She doesn’t know it, yet



She doesn’t know, yet

But one day she’ll, know

What it means, to die

And be reborn, beautiful she will be

She’ll spread her wings, fly

But she doesn’t know it yet

She doesn’t know it yet

But she will be, the butterfly

That she cried over, when she squashed it beneath her shoe

She doesn’t know it yet, the butterfly

Survived, and flew off

Afraid, but alive

How alive, was she

When she found her own kingdom by the sea

But she doesn’t know it yet

How unlike everyone I’ve ever met

My beautiful, darling Annabel Lee

Dreams

I want to see sweet dreams
In slumbers of calmness.
Falling and rising with the moments.
Creating world of my own.
Cloning my own fantasies.
 Reality is giant mountain 
Hard to digest
Making me forget
the empathetic spears.
I want to travel nowhere
Like radiant of the sun
Travels the world.
I am hungry 
For progress, not for perfection 
cause nobody is perfect.
My struggles are milestone
One day,
giving others to courage pursue.

Shahnoza Ochidiyeva

Happiness

It’s a great blessing that the heart beats                                
It’s a blessing the souls are alive and well
It’s a blessing to live safe and sound,
Tell, hey, person what else is needed?

It’s a blessing the tree of ignorance has died,
It’s a happiness that the hearts full of freedom
It’s a great blessing to be servant of Allah,
Tell, hey, person, what else is needed?

It’s a blessing to have big bravery
It’s a blessing to earn with difficulty
It’s a blessing fate gives us to feel lucky
Tell, hey, person, what else is needed?

It’s a blessing my mom says loving words
It’s a happiness that my father’s eyes smiling
It’s a happiness that our country peacefully living
Tell, hey person, what else needed you?
Imaginations

They say imagination has sharp wings
Oh, it flies anywhere
Which in human imaginations
Reach the heavens everywhere

They surrounded me too
Flew away towards the dreams
Filling my world with joy
Everything came alive around me

I travelled to Paris, America and Rome
I was on the seventh sky at that moment
That Turkey welcomed me warmly
But I missed my sweet home.

I saw so many places
Almost laughed for a moment
Looking at the purest sea
Missed you, my Motherland.

Turning the road of my thoughts
I returned to my place at once.
Strange joy, strange pleasure
A special feeling spread over my soul.

                                      

Ochildiyeva Shahnoza Abdivohid qizi was born on July 17, 2006 in the republik of Uzbekistan, Surkhandarya region, Denov district. Presently, she studies at school number 49 in 10th grade. She is a Captain of the Denov District Council of the Youth Union of Uzbekistan. She  actively participates different  national  competitions, festivals, gaining honorable places. Also one of the youngest and most active members of several international organizations. Her poems have been published in several newspapers and magazines. In 2021, the first collection of poetry was published under the name “Yurakdagi orzularim”. Samples of creativity were included in the anthologies “Türkçenin dünyadaki özbek sesi” published in the Republic of Turkey and “Talented voices of Uzbekistan” published in America. In 2022, her new book came out of publication under the title “She’riyat o’ziga ayladi asir”. Her new book which was called “Happiness” was published in Amerika. Nowadays her books are selling in 26 countries of the world!

can't talk my teen self

out of that second date

father paradox


-----

Cinderella

married the Prince

maid's tight dress


-----

Ice Age wanes


every generation

the village moves


the last midden still

visible at low tide

not the graves


-----

Mom and Dad's

Pleistocene honeymoon

born 10,000 years late

First love

I know you waiting for spring,

You asked him from the grass.

You don’t have idea my heart,

Spring is coming when you laugh.

You are waiting

To the sweet thought of the swallow’s song.

Don’t believe in spring, it will pass,

You’re in with love too young.

Semi-pink buds of almonds,

You’re waiting while pain from the heart.

You aware of in cold February,

A flower bloomed but you didn’t notice it.

Warmth of spring to your soul,

First of all the sun didn’t shine.

In your heart purer then an almond flower,

I was the first to open.

Mashkhura Usmanova was born on May 16, 2006 in Gallaorol district, Jizzakh region. She has been practicing writing poetry since she was ten years old. She is a member of the international organizations “Creativity Forum for Culture, Arts and Peace” of Egypt, “AsihSasami” of Indonesia, “Iqra” of Pakistan, and “Juntospor las Letras” of Argentina.

---------------------------------------------------------------------
straight from cuba
 
seek out the lord
in the piano bar
down the street
 
maybe in the
curves of the
beautiful woman
playing the bass
guitar
 
maybe the lord
is lining up on
the table in the
corner
 
or unzipping her
shirt a little as she
tries to make an
impossible combo
shot
 
seek out the lord
in a plume of cigar
smoke straight from
cuba
 
the lord surely must
be in this glass of
whiskey
 
you have to be
a little drunk to
believe in a place
called heaven
-----------------------------------------------------------
proud to say
 
spent the afternoon
listening to dolly
parton songs while
my mother was in
her physical therapy
session
 
proud to say
none of the
poems were
about the
obvious
-----------------------------------------------------------
the conversations get a little wordy these days
 
i never had the need
to keep up with anyone
 
never cared for kings
and queens, presidents,
principals or gods
 
got really comfortable
talking to myself at
an early age
 
the conversations get
a little wordy these days
 
someone wants to show
off all those thirteen letter
words they know
 
i know i am the odd one
 
the one everyone could
think would be the next
mass gunman
 
and i have never even
owned a gun
 
although the local gun
shop and i share the
same first name
-----------------------------------------------------------------
live longer than me
 
