-----------------------------------------------------------------------
no one ever promised
 
endless days
of rain and
fog
 
just pure
fucking misery
as my arthritis
is jumping
for joy
 
and the days of
drinking the pain
away have got to
the point where
dylan thomas
looks over at
me and smiles
 
no one ever
promised life
would be fun
and fulfilling
 
hell, i wasn't
even promised
a tomorrow
 
these are the
days where i
wish my father
had the courage
to follow through
on his threats
------------------------------------------------------------
in a dying town
 
an old buddy of mine
opened up a coffee
shop in the town
we grew up in
 
i wish him all the
luck in the world
 
a small business
in a dying town is
usually a recipe for
the onset of a mid-life
crisis
 
of course, he served
in the navy
 
so, it's probably not
the first crisis he has
come across
------------------------------------------------------------
a smile to your face
 
i still remember that
perkins parking lot
and how you couldn't
believe how easily
i slid my hand down
your pants and brought
a smile to your face
 
you're still the only
woman to ever answer
her door in lingerie
for me
 
i'm sure your wife
is enjoying that now
 
thankfully, i haven't
drank all the memories
away
-------------------------------------------------------------
down the roads of apathy
 
near the end of summer
 
another hot, long, sweaty
ride down the roads of
apathy here in the midwest
 
the road to nowhere has
been washed in the blood
of countless suicides and
the old souls realizing all
their mistakes
 
the kkk still like to recruit
here, but often knock on
all the wrong doors
 
i saw a black man walking
with his daughter in the
neighborhood yesterday
 
first time i have smiled
 
in months
-----------------------------------------------------------
this holiday weekend
 
a local radio
station is doing
an 80's marathon
this holiday
weekend
 
just what i
want to do
 
relive my fucking
childhood with all
these songs choking
on nostalgia
 
i figure i'll throw on
some beethoven
 
pour a glass of scotch
 
and think of a few
creative ways to die

J.J. Campbell (1976 – ?) was raised by wolves yet managed to graduate high school with honors. He’s been widely published over the years, most recently at Horror Sleaze Trash, The Rye Whiskey Review, Terror House Magazine, The Beatnik Cowboy and Pyrokinection. You can find him most days on his mildly entertaining blog, evil delights. (https://evildelights.blogspot.com)

DIARY OF A LOAFER

Maturity the birth of gentility,
A fugitive I am,
Told never to shut a lad up,
Shut a boy and shut an ancestry they said,
They carry the shoulders of glee they said.

Miming my way through the rabble.
My confidence ebbing away.
Sit down, don't talk, you're overweight, dress pretty they said,
I ate the dust,
I still remember them smirking at me,
Visible disgust on my face.

Always being told the bitterest truths and the sweetest lies,
And here I am 17 years later still imprisoned in a pyramid  of thirsty men,
I see myself as a nova.


BIOGRAPHY

My name is Hannah Aipoh, I am sixteen years of age, l was born on the 23rd of February 2006 and I hail from Estako East Local Government Area, Edo State, Nigeria.

I aspire to be a gynaecologist and a poet laureate.

                                       A Father’s Vigil

A man sits on a folding stool talking with his daughter even though she is not listening. But he does not mind. She has not listened to him these past years. Still, he talks as if she is there, not in the shallow grave she rests in, consumed by the natural way of all the dead in this corner of the park. The park did not allow a head stone or marker. He built a cairn of the rough serpentine rocks the day of her interment, the family crying and weeping with the sorrow that comes from the disbelief of a child passing. He wept along with them. He believed she had passed but knew that it was not an end.

The rocks were gone when he came to talk the first time. He came back every year, an annual vigil. Every time he came to talk with her, he tried to remember the tree she was buried near. At first, he came on the anniversary of her burial then on her birthday. A friend told him not to remember her at her death, but her birth. The conversations were the same, but it was easier to talk with her on her birthday than the anniversary of her death. He talked of family things: family trips and holiday gatherings, at Christmas, Thanksgiving and the 4th of July. One year it was the story of a white Christmas at her grandma’s house and the snowball fight that ended with everyone cold, exhausted and laughing. And the Fourth of July in Disneyland, the noise, the light, the awe. He talked about birthdays and events, both happy and sad. He told her about her grandma's 85th birthday, and how she died the next year. He talked of personal things: fears and regrets, joys and successes. He talked of the regrets of not spending more time with her: sharing her favorite movie, playing tag in the park with the dog.

He talked of her: memories and possibilities, so much of her life left undone, dreams left undreamed, wishes never to be fulfilled. Early on he wondered if he was sane or just obsessed by coming every year. Her mom worried about him. As the years passed she worried less and less. He often came back more relaxed, almost relieved, like a burden had been diminished. He often asked his daughter what she thought about the things he told her. He knew she was not listening.
 
But she was there, for him, all his life. She became his confidante.
When his death was near, he made one last visit. This time there were no stories, no histories. Just the fears of the uncertainty of death: was there an afterlife, would he find her there, would someone come talk to him, would he listen. At the end he thanked her for being there, and wept. If she had listened, she would have thanked him for the company.

