Hotel Eternity

TO EXIST BETWEEN ETERNITIES WILD 
NOTHING LIKE THE EYES OF THE SKY 
AXIS INFINITY DICTIONARY OF OBSCURE BLISS 
COME FORWARD WITH YOUR VISCERA AND VIOLENCE AND SHARE MY WINGS
UNLEASH YOUR SPIRIT BENEATH THE RAMJET 
ALLEGRO TEMPLE OF THE NIGHT SKY 

A NEED FOR MIRRORS AND COUNTLESS SKIES 
SHAKE YOUR INFINESSENCE SLOT CANYON 
HIGHBREATH NARCOTIC ERUPTIONS CLOUD NOTHINGS 
EXOTIC PULSE A NAME BEYOND DESIRE SEMAPHORE SIN 
PLAY AT YOUR OWN RISK TALKING TWILIGHT 
INTO A SPHERE OF YOUTHFUL SYMPATHY RIDES THE THIEF OF YOUTH 
THIN AIR ADDICTIONS MELANCHOLY BODY SACRILEGE TATTOO HIGHWAY INSOMNIA PUNK

TEENAGE BLOOD REPETITION OF A THOUSAND HUNGRY EYES
SOMETIMES WE ARE ALL ETERNAL IN THE CONSTELLATION OF MIDNIGHT MOSAIC FACTION

MY GREEN UNQUEEN GALLERY CRUSH HYPERRITUAL AUTUMN CRY 
OPULENCE LIKE A TRIANGLE AND A DUEL
SOME TALK TO MEN WHILE OTHERS TALK TO GODS
DANCE IT VISCIOUS RIDDLE OF THE SANDS CHAMELEON CHARADE 
STAR CODE CHALICE
ASK THE DESERT ORACLE THESE POISON DECLARATIONS THE REAL UNREAL CONVERSATIONS WITH A NEW REALITY
NATURE’S SYMPHONY DRAFT INTOXICATION

The Music of Pain

The music of pain springs from my face
Everyday every moment the rosy brightness fumbles
My fly ball dream crumbles
I die and hover in the darkness
Oscillating to the light or shade
Eyes fixed at the faraway ancient days
Through the wafts of flowers in the morning air
Once we walked together the long line side by side
Hand in hand
Eyes into the eyes
All on a sudden my soul mate slipped away 
Dashing me into this grave state of mind 
I would like to find out the answer  
Why and how?
Again and again I get back in silence  
No reflection from the waves of the river Padma or Mohananda
My eyes dropping as the rain from the sky 
The music of pain springs from my face 
Everyday every moment the rosy brightness fumbles
How scorching the sun of the noon!

Chapainawabganj, Bangladesh
10/12//2020

Good Bye - Saint Martin

Gazing out at noon I turn back again and again 
Through the window of the ship on departure  
My loving travel spot I'm leaving - breathing sad on the flowing waves
How wonderful the sky! How wonderful the blue water!
The ocean blowing the same like that time
When I came here a few years ago
How change I look to follow
The Resort Buildings, the schools, the madrashas or the bushes, the corals, the shops, the life of the people, the palm and other trees  
Thinking all suddenly my eyes caught up three ocean birds over Saint Martin right at the point where water and the land joins, just one or two kilometers distant water The Three Heavenly Birds welcome me flapping their wings, soaring high and getting down once for all.
Where I go, where I come, I do not find the destiny
I look out the vast sky, the vast water and look on me
O Birds, Can't I reach you?
I don't possess the wings to fly to thee, my love.

Chapainawabganj, Bangladesh
11/12//2020

Love Streaming in Rain

You are not that rain
Touching my face flies away soon
A gust of wind leaving me alone
Can you, dear?
I know, you can't
You are my rain pouring in torrent
Drenched in love, the land with its glow 
The new blades of grass and seeds  
In every season and out of season
The flowers blooming in the sun
Bestows in happy ending.  
	
