power to critique, heal, and reform across cultures and histories. Mutaliyeva Umriniso’s story highlights how both anguish and laughter can exist within the same person.

Paul Tristram traces various moods of a creative artist, from elation to irritation, reminding us to follow our own paths. Esonova Malika Zohid qizi’s piece compares e-sports with physical athletics in unadorned writing where convictions emerge with steady confidence. Dr. Perwaiz Shaharyar’s poetry presents simple, defiant lyrics that affirm poetry as an indestructible form of being, embracing joy, exclusion, and madness without apology.

Ozodbek Yarashov urges readers to take action to change and improve their lives. Aziza Xazamova writes to encourage those facing transitions in life. Fazilat Khudoyberdiyeva’s poem asserts that even an ordinary girl can write thoughtful and worthy words.

Botirxonov Faxriyor highlights the value of hard work, even above talent. Taro Hokkyo portrays a woman finding her career and purpose in life.

We hope that this issue assists you, dear readers, in your quest for meaning and purpose.

Dream


The avalanche of broken dreams
The choir of new sought promise
Surmise me as I go on seeking the world
The telepathy of numerous things
All at once come undone under my periphery
The vision of hydrangeas and little faiths
What if all a dreamscape of muted epiphanies? 
Truly dream then again and again under the canopy
For faith of all things come around
The sun basks in a miraculous height
The trampoline circus of humanity at a standstill
Still flickering and sowing the seeds of freedom. 

Deb Hatcher

The last day that I saw Debbie Hatcher, she was just 15 years old. Slender and pretty and dressed in a skirt that hugged her hips, she was cute as a button. She had shoulder length light brown hair and a gold herringbone locket she’d received for her fifteenth birthday. She wore it literally everywhere; she was so proud of being in love with a boy who would bestow such a precious gift on her.

We were standing in the school library, in the Ds, somewhere between Durant and Dante, searching for a likely subject for a book report, when, madly impulsive, I approached her as if in a dream and kissed her lips. She was startled at first, but when the shock had disappeared, she let her guard down and kissed me back. I had known Deb since grade school, but only fantasized about her as a sort of forbidden treasure, lovely to admire from a distance, but strictly unapproachable.

Here I was, Tim Meese, not yet 16, and kissing a girl for the first time. And what a girl! I silently congratulated myself for starting at the very top of the social pyramid. She leaned into me and I into her, until we were both quite lost. At length, old, old Mrs. Kroger — she must have been at least 50 — the school librarian, sneaked down the aisle and coughed peremptorily. We instantly separated, embarrassed to have been found out. Although this was my initial foray into kissing, it was clearly not the frist time that Deb had been kissed. She was far too expert at it to be a novice.

We glanced at Mrs. Kroger, to assess the level of trouble we were in, but she smiled her secret smile and withdrew. I felt supercharged, and Deb seemed similarly affected. She leaned close and whispered to meet her after school at her house; I hastily agreed. And what of the necklace-giving boyfriend? It turned out that his family had moved to the coast two weeks before and so at least he was no longer in contention for Deb’s affections. But I didn’t know this yet.

After lunch, I spied Deb in the corridor between classes, walking with her friends. I smiled at her, but she looked right through me. I blinked. Weren’t we inexorably linked forever, having tasted one another’s lips and even shared a breath? Had I only imagined our reconnoitering in the library? I shook my head and proceeded on to class.

After school let out, I anxiously plodded the three blocks to Maple Street, where Deb’s house stood. When I arrived, I knocked at the door and Mrs. Hatcher, a stay-at-home mom, which nearly all moms were back in the day, invited me in to wait for her daughter. We engaged in small talk and she plied me with pretzels, chips and Pepsis. Gazing about the living room, I spotted a photo of Deb and Jason, the boy who’d given her the locket. I didn’t know him well and stared at him disconsolately, enviously.