3


murmurs

of ill winds

shift to the west

cheerful ladybird 

returns to nest



2


yellow warbler

on the green palms of nature

takes a perch

unsuspecting 

of a waiting goshawk 



1


her turn 

at the queue 

staggered tears

she collects in a basket

wages of labour



  Christina Chin / Uchechukwu Onyedikam

Persevere

Even if your purpose here on this circular sphere
Called Earth appears uncertain and unclear
I’ve learned one’s worth isn’t a mere
Sum of what they’ve purchased or what they’ve earned in a career
Life’s about how you feel about the person in the mirror
Like whether or not they’re further on nearer 
To who you want to be, a word for the ears
Of those not there yet, ‘Persevere’


A Winning Formula

When there burns a fire within
And you’re spurred on by a desire to win
If you never concede defeat 
You can withstand pressure and keep the lead
Going against the opposition
With the approach, “A win is not a given”
Execute the game plan
And never lose faith, and you may remain the champ
For some time to come
When you find you’re the one
To beat, you’ll know that you can win
And be the one who stands in
The ‘winner’s circle’, when it’s all said and done
And you’ll rank second to none
Realizing there’s no ‘I’ in ‘team’
A group can realize a dream
And win.


Stargazing

Every evening my eyes scan the cosmos
Paying particular attention to a certain section of the solar system
In search of the sights I identify
As the celestial streetlights that litter the night sky



Active Imagination

What if we didn’t have division from capitalism,
A clash of religions and a class system
And we were equals even if polar opposites,
Government put people over politics
And we could make citizens’ arrests 
Of those that abuse the power they’re given to protect
And serve, when wrong is done under the cover of law?
What’s done to one can be done to us all
So we should all spend a few
Minutes each day trying to walk in the shoes
Of others; going forward, what if we bid,
“Farewell” to the ills of the society in which we live?
I wonder…


Matters of the Heart

While I haven't been in love, yet
I have been given tips on the subject
And no, love isn't blind
You'll know it when you see it, just give it time 
And let it take its natural course, if
It's real, then you won't have to force it
We tend to think of love as 'dependency'
And that we're empty and incomplete
When we’re not in the presence of
The one whose affection and love
We seek, but that’s not true
Being alone doesn’t have to stop you
From enjoying your own company, with 
That said, if you and the one you want to be with 
Complement one another 
And share a bond friends and lovers
Can appreciate, you may have found
Love everlasting, I say that now
But really only time will tell
Love’s a matter of the heart, but the mind will help
You recognize true love; love can smooth any wrinkle
And until I find that, I'm cool with being single 


Realize The Dream

Some think, “To dream is a childish thing
And dreams only come true in your wildest dreams” 
But how do you think Martin Luther King Jr. 
Was able to see so far into the future?
Becoming a man on a mission
And it's up to us to expand on the vision
He had and do our best to bridge 
Gaps and make prejudice
And inequality obsolete
So no one’s at the bottom seeking
A better life, no matter how grim the prospects
If we’re in lockstep
There isn’t a goal that’s not within reach
Though I’m cognizant peace
Might seem elusive 
Like a pipedream rooted
In fantasy, there’s nothing we can’t achieve when
Doubt isn’t given a chance to creep in
We can even make Indigenous mascots and team names
And images a thing of the past; Dr. King aimed
To change the world, and the quest
To see his dream manifest
Continues on…

Discussing Death

Gaurav Ojha

From the perspective of death, human life is just a passing story; we are here at this moment and in another dimension of time and history all of us are here no more. Recently, I was going through an old picture from my childhood days, which included me as a toddler and as I was going through a picture I realized that three out of four individuals are missing, they are dead and gone. 

I am alive now, but eventually I am also waiting for the same fate. After some time, just like the three of them, I will only remain in some other pictures. Similarly, I was looking at a crowded picture taken in the year 1910 with hundreds of people at a musical concert thoroughly enjoying together and by now I can safely presume that almost all the people in that picture are dead. Life happens only once to each of us, and there comes a point where everything concludes and ends. 

These are my discussions on death and there are so many of them, me and some of my friends we discuss death; however this proclamation seems bizarre to most of us because we are preoccupied with life without acknowledging the dimension of death. After all, everything in life together with all its achievements appears pointless and limited from the perspective of death and dying. Hence, death discussions are either forbidden or else postponed. 

Death salons and cafes are becoming popular throughout the world with hundreds of people discussing death together, however we don’t have such privileges yet to discuss death with beautiful music, talking about the darker sides of life. Paradox is that from the childhood days children are exposed to death, characters die in cartoons, serials and movies. But we are constantly ignoring discussions on death all together. 

Death discussions are important, because how we think about death somehow determines how we live our life. Death creates urgency to act here and now because life can’t be postponed. Finite dimension of life means there is only life at this present moment and everything we do or achieve in life can be interrupted by death. Therefore, unlike many people, I think because of death, everything we do or achieve in life becomes precious. 