Chapainawabganj, Bangladesh
12/12//2020


The Paharpur Buddhist Vihara

Thousand -year- history hidden in every brick bond
O Paharpur Buddhist Vihara, the rock in the moon
The light you spread once all over the South-East Asia continent
Still now flowing on waves of the ocean 
Standing still with the glory of the long past
Kissing the shore of the Bay of the Bengal 
The magnificent building and the lofty head over time
All the sacred gods and deities preserved so nicely in the protective glasses
The museum surrounded with the beautiful garden beside the monastery
The World Heritage Site -people from all over the world
Visit and sigh - for all its religious practice, education and astronomy 
Other sectors of secular arts, culture, science and wisdom   
Really even at this time when only its skeleton lives
A place now fully rural but then a kingly state
Shines the kingly body, the gigantic brilliance    
Aristocratic, splendid and grandiose -it was as it were a dream
The king Dharmapala established this kingly monastery (c.781-821)  
A center for the saints, teachers, bards, and many other fans and followers 
Pilgrimage as it was, it gained the cultural value with its teaching-learning process
The Great Buddhist and the two scholars- Silabhadra and Atisa Dipankara 
Among many other renound teachers enlightened its atmosphere
Every brick and the dilapidated structure seem to cry for the glorious past
You stand so high; the pinnacle wants to kiss the sky
Tourists come; tourists go but the waves of the vast ocean 
Never stops to flow.   

Chapainawabganj, Bangladesh
12/12//2020

  
The Kusumba Mosque

Bees are swarming over head
To enter inside the mosque through the arched door 
I startled at the sight of the honeycomb 
Here and there one two three four in this way 
They are flying and buzzing before my eyes
I went through and looked into the time 1558 AD. 
The reign of Ghyasuddin Bahadur Shah, one of the Afgan kings of Bengal
Built by some Sulaiman following the name of the village, Kusumba
The interior isles, bays and the half round domes can enchant anyone visiting the mosque
The surrounding stones blaze the tradition to generation after generation
The large pond in front of and the trees around with the sweet note of birds
I think of present and past for those who would come to pray
And collect the golden nectar praying to Allah      
Bees are swarming over head - honey filled in the honeycomb
My mind fringed with light and strength.

Chapainawabganj, Bangladesh
13/12//2020

Family Tree

This time of year I envy the treeless families

Their empty yards, dying and dead grass

Waiting for the winter coming on and

Spring not far behind

But us tree families spend our time trying

To clean up after our family tree

Our ancestry, its ancestry on display

So there we are, rake in hand

Piling up the debris left behind by just being

Being there

My family tree with its high branches

We like to look up to, and

Some low branches, so low I need to

Bend almost in half to get by

And then there’s that part we’ve cut away

Over the years, a regular bald spot looming

Larger and larger

Something I’ve inherited, like trembling hands

And these malformed feet

This time of year, walking backward raking up

Conjuring up connections to this

Mysterious ancestry, piles of leaves

So much to clean up

That

I envy treeless families.




                        Leafmeal Lie


At 10:06 this morning a leaf fell from the maple

Out front. Saw it from the couch, looking out

The storm door. It fell, it floated down ending

Its season, its cycle on the ground under its tree.

It must have started like the others, a bud-like

Growth, the kind squirrels will eat in the Spring,

But it survived, grew, felt all the Summer heat

And the drought, the wind, the heavy downpours

And then this Fall weather, the chill, the falling

Away of its many companions. Then at 10:06

This morning it ended its cycle, its seasons, it fell

Floated to the ground to await its fate. Perhaps

It will be the mower turning it to mulch with

The rest, or maybe it will blow up the street, mix

With other leaves, get raked, get bagged, get

Carried off and composted miles from here, miles

Away from its tree. Or it could just blend in, lie

Flat, avoid all of my attempts to get rid of it, and

Then lie flat as it gets colder, begins to snow, and

Spends the Winter wet, frozen under the snow

Till Spring returns – and I’ll be sitting here on this

Couch looking out the screen door, waiting for

Something else as momentous to happen.


                   Cramped

No need for an alarm anymore

Or any of the other sounds that

Used to wake me: the sound of

My sons getting ready for school

Or my wife crashing away, trying

To fix our world before heading

Off to fix the world of her work.

No I don’t need any of those any-

More, this morning I woke up to

Leg cramps. My left shin, or was

It my right cramped into a pain

Strong enough to wake me, get

Me up hobbling around the room

Hoping to end it, to satisfy what-

Ever imbalance that set it off. It

Worked, I was up and the cramp

Toned down enough to walk on.

It was morning and I was up for

The day, without an alarm or any

Of the other distractions that played

That role. Online they say that my

Cramps are common for aging adults

And athletes. Never was an athlete

So I fall into that fifty percent of sixty

Plus year-olds who suffer these cramps.

It’s good to know I fit into the statistics

With about half of my group. I’d like to

Picture a chart somewhere, some med

School showing the percent and perhaps

A diagram of an aging cramped shin

Waking an aging adult instead of his clock.