Mrs. Hatcher went on to tell me that Jason’s father had taken a job with an aircraft manufacturer in Los Angeles, and so that was the last they would see of Jason. She didn’t seem at all unhappy at the prospect, condemning him as “too progressive,” whatever that meant. Mrs. Hatcher remembered me from second grade, when her daughter and I had been matched up to perform the minuet in some stale elementary school production of a 200-year-old play. She inquired politely how my dancing was commencing. I told her that I was more into The Twist and The Mashed Potato these days, and she sniffed.

After quite a long time, the telephone jangled off the hook and Mrs. Hatcher snatched it up. She listened for some time, drew a sharp breath and said, “I’ll be there.” She looked stricken, and then stared off into space for an interminable moment, and finally turned to me and said, in a choked voice, “You’d better go home, Tim,” and she disappeared into another room. I quietly let myself out.

The telephone call and Mrs. Hatcher’s behavior were a mystery to me, and I didn’t know what to think. It wasn’t until the next day at school, when word leaked out. Deb Hatcher was dead. She had copped a ride on an upperclassman’s motorcycle and there had been an accident. Deb, unlike the driver, didn’t have a helmet and had suffered terminal injuries when she fell from the bike and struck her head on the pavement. The driver suffered only minor injuries.

It gave me a weird, eerie, ghostly feeling to know that I was the last boy to ever kiss Deb Hatcher. She’d had her whole life before her: additional boyfriends, a husband, children of her own, a career, perhaps. She was smart; no telling how far she might have gone. And, just maybe, she would have gone there with me. They offered a sort of rudimentary grief counseling at the school and they dedicated the yearbook to Deb and one other boy, who’d died from leukemia. I didn’t see the grief counselor and I didn’t buy the yearbook. I didn’t need the glossy photo to remember Deb. I attended the funeral. They had a closed casket.

I have got two brothers,

One is dark, one is light.

They are two different worlds,

And I must live with both of them.

I have got two brothers,

One is angry, one is happy.

One urges me to help and share,

The other tells me not to give.

I have got two brothers,

One is satisfied, one is greedy.

The selfish one wants me to murder,

The selfless one wants me to nurture.

When living in such a dilemma, I always have to be awake.

If I tread the dark path, I might lose my way to heaven.

And I spend every day,

Every month, and every year,

Just choosing and following-

Either sunny or rainy.

There is only one of me,

And I must choose between them.

Two brothers, and still

I’m torn between hating and loving.

Don’t think it’s easy

To live on Earth and be wise.

People have two brothers-

Always either dark or light.

… 

Sarvinoz Giyosova, freshman in “Languages Faculty”. 

THE COURAGE TO LOVE

Eva suffered many misfortunes in her childhood. She endured even more discrimination and humiliation. She channeled that hatred into fuel, throwing herself into her studies.

Eva consistently ranked first in her class, earned scholarships through graduate school, and landed a job at a top-tier company. But that’s where she stumbled. She couldn’t keep up with the workplace relationships. After much turmoil, she quit the company.

Eva had become distrustful of people. She enrolled in nursing school and became a nurse. She ended up working on a cancer ward.

But physical labor didn’t suit Eva, and she couldn’t bear the bullying from her colleagues at work. She fought desperately against the urge to cling to someone. She was also exhausted by the constant stream of patients being wheeled in, only to die.

One day, Eva heard the words of a dying patient. Before passing, they invariably confessed their sins and expressed gratitude to many people. There were no exceptions. Knowing this, she found the courage to love.

Eva learned the strength of the power to love and the weakness of the power to hate. Eva realized that most people in the world did not know this. She came to know that humans are born only to die. Eva succeeded in living, loving others without hating them. And Eva is everywhere, living with a smile on her face at all times.

