Mashhura Ahmadjonova was born on October 25, 1999 in Uychi district of Namangan region. The winner of the 2nd place in the regional stage of the “Most Active Reader” Republican competition. Member of the Indian organization “All India Council for Technical Skill Development”, the Argentinean organization “Juntos pol las letras”
A poetry book that you can’t put down is hard to find, but Fever qualifies. This collection shows how it felt to grow up as a boy in the mid-20th century, and then to live in the drastically revised world of the 21st century and encounter all the new definitions and expectations.
The title poem pulls the reader in with its couplet form that provides long expository loops and close-up scenes. The book is like a river, running on and on and over rocks and around obstacles. The inner and outer landscapes are fresh and appealing. The reader is carried along, and now and then there is a bright stone, or perhaps a glimpse of something frightening under the flow, and always there are startling insights.
Chuck Taylor is a veteran poet, prose writer, and photographer who taught Creative Writing at Texas A&M University for many years and has published dozens of books. This is an especially attractive volume, with Munch’s nude couple embracing on the cover and brush drawings throughout by the poet himself.
More than half the book is the first section called “Fever”, which describes the growing up of Vance, who has a somewhat rocky upbringing in the mid-20th century with a neglectful but demanding mother and a quixotic father. From there, Vance enters the adult world and has adventures which will form him and push him somewhat off the grid forever. Sexual discovery and identity evoke smiles and winces. Young Vance reads Augustine of Hippo, who found sex “the original sin”:
…sex is the fall
from grace, from the garden where once the lion
and the lamb lay down together, into the
toil of soil, the thorn of roses and
the blood and pain of baby birthing; sex
passed from Eve and Adam, worm slithering
dumb into our operating systems
at around twelve or so, starts maddening
dreams, hijacks souls and bodies, and makes us
do what God in nature wants—populate
the Earth to choking; forget ideal dreams…
…Yearn instead for naked
skin, for bare ass; the virus has grabbed our souls…(20)
“Fever” is written in a kind of flexible blank verse, ideas strung together, thoughts leaping over the rhythms.
Other sections include “Taking Off,” “Takeoffs,” and “Lizard King.” “Taking off” narrates stories of the young man completely escaped from this constrictive home, and what he learns through his first individual experiences. The last section is “Lizard King,” which is dedicated to John Morrison, and it is an unusual poem that has only one word per line. The poet pleads with us to slow down in the reading, but this is hard to do.
“Taking Off” gives glimpses of many kinds of prisons, including age. The “Lady of the Pink Slippers” wants Jack, visiting his resident mother, to open the glass door of her care home and release her. But he can’t—the door is so constructed as to prevent its opening. He muses on prisons in his own life, then ponders the
lady of pink slippers who we
muse, we dream, must surely
be given, most definitely, the
right lucky chance, given
a great maverick moment—
though tired, though busted,
though beatific, though beat—
to wing with us on through
doors across fields into the
long various grasses of freedom. (99)
These poems attempt to define the relationship between men and women, physically, socially, and emotionally. The main characters growing up this during the period of rapid change in values in the understanding of sexual and gender roles, gives a unique perspective on these changes . I often wondered how the young men I knew fifty years ago managed to accommodate the difference in expectations. Reading the poems, I can feel what a young man felt, and know what he learned as he aged.
The concluding section, “Lizard King,” the poem of one word per line, is not amenable to quotation. But the third section, “Takeoffs,” is most entertaining. “Takeoffs” gives meditations, ideas, and images based on other literature, sometimes in the form of imitation. They may be serious or laugh-out-loud funny. He kindly gives us the William Ernest Henry “Invictus” so that we can fully understand Taylor’s version “Inlustus,” which follows it. “Inlustus” concludes:
Beyond this place of peace and grace
looms a filling Mexican dinner plate,
and the candlelit pleasure of your face
in the afterglow of our randy state.
It matters not how cold the side dish soup,
how greasy hot the plop of refried beans,
you are the dizzy center of my loop,
I am the gleeful nibbler of your greens. (141)
Fever demonstrates the need for freedom and the various traps and prisons we find instead: sexuality, other confining elements of the male role, societal demands often based on sexual expectations. And it shows us a side of male experience not so often explored. This is a collection to glide though and then return to.
