Shattered Relationship

We have no pictures together other than one. In it I am seven or eight on a family trip to a theme park. I wear a blue shirt and short jean shorts and my hair is pinned back into a bun. My mom wears an orange sleeveless shirt with her hair pinned back as well. She is thin with jet black hair that grazes the middle of her back. We are on a ride where a boat swings back and forth. I got on the ride with my mom and sister. I thought I was old enough to handle it, little did I know. As the boat rose higher and higher when it swung in the air, I yell to get off. My sister laughs at me as the conductor slows the machine down from his control station. I can’t remember the last family vacation that was actually fun like the one from the picture. Now we fight every trip we try to take together, so we have quit taking them.

That trip was the last moment I remember being happy with my mother and the only picture of us two together alone. The bickering between us began my freshman year of high school. I was fifteen, and like most teenage girls, I fought with my mother about everything, especially when my father was out of town which was often. She always nagged me about irrelevant things like cleaning my room, the bathroom or doing the dishes or laundry. My friend Courtney lived down the street, so I would always walk to her house to spend the night to get away from my mother. I was always questioned when I wanted to go to Courtney’s, partly because Courtney was a year older, but also because my mother thought we were going to meet up with boys. Courtney’s mom was a lot more lenient and would let us go the mall and movies alone. We usually met up with boys or had them pick us up from Discover Mills Mall to go to a house party, so my mother was right.

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Krista Tate currently lives in Atlanta, GA, and is an undergraduate student at Georgia Southern University. Your comments and feedback are welcomed. Email kt00673@georgiasouthern.edu.

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[Reviewed by David A. L. Brown]

Make Nowhere to be Home a Home on your Bookshelf

As a westerner, it is easy to condemn any government’s use of violence, fear, and exploitation against its people, yet difficult to make a lasting—or even visible—change to the status quo.  One group, however, is making their mark on the world by creating a stage for victims to speak for themselves.  Toward this endeavor, Voice of Witness, a relatively new advocacy group dedicated to alerting the international community to social and political injustice, recently released Nowhere to be Home, a chilling collection of accounts from Burmese refugees and exiles.

For those who have lived under the shadow of the Burmese government, there is no peace.  Authors Maggie Lemere and Zoë West highlight the daily tragedy of Burmese oppression through a series of interviews with once-ordinary citizens, of whom all have either fled or been forced from their native land.  It is readily apparent to readers that the authors consider no voice too small to be heard.  Nowhere to be Home is the collective experience of mothers and sons, prisoners and soldiers, monks and sex workers who were forced to remain silent about their own victimization in Burma, brought to light for the first time.

From the outset, it is apparent that many of the voices retelling their experiences are undereducated, if at all.  Stories are broken, fragmented accounts reflecting the fragile psyche of each individual victim.  This works for the authors, constantly reminding the reader that these are not professionals reciting well-worn acts.  Despite the apparent simplicity of each narrative, the stories flow easily, and are well-directed.  Once a particular survivor draws you in, you feel compelled to explore every word of their story before putting the book down.  Thankfully, chapters are short, concise, and striking, each leaving a new impression on the reader, and granting new insights into the lives of millions still living in poverty and fear.

David A. L. Brown is a staff writer and reviewer for Synchronized Chaos Magazine. Brown may be reached at brown.davidal@gmail.com.

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JANUARY WAS THE WOUND

JANUARY WAS THE WOUND

& the sun no more than a memory
A glaze behind the eyes
A shimmering afterglow
Of days long since birthed
Of days long since ended
The clouds gathering a smothering darkness
Weaving veils of mourning tight stitched across a sky slung low & mean
Swollen with bad intentions
All the usual signatures that deaden the day
Baffling the mind against external sensation
Demanding of the imagination that it turn with ever greater urgency inwards
To wander the hallucinatory weave of worlds within
Where the rain falls its percussion of cutlery
Detonating on the scrubbed surface of a plain deal table
Where the dying man sits in the slumped light carving keepsakes & sorrows
The window is the sky that is the clouds that are the ships that carry their cargo of distance & dreams
& the rabbit vanishes down the hole to discover the orchestra aflame
Birds nesting within fragile skulls
Panthers a sinuous presence within the sighing shadows
Here to think actively against thought
To commune with the Automatic Ghost & its attendant revelations of self & other
The faceless stranger who walks always beside in a glimmer of whispers
To create a sun & a sky & a love more real for their quality of dreaming
Now is the hour when we must unpack the baggage of ashen shadows weighted beneath sleep-hungry eyes
Now is the hour when we must spill our secrets from the scarlet sack
Now the hour of the whispered dream
Now the hour of the murmur
Its inexhaustible nature
Of mountains & oceans
Of silent phones in abandoned rooms
Of inverted umbrellas gathering scorched feathers
Of the empty page & words unwritten
Paint a crimson wound across the hungering heart & discover again that realm of wilderness & fever
Tender
Aching
The west wind whispering of a sublime desolation
The beautiful ruin of songs yet to be sung
So unstitch the silence & sing…

Simon J. Charlton is an ongoing contributor to Synchronized Chaos Magazine. He may be reached for questions or comments at simonjohncharlton@gmail.com.