Preferences Recommendation To Read Dickens’ Great Expectations As Biographical Victorian Classics

Review questionnaire, documenting experiences beyond memoirs journal entries within the novel, stylistically, thematically or in context comparison, drama rehearsals, photography illustration scrap book exhibition and quotation journal fascinates the readers, critics and the classroom environment. Pandemic outbreak disruption unprecedented radio and television learning experiences will flourish with the reading of the text. Public readings from extracts of magazines by Victorian Era’s Charles Dickens can happen in modern times but virtually through online workshops and seminars or symposiums to maintain physically social distancing. Moreover, Miss Havisham’s cleansing symbolizes redemption or salvation of atoned body and purity of soul depicted in the fire: driving beetles and spiders and destroying the faded bridal dress. [Bridal dress symbolically significance of imprisonment]. Magwitch reunion with Estella cannot be evaluated with subtlety since he doesn’t meet her physically but is reminded of her news that she had been alive. Ending of chastened Estella and readers’ guesses can be the subject matter of another great thesis…Pinnacle of elegant society courtship with the periphery of sub urban community.            

Bibliography and Further Reading Or Works Cited Or Reference Guidelines

1. Critical Fortunes of Great Expectations, Richard Dutton, MA (Cambridge), Ph.D (Nottingham), is Lecturer in English Literature at the University of Lancaster.

2. A Teacher’s Guide To The Signet Classics Edition of Charles Dickens’ Great Expectations, Series Editors: W Geiger Ellis, Ed.D, University of Gerogia, Emeritus, and Arthea J.S. Reed, Ph.D, University of North Carolina, Retired. (Laurie Calvert, North Carolina National Board Certificate Licensed Educator Teaching Middle and High School, 2002 Penguin Group USA)

3. UK Essays Website Analysis of Charles Dickens Great Expectations

4. Death And Inscriptions With Respect To David Copperfield, Great Expectations and Charles Dickens, Anna Foley’s thesis submitted in partial fulfillments of the requirements for the Degree of the Master in Arts in English in the University of Canterbury, 2003.

5. The Analysis of Pip’s Characteristics In Great Expectations, Sinchuan University of Arts and Sciences, Dazhou China, Sino Us English Teaching, June 2016, Volume: 13, Issue No-6, Pages no: 499-504

6. Tamai, Fumies, Great Expectations: Democracy and The Problem of Social Inclusion, The Japan Branch Bulletin of the Dickens fellowship, No. 25, October 2002.

7. Studying Great Expectations, Andrew Moore, UK Coordinator of the European Network of Innovative Schools [acknowledged with the epitaph of “Universal Teacher” from Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s poem, Forst in May, where the poet recalls his own sterile and punitive education as a boy and hopes for something lucrative for his offspring] *This information of Andrew Moore is extracted from The Guardian’s obituary of “Andrew Moore” by Barbara Bleiman and Julie Blake Wed 12 Apri 2006 21:35 EDT.

8. Criticism of Society In The English Novel Between The Wars, George Orwell’s Essays in Criticism

beat me to the punch
 
i got my nerve
up once to ask
this woman to
marry me
 
i never got the
chance to find
out the answer
 
i guess her wife
beat me to the
punch
 
and on days
like these
 
cloudy, gloomy
a forlorn sun
dying on the
horizon
 
hesitation has
cost me plenty
in this lifetime
 
luckily,
my patience is
finally starting
to wear thin
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
missing the batteries
 
watching the people
again
 
got an old john prine
song on repeat in
my head
 
the minutes slip by
like a clock that is
missing the batteries
 
i see little glimpses
of a dark future in
each of the strangers
that go by
 
i remember a little
boy that never wanted
to get old
 
he knows now
 
suicide was the only
option to make that
possible
-------------------------------------------------------------------
these old hands of mine
 
you can cut
the tension
with a knife
 
her smoldering
eyes and these
old hands of
mine
 
i gave up on
these dreams
years ago
 
the tragic
romantic in me
never gave up
hope
 
hopefully this
one breaks me
for good
----------------------------------------------------------------------
flows the brightest
 
open your third
eye and sink
into the void
at the time the
neon flows the
brightest
 
it's a journey
you have to go
on by yourself
 
the most beautiful
woman of your
memories will
greet you there
 
and explain your
failures in a way
that you no longer
will find the need
to hate yourself
--------------------------------------------------------------------
the evil spirits within
 
my imagination likes
hard liquor the best
 
anytime the proof gets
over 100, the evil spirits
within me like to start
dancing
 
trace every scar with
their tongues
 
sometimes i'll close
my eyes and i can
come down from the
cross and actually
enjoy the view

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

Truth Never Goes Out of Style

Interviewing American Artist Danielle Shorr

You can never expect when you will find a great read. It catches you in the strangest of places. During an Uber ride, while coming out of an educational center, or in the middle of a heated discussion. Sometimes you’re in the movie theater, watching a silly movie and a bored version of you checks your phone only to find a poem, a thought piece, or a short story that attracts your attention away from the mayhem onscreen.