Our act of love, kindness and support for parents, children and friends is meaningful because we will not have them around forever or always with us. Everything is going to end, making everything we have precious. As an example, a couple days back as we were discussing death, a friend reflected on his mother’s love for his baby daughter. His mother is already into her eighties and she knows that she will not be around to see his daughter grow much longer. And, in those reflections of life from the perspective of death, we also realize how each and every bit of life is so beautiful, complete and precious.

A Taste of Death

Gaurav Ojha

In his seminal work, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, English author Douglas Adams suggests that the meaning of life is 42, and I used to think of it as gibberish and my response used to be like how about 52, 67 or 103? And, it was only a couple of days back; I was able to grasp the subtleness behind this suggestion.

When I was wandering near the Ghats of Pashupatinath, I stumbled upon a resonance that she was only 32, she died of an incurable disease and all that remains of her now is a handful of ashes slowly dissolving in the river. Maybe the meaning of life is life itself, the matter of living in a certain way and after we die it’s all over.

For Douglas Adams himself it was 49, he died of a heart attack while taking a rest after his regular exercise. Similarly, for the rest of us still alive, our time is set, the clock is constantly ticking and we never know when death strikes us.

After witnessing a burning funeral pyre at the Ghats of Pashupatinath, I sat beside a Shiva temple near the river bank.  With that sinister smoke swirling in the sky, sounds of wailing, that dreadful smell of human flesh and seeing a human body reduced to handful of ashes, I thought to myself how bizarre our human life actually is, after all that human impulses, dreams, worries, joys, suffering and sweet passion for life, why this sorrow of death?

Sitting beside the temple, a sense of fear and anxiety gripped me from within, and I kept on asking myself, if we are living now to be nothing more than a handful of ashes, why do I have to breathe? What is the purpose of my life? Why this trouble of living? With the fragrance of death all over me, all other purposes, meaning, aspirations and expectations of my life appeared dull, empty, trivial and contradictory.

In the midst of death and dying, I reflected on my struggles, sufferings, strivings, plans, relations, anguishes, aspirations and achievements. And, I said to myself, isn’t life a tale told by an idiot that signifies nothing, a bitter sweet symphony, a brief episode of dancing shadows or a meaningless puzzle squeezed in between our birth and death? It’s inevitable that we all are going to die. Death is in life as a necessary ingredient that makes human life vibrant, exciting, erratic and alive.

On my walk back home, I felt a liberating calmness touching me, a kind of feeling that cures the mind. However, beyond the Ghats of Pashupatinath, the greatest surprise remains the same, as Yudhisthira laments in the Mahabharata, death pinches us all the time and still we human being live as though we are immortal, believing that we will be living our human lives forever with all our passions and possessions together, what a self-delusion indeed.

Ripples Of Life

Gaurav Ojha

When our student died in an awful accident, struck by a truck while cycling, he was barely fifteen. The student was a bright star gleaming in his potential. Some of us thought he would one day be a great poet. He used to scratch poems within minutes and had a voice that resounded like a mature orator. However, due to a reckless mistake, all our impressions and expectations were reduced to a handful of dust scattered in the river. After his death, for days I felt a little diminished and couldn’t be at ease with myself. The claws of death had snapped my neck, and I kept pondering what if death was just around the corner waiting to catch me as well. 

Maybe his untimely death was a reminder of my own mortality. My mind got clouded with thoughts of death, and I was really anxious, eclipsed by the shadows of my lingering death. I know I can’t experience my own death with the death of another person. And, I don’t know when my death is going to happen, but I am sure there’s no escaping it. Maybe my life is just a ripple in a vast ocean of eternity, life that keeps on bubbling up, as it pours out and passes away.

Impermanence of life is all around us, and as human beings we are inexorably moving towards our death. Everything we see, touch, taste, love, hope, despise or desire is in the process of dying. There is nothing that remains unchanged. Besides, if there is a bit of meaning in life, as writer Franz Kafka reminds us, it is that it ends. Life reflects itself in the mirror of death. With death life comes to an end, and how easy it is to be forgotten and replaced. Therefore, it is meaningful to contemplate on the tiny ripples of our human existence and to think how meaningless human life actually is.

Meaninglessness of life often infuses some sense of lightness into my being. I feel at ease with all these tiny ripples of my life sparkling around me in their randomness. And, I have embraced the reality that it is not possible to have absolute control over how the plot of our life unfolds or when this chapter is going to end. Hence, whichever way our life shuffles, either substantial or just meaningless, the zest of life is always the same, that it ends.

LIQUID TREASURE

Black air covers the sky

Which come from a small tube hole

A liquid that moves the motors

Controlled by many companies

Pumps are the distributor

People lined up,
With their earnings

To fill the tank,
Which stitched in the motor.

Government earns,

Value increased,

Reliance grownup,

Aramco empower,

A liquid that makes 

billionaires or zero.