1998 Rekitei Shinei Award winner in Japan. 2021 Arab Golden Planet Award winner in 2022, Awarded the title of Doctor of Letters from the Arabic-speaking world in 2023 My poems are published in Orfew.al magazine in Albania. Also translated into Italian in 2024 My poem is published in the Daily Global Nation in Bangladesh. My poems published in Samantaral Bhabna, India. Interview with an Algerian newspaper is published. My poem is published in Greek Police Magazine. Received a certificate of honor from English poets. Published in a Korean magazine. Published in Koltaka jishu International Poetry Magazine, India. My poem is published in a Greek e-magazine. My poem is published in the Barcelona Literary Magazine. My poem is published in Poetry Planetariat, a Nepalese poetry magazine. My poetry collection is published in Bengali-speaking countries. Three of my poems were published in India’s Half-yearly magazine. Three of my poems were published in the Raft of Dreams Literary Magazine. My poem is published in Hyperpoem Anthology, founded by Alexander Kabishev from Russia.

Tears Behind the Makeup

Do you think clowns also have problems and pain of their own? Do they cry at night like we do? Just like a coin has two sides, I believe people think differently about this. Some say, “Of course, they do — after all, they are human too,” while others might say, “Why would they? They make us smile, so they probably don’t have any pain or problems.”

From my point of view, I believe that clowns may have even more pain than we do, yet they are braver than us. Why, you ask? The reason is simple. We only carry our own pain and problems (sometimes those of our close ones or relatives). But what about them? We all know that psychologists and doctors feel their patients’ pain and live with it as if it were their own.

Clowns also have patients — they are just called differently: “the audience.” Clowns heal even more people than doctors and psychologists; or rather, they prevent people from getting sick. Whether we want it or not, when we see them, a smile appears on our faces. And every smile is a step toward a healthier life.

Let me tell you a story.

One day, a patient came to see a doctor. The doctor asked him,

“Please tell me, what is bothering you? What are your complaints?”

The patient replied,

“Doctor, I feel unwell. I can’t enjoy life anymore. I suffer because I can’t forget my pain. I’ve lost my appetite — I can’t even swallow a piece of bread. Images of hungry, half-naked people don’t leave my mind. I can’t sleep until morning; I shiver with cold as if I’m living through their suffering. When I hear news about crimes, I feel as if I’m guilty too. Laughing? I’ve completely forgotten how to laugh. I don’t smile anymore, doctor. I can’t laugh. If you don’t help me, I’m afraid my condition will get worse.”

The doctor examined the patient carefully, placed a hand on his shoulder, led him to the window, pulled the curtain aside, and pointed toward the street. There was a circus poster with a clown’s picture on it.

“My dear,” the doctor said, “do you see that clown? Every evening he puts on a wonderful performance. I advise you to go and watch it. You’ll forget all your suffering, laugh freely, and leave your pain behind. Your heart will feel light, and there will be nothing left of your illness.”

The patient lowered his head, sighed deeply, and said quietly:

“Doctor… that clown is me.”

Mutaliyeva Umriniso Rahimjon’s daughter was born on 14.01.2011 and currently lives in the Tashkent region of Uzbekistan. Umriniso is a proud model of behavior, intelligence and knowledge at school. She is interested in mathematics, Russian, and English and is studying them. She has also participated in science Olympiads and won honorable places. Umriniso is also engaged in creativity. Her creative works have been published in prestigious American magazines and she has been volunteering for several organizations. In her free time, Umriniso also plays tennis, checkers, reads books, and draws. She has many goals and she is taking steps towards them.

Freedom

A word 

Who has all the meaning of…

This is happiness 

This is harmony 

This is respect 

But what we do

Humans are killing humans 

Humans are manipulating humans

Freedom ,

A game between two birds without wings

Freedom,

A hope inside two hungry stomachs …

Freedom,

Elefteria

A sun waiting to rise…..

In our days 

In our century 

We are in need of a second educational system 

Re write new words 

Or learn the meaning of the old one 

EVA Petropoulou Lianou, International poet, Founder, Poetry Unites People