On June 23 2005 a fellow hiker got a request from The Balance Disorders Lab of Oregon Health & Science University (OHSU) to find males from ages 52-73 to join a balance study with the goal of better treatment of Parkinson’s disease. At that time I was a male of age 62, and it sounded interesting to me. I had not had much knowledge of Parkinson’s, but another fellow hiker had died of it. Another fellow hiker joined the study as well.
How bad is Parkinson’s? In American 60,000 are diagnosed a year. Men are 150% as likely as women to get it. More people have it than MS, MD or ALS combined. The annual cost is $52 billion in the U.S.
The response to my request to volunteer:
The purpose of this research is to determine how deep brain stimulation (DBS) and levodopa influence abnormal patterns of walking and balance movements in patients with Parkinson¹s disease. You are invited as an age-matched control.
You will be asked to undergo clinical tests of your balance and walking (e.g., standing with your eyes closed, standing on one foot, walking, turning, etc.). You will also be asked to stand on a movable platform. On some trials you will be asked to simply stand quietly or asked to take a step. On some trials, the platform will move and you will be asked to try to keep your balance without stepping. During all these trials, your body movements will be recorded by small movement sensors that will be attached to your body. Small self-adhesive electrodes will be placed on the skin over selected muscles of the leg, thigh, and trunk to record muscle activity as you move.
Some criteria that would make you not eligible for such a study would be past orthopedic surgery (hip, knee, back) or any sensation loss in your feet.
I found out later that Levodopa is synthesized into dopamine in the body and is a common drug for Parkinson’s because loss of dopamine neurotransmitter is the cause of Parkinson’s disease.
I passed all of the criteria and set up my first appointment for August 22.
The initial study was at the main OHSU facility at “Pill Hill” because of its location on a hill and its medical facility. The proper name is Marquam Hill after some early Oregonian. I have been told that a railroad bought the area before finding that it was a hill, and then donated it knowing that it was not a good place for a railroad line.
My invitation to a mouth motion study:
Wed 7/27/2005 3:23 PM
You
Dear Mr. Hawley, Thank you for interested (sic) in becoming our control… As you might have heard from xxxx about the DBS study for the Parkinson’s patient, we are a part of the study.. We focused on jaw & facial movement… I am working for Dr. xxxx.. This study has been going on for about 8 years or so… We are testing to see whether the Deep Brain Stimulators (DBS) implanted in the Parkinson’s patient is helping them or not. In doing so, we need control subjects that age & gender matched with our Parkinson’s patient to compare the results… The testing should be done within 1 to 1 1/2 hours.. A small piece of magnetic (sic) is placed on the lower jaw with the head frame around the head to dectect (sic) the jaw & facial movement with the electromagnetic field.. We are asking you to perform the basic jaw movements such as open & close your mouth, bite on cotton roll, chew gum, and bite on carrots…These tasks are easy for normal people, but can be very difficult for Parkinson’s patients… If you are interested in becoming a control subject, I would like to schedule you for August 3rd or August 10th (after August 22nd is okay, too)… I am looking forward to hear from you.. I can be reached at (xxx) xxx-xxxx..
The session was much as described. The interesting part was the apparatus attached to my face. I asked for and got a picture of me during the study. I looked like Hannibal “The Cannibal” Lecter when he was imprisoned.
There was another study on “Pill Hill” which tested reaction time with something like a simple computer game on a computer screen. Both hands were tested and unsurprisingly my non-dominant hand (left) was slower to react. Everything else was at the balance lab.
The balance studies were much as indicated:
They pulled the rug out from under me (actually moving a steel plate without warning). I had a harness on, but didn’t need it. I found that my reaction was to step forward with my dominant right leg and go into a semi-kneeling position. That was completely involuntary; there was no time to think. Digression – I had not thought previously about leg dominance. Most are right legged and right handed. You can test leg dominance by testing which leg you would naturally kick a ball with.
I failed miserably at walking in a straight line while blindfolded.
I was fairly good at walking in a circle and ending where I started while blindfolded.
While walking I counted backwards by threes from a number announced as I started. Example – Researcher 88 go. Me 85, 82, 79, … . This was to test multi-tasking which they said was more difficult for a Parkinson’s brain.
Another test of multi-tasking was starting walking and saying names of either males or females in alphabetic order. Example Abe, Bob, Carl, … .
Staring at a wall or a picture showed in one case that I could fall asleep standing up. Their electronics confirmed my impression. I later used that skill in the fiction “Court” about someone listening to a really boring speech.
Besides the electrodes, light reflectors were attached. They could be used for motion capture like films to aid motion analysis.