walking with my mother
up and down the sidewalk
on a finally sunny day
 
she wants to get more
mobile again
 
either she really feels
alive again or she is
determined to see if
she could live longer
than me
 
my anxiety has put
the money on her
 
it must have forgotten
how stubborn i really
am
 
i could probably live
to 100 just to fucking
spite everyone
-------------------------------------------------------------
who will check my emails when i die
 
the white noise
is meant to calm
 
dull you to sleep
instead, it is slowly
driving me insane
 
who will check
my emails when
i die
 
do ghosts need
dick pills or
have the desire
to contribute to
a political
campaign
 
sleep in the
sunshine
 
go drinking
at midnight
 
the lost souls
like to gather
at the corner
 
humming jane says
like we did thirty
years ago
---------------------------------------------------------------

J.J. Campbell (1976 – ?) is old enough to know better. He’s been widely published over the years, most recently at The Beatnik Cowboy, Horror Sleaze Trash, The Black Shamrock, The Rye Whiskey Review and Yellow Mama. You can find him most days on his mildly entertaining blog, evil delights. (https://evildelights.blogspot.com)

Minerva at School 

The phone rang and she picked it up, eyes still riveted on the news story she was watching about a school that was on lockdown due to an active shooting. Furious at yet another massacre and annoyed at the vibrating device, she turned away from the TV, immediately recognizing the voice on the other end. 

“Mom!” it said. She heard, in the familiar voice, gut-wrenching fear and slowly, unravelling self-control. That was all she needed.
“It’s Minnie Me’s school, isn’t it?”, she questioned, coldness beginning to seep throughout her whole body and various scenarios beginning to run through her brain.

“Yes. We’re here now. Macy’s getting oxygen because she had an anxiety attack, and we just don’t know what to do. The authorities won’t give us any information. The shooter is still in there and we can’t find Gemma.” At this point, he could hold it in no longer. His hard, raspy, intakes of tortured breath were difficult to control as were the trembling shoulders and shaking hands that held the phone.
She couldn’t see any of that, but she felt it as only a mother can and so with the calming, silky, and soothing voice of a Mom but the coldest intentions of a killer, whose heart is covered in bonded steel, she said, “Sweet boy, don’t you worry one bit. I’ll take care of everything!”

Taken aback, her son exclaimed, “Mom! What do you mean, take care of everything? Mom! Mom?” but the line was already dead.
In seconds, she was out the door, having picked up her leather satchel, which contained everything she would need, disassembled repeater rifle, knives, a change of clothes, and other nasty implements of her trade. She did not bother to change from her house dress and fluffy slippers. She would need them, too. It took just a few minutes to hop into her Bentley and fly down the driveway and out to the street, speed limits be damned. About 3 blocks from the location of the shooting, she performed an expert 180 degree turn and ended up speeding to the scene, backwards. Everyone scrambled to get out of her way as she headed for the huge plate glass windowed entrance to the school. 

“Sorry, sorry!” she cried to anyone who could take a moment to listen, as she ripped through wooden sawhorses and side swiped police cars. “I can’t control this car! Help!”

Bam! Boom! Screech! Then there was the tingling explosion of falling glass, but she had no time to notice the effects of the crash, the reaction of her body, or anything else.  There was only the fierce hate for anyone who would endanger children, crazy or not, and her overriding anxiety for her granddaughter.  If he had hurt her, he would not live. Those emotions raised her out of the damaged car easily before anyone could get to her, and into the building she ran, remembering to limp as if old age and injury had command.

She had no difficulty finding the correct room. The kids were screaming, and shots were being fired. She had her Black ops outfit on in no time, with only seconds before the SWAT team arrived.
She banged on the closed door. “Is this the hospital?” she questioned, in her best old lady voice. “My car just crashed and I’m hurt. I need a doctor. See? I’m bleeding!” and she held up a bleeding arm to the small window in the door. She continued to scream, “Help, help!” until the gunman, thinking he had another valuable hostage, turned toward the door. The bullet landed right between his eyes, and he fell to the floor with a flop. 

Entering quickly, she told the kids, “Run! Run as fast as you can!” Out the door they went, clogging up the narrow hall, giving her a minute to hide her satchel and change back into her house dress and flipflops and cower in a far corner of the hallway. Now, she was screaming and crying for real, as adrenalin began to withdraw. SWAT and officers questioned her, but all she could do was respond in hiccups. 

“That man pointed a gun at me! Those children were SO loud! All I wanted was to see a doctor!” and “Where am I?” The questioners gave up. It would have to wait until later. They turned her over to paramedics who took her to their ambo but soon deserted her for the more critically injured. This was the opportunity she needed to creep away, over to the waiting, black, window-tinted Suburban, just up the street. As she slid into the luxurious back seat, Darryl, her handler, looked at her as if to say, “Keep on doing this shit and your ass is cooked!” 

She responded in kind, the eyes saying it all. “Mess with my family and die!” just as her phone rang. 

“Mom, mom! We got her! Gemma’s fine. Macy’s happy as a clam and I am so relieved it’s over. Some old lady crashed into the building, and it was the breakthrough the cops needed to take over. Whew! Mom? What did you mean about take care of everything?"

Minerva did not answer but Darryl watched the smile of the century cross her face and the few wrinkles smooth out to reveal the most beautiful woman he had ever seen. 

“Wow!” He said to himself.