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[Article by Robbie Fraser]

At Synchronized Chaos, we like to focus on up and coming artists as often as we feature those who have an established place in their field.  For this issue we’ve decided to turn that focus to Brent Vickers, a recent college graduate from Texas State University majoring in English, and an aspiring writer. While Vickers has a style that is uniquely his own, his story is one that many Synchronized Chaos readers are likely to find relatable.  While clearly displaying his ability through the written word, Vickers is still searching for a firm place in his cultural field – the proverbial “big break” of every hopeful artist. He is a young and talented writer that is nonetheless confronting an uncertain future.

Here, we have featured a few poems that Vickers selected as a small sampling of his work, as well as a brief Q&A exploring his development as a writer, and more importantly, what the future may hold for him.  With some of his poetry and fiction already published, and the promise of more to come, Vickers has managed to venture further down the road to success than the vast majority of those who have made similar journeys.  With a screenplay currently in development, and an independent production company already looking to purchase the rights, it may be only a matter of time before Vickers finds his destination within view.

Synchronized Chaos: How long have you been writing poetry?
Brent Vickers: Since I was around fourteen or so.

SC: What poems or poets first inspired you?
BV: John Keats and Edna St. Vincent Millay.

SC: What is your favorite poem?  Favorite line?

BV: He wishes for the Clothes of Heaven by W.B. Yeats; don’t really have a favorite line. If i had to choose I’d probably say “though lover’s be lost, love shall not/and death shall have no dominion” by Dylan Thomas or “we are the music makers and we are the dreamers of dreams” by Arthur O’Shaughnessy.

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Robbie Fraser is an associate editor for Synchronized Chaos Magazine. Fraser may be reached at robbiedfraser@gmail.com.

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[Reviewed by Floyd A. Logan]

Prasad’s Book Has Kissed My Thoughts

“Preciously held, and publicly owned” are the words that come to mind as I leaf through this colorful book. This photojournal of murals and art of the Mission District is not long at less than 60 pages, but is rich in impact, impression and narrative. This is the sort of book that can be opened at any page in any order and there is something worth seeing or thinking about. In short, it’s light, but it’s “heavy”.

Prasad speaks to you in first person. Even though the articles are assembled without dates, there is a natural flow to her book. It is natural to look up at a mural on the side of a building, then look down at the pavement, where messages await your reaction (sometimes, your revulsion). You may then be tempted to go further down the street, into an air conditioned sunny cafe for a short break, and, perhaps an aromatic cup of Persian tea. As you sip your tea, you look around at the walls and forget where you are for just a few minutes. Prasad speaks to you in a comfortable way, sounding as one who is by nature a creative person, accomplished in some respects, but still willing to slow down and take a closer look. This narrative of sharing, provides a cheerful, vicarious partnership, as we are on a tour, led by Prasad, who knows that there is always more to be observed or proclaimed about our living in this moment.

Floyd A. Logan may be reached at floydalogan@gmail.com.

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[Reviewed by Bruce Roberts]

Count Lyev Nicolayevich Tolstoy has long been acclaimed as one of the world’s greatest novelists, author of War and Peace, Anna Karenina, and The Death of Ivan Ilyich, among others, in a lifetime of writing.

In 1886, he also published a short story, “How Much Land Does a Man Need.” Now newly translated by Boris Dralyuk, a Ph.D. candidate in Slavic languages at U.C.L.A., this simple story speaks volumes about the world throughout history in general, and about modern America in particular.

“How Much Land Does a Man Need” is a folktale. The characters are Russian peasants, people who actually work and derive sustenance from the land. In this story though, their simple life is complicated by a character with other motives, the Devil.

Born into Russian nobility, Tolstoy became less and less satisfied with his wealth and talent and good fortune as he grew older.  He even wanted to renounce the royalties from his famous novels, feeling strongly that no man should have so much while others starved.

This renunciation of wealth is ironically the unwritten message of this folktale. The title question is a universal metaphor for greed. Pakhom, a peasant farmer, is relatively successful and content with his life—except for this question.

Bruce Roberts is a poet and ongoing contributor to Synchronized Chaos Magazine. Roberts may be reached by at brobe60491@sbcglobal.net.

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oil on canvas

This featured work, Ancestors, is by Canadian painter Larry Azoth. You can see more of Azoth’s art at artreview.com.