There was one quiz about physical abilities such as walking across the room. Every they asked was easy to do except opening a foil packet. After the quiz they told me that it was a test on the quiz taker’s honesty. Everyone has difficulty opening one of those foil packets. Digression – in the last years of my mother’s life, I was in charge of opening jars and other containers. Some were very difficult for me, a fairly healthy sixty something at the time. How are old and weak people supposed to deal?
I had to skip one session because of a very painful foot. Another time I kept quiet and suffered though the session. In 2014 after my part was concluded, I had serious foot and knee problems for months, which were helped by what I call bracelets around my knee. None of my foot or knee problems were caused by the study.
Age, height and weight were used to match me with me with a person with Parkinson’s. I believe that my experience with yoga and as a hiker and a park steward probably made me better than average with balance. Those activities require a lot of experience balancing and falling.
Occasionally there were interns who helped and learned. They were from different countries, but all were young and attractive. The Italian was complimentary about my muscle tone and conductivity. I would have been more pleased if it had been a she rather than a he, but still good.
A part of the study took place outside of the lab. For several months my wife and I kept a falls diary. It was for detailing all of my falls and near falls for the time that it was maintained. At first I was very careful not to fall, but I was told to behave normally. With my park stewardship and hiking, I was frequently on vine covered hillsides which could be wet and slippery. As a result, I fell a lot. I inferred that they were looking for falls around the house, so results surprised them. Every time that I reported my many falls, they would ask what drugs I was taking. My most extreme report was on a hot day when I was dehydrated. The terrain was treacherous and I had a very painful foot. I had three falls in half an hour. My reports would have more extreme if I had reported “near falls”.
There was a get together which included both controls and Parkinson’s people. I made the insensitive mistake of introducing myself to a victim of the disease as a “normal” rather than a control subject. The investigators summarized the results of the study. It showed that, despite many benefits of DBS for signs and symptoms of Parkinson’s disease, jaw movements and balance are not improved, and may worsen after surgery.
I missed out on a potential brain study because of scheduling and equipment problems. When I was available, the equipment wasn’t and when the equipment worked, I wasn’t available.
At the end of the study we were treated to review of the results.
After my participation in 2012, I ran into a few people who had Parkinson’s. One was in my high school class. He had stem cell treatment, but died about a year ago. The husband of someone in the same class had DBS. Because he was bald, the implant on his head was easily visible. Both a grade school crush of mine and a neighbor attended specialized Parkinson’s classes at our gym recently.
I’ve done several volunteer things – flower basket hanging, China Camp docent on the San Francisco Bay, wheelchair jockey / unpaid escort / pusher at a local hospital and the aforementioned park stewardship. The balance study was the most entertaining – I never knew what would happen when I showed up – and the best potential for helping mankind.
After all these years my remembrance is a bit fuzzy, but I have consulted all of my correspondence with OHSU and talked to my live in editor.
Since I wrote this OHSU has solicited me to have my head examined in another study. This study asks the question “Do social contacts, particularly conversations help the brain”. I’m probably qualified for this study because I don’t have many close contacts, avoid long conversations, hate phones, and never text. The study involves lots of phone or video conversations, so maybe I’d get a better brain,but I could not schedule all the calls so it didn’t work.
Dr. Jernail Singh Anand is an Indian poet and scholar credited with 170 plus books of English literature, philosophy, and spirituality. He won a great Serbian Award Charter of Morava and his name adorns the Poets’ Rock in Serbia. He was honoured with the Seneca Award LAUDIS CHARTA by the Academy of Arts & Philosophical Sciences, Bari, Italy 2024. He is the Founder and President of the International Academy of Ethics and was conferred a Doctor of Philosophy (Honoris Causa) by Univ of Engg & Mgt, (UEM), Jaipur.
pinpoints of light in the foothills I’m down here with a lantern
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car alarm car alarm car alarm last night of summer
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most of the Big Dipper first night of autumn
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in the hills above the city approximations
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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.
In the cold days of winter, in the heat of summer, even in the rain and hail, an old mother sat staring at the tree that had started to rot on the old bench in front of Uncle Toshpolat’s shop.
Day after day, I pass by this corridor and ask her how she is doing. I liked how the very old mother smiled with kind eyes.
Then I thought that if they sit in this position all day, if they don’t have children, when they are old, if they don’t stand in front of them, they would sit the same way in the cold and in the heat.
I always tried to talk to them, but I didn’t have time because I was busy with work. Days passed. One day, when I was hurrying, I saw them again, unfortunately, they were unconscious. I quickly took her to the hospital. After 2-3 days of treatment in the hospital, they started talking to me. They laughed when I asked why you didn’t talk all this time.
“My child, why did you save me? I have no right to live in this life. I don’t want to live,” they said.
“Don’t say that, Auntie. You will live a long time,” I said.
They said, “Would you come out of the hospital and take me to my place?” I shook my head.
The next day we went together, they sat down and started talking.
“Hey, my daughter, we mothers are giving up ourselves as children, but they don’t call us,” they cried. “Since I was young, I did less than anyone else, I fed without eating, I wore without wearing, it’s not thanks at all, but I didn’t think that my work would be so lowly appreciated,” they said.
“Look, my dear, this tree was beautiful and strong 5-6 years ago. Year after year, this tree was not paid attention to, even water was not poured under it. In time, it dried up and became firewood. Unfortunately, the same is true of mankind. It’s been a long time since my only son, who didn’t take me to heaven, kicked me out of the house until my death.” – he said, his eyes were sparkling with coral tears. “Auntie, go, I’ll take you with me,” I said. When Asta shook her head: “No, my child, I will sit here and wait for my death,” Yuring said.
I was afraid, emergency help came, but her aunt was dead.
The true meaning of the incident that taught me throughout my life, 15 years later, when I came to this village to rest with my grandchildren, the same mother and her son were sitting at the same table, wearing old clothes, leaning on the same rotten tree. Sorry….it’s too late now
The truth I realized is that if you carry your mother on your head, your child will also carry you on his head. Do you despise them? Your children will despise you in time. Don’t forget that this world will give you back. Appreciate everything in time.
Nurullayeva Mashhura was born on December 12, 2006 in Sariosia district of Surkhandarya region. In the same year, she graduated from the 11th grade of the 3rd general education school in Sariosia district. During his school days, she took pride of place in many science Olympiads and competitions. The owner of several international certificates, her stories and poems have been published in international newspapers and magazines. There are many goals in the future.
The fog came furtively in the night and slumped heavily upon the fields. At dawn I wondered, though this mantle is beautiful in its transformation of landscape, will it truly depart, relenting with the sun or will it remain this time, blinding us permanently to our vistas – so that we see only our own hands and nothing else before us? Its impenetrability deafens us, a pall muting the sounds of my small world, stifling dear familiar voices. I am inclined to whisper as there is uncertainty in what I might be missing. I surmise it is for this eventuality that pianists memorize an entire concerto, why actors rehearse lengthy monologues, why we weep over an aria.
I was not acquainted with Aunt Aurelia’s voice as she died, a young woman, of appendicitis, twenty years before me. All that is left of her is a receipt for a dress for $2.35 bought in Akron, Ohio, her grave in Saint Luke’s Cemetery, and a few photographs. From her image I’d like to believe I may have enjoyed a memory of her voice. There’s now no one left to remember her conversations around the kitchen table with her mother and sisters.
(True, gratefully, I’ve nearly gotten my mother’s shrill voice out of my head – a finality to her mania. But this preference is the exception.) I have a cassette recording of my therapist’s voice, my surrogate big sister, reading The Velveteen Rabbit. When I was a lost young man, it was a simple and effective (though somewhat embarrassing) tool in soothing long empty evenings in empty rooms – saving me from my own desolation. She died of cancer this year. This remnant, this flimsy ribbon cannot be all that’s left of her voice.
It is my terror that a fog will surreptitiously descend upon my memory – that I’ve nearly forgotten my father’s voice – that I may somehow misplace my beloved’s. If I cannot recall the subtle wit and intimacy in her tone, how may I hope to navigate my days? I comprehend the inevitability of my annihilation. I embrace the certainty. However, I am plagued by the horror that my wife and children will forget my timbre, my tenor, my laughter – that my voice will fade over time, unintentionally becoming too wearisome for anyone to recollect. There is no other aspect of my mortality that frightens me.
David Sapp, writer, artist, and professor, lives along the southern shore of Lake Erie in North America. A Pushcart nominee, he was awarded Ohio Arts Council Individual Excellence Grants for poetry and the visual arts. His poetry and prose appear widely in the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom. His publications include articles in the Journal of Creative Behavior, chapbooks Close to Home and Two Buddha, a novel Flying Over Erie, and a book of poems and drawings titled Drawing Nirvana.