So, when I came across Danielle Shorr’s poetry and her graphic essays, I was mesmerized. She talked about some heavy stuff in a smart, raised-eyebrow manner. Not only did she openly unbandage old wounds and show a vulnerable, raw side of her, but her writing was also quirky, funny, and too smart for our systemized modern world to read sans context.

I googled Shorr and had an Elle Woods moment. This gorgeous blonde is rewriting what it means to be a poet and a creative, with her perfect blonde hair, her hourglass figure, and her cyan blue eyes. I sought Shorr and she generously agreed to be interviewed by none other than your favorite Egyptian author/poet. I wanted to introduce Shorr as a poet but then I noticed her visual essays and realized there’s more to her than met the eye,

“I’d like to say an artist in general. I love writing but also digital art and drawing. I think art can and should be interdisciplinary when possible.”

Slowly, I learned all about her artistic journey, influences, and background,

“My story isn’t anything crazy. I started writing in high school, mostly music, and then I moved towards poetry/essays/etc. College is where I was able to develop my writing more, but when I was eighteen, I won a poetry slam and became a member of a slam poetry team representing Pomona in Los Angeles, California. That’s where I give most of my credit for finding my voice. That opportunity taught me how to speak up and write about the things that matter. I like writing because you don’t need money to write. You need minimal supplies, just a pen, and paper. Anyone can do it anywhere and that’s what’s so lovely.

I have so many artistic influences! A lot of those are my friends and teachers. Poetry-wise I’m influenced by Mary Oliver, Maggie Smith, Frank O’Hara, Yesika Salgado, and many more. [Of the most moving poem she read] I love Good Bones a poem by Maggie Smith. I always return to it.”

Reading Shorr’s powerful graphic essay, My Neighbors Can See my Nipples and Other Observations I immediately connected with a sense of Christmas nostalgia. Being a Muslim girl who was not allowed to own a Christmas tree because of her faith, I was particularly struck by this paragraph,

“Being Jewish, I have never owned a Christmas tree. This is unfortunate because I have always been a sucker for holidays and kitsch. Christmas time as an adult is a special joy for me, as I get to witness the decorations around my town that I so desperately longed to have myself as a kid. “Jews don’t decorate for Christmas,” my mom would remind me”

It never occurred to me that I would connect to a fellow Christmas non-celebrator, not in the US. As a sucker for Hollywood family and teen movies when I was growing up in the 90s-00s, I always assumed that Christmas was raved and celebrated all over America. You didn’t have to be Christian to celebrate it, only Western and enjoying all the festivities, the food, the decorations, and the lights. To hear Shorr’s honest testimonial about her similar Christmas-less childhood, I was inspired,

“I’m so glad my essay resonated with you! Interestingly, Christmas and Christmas decor is so mainstream ingrained and we don’t often realize how alienating it can be to be of faith outside of Christianity during the holidays.”

It was downright ridiculous not to bring up her looks. Women are prone to judgment and scrutiny based on how they carry themselves around. And a woman in the arts had to have a certain air around her, or else her talent would be questioned and sometimes doubted. Looking like a Hollywood babe and writing thought-provoking poems and essays, I had to ask Shorr how that experience affected her creativity,

“That’s such an interesting question. I think I have met my fair share of people doubting my writing abilities/teaching abilities because I do value aesthetics in how I look. I think it’s so important for people to learn and see that your sex appeal does not diminish the quality of your work, that you can be hot and sexy and confident and that doesn’t detract from your talents/skills. I think it’s important to emphasize that valuing your appearance doesn’t make you any less of an artist/creator/educator, etc.”

Shorr surprised me with every answer she had to offer. Her artistic mind was calculated and yet sensitive and vulnerable. She carried her fragility like a swan, and that’s what made her shine inexplicably with vibrant, unexpected answers to my inquiries,

“I think there is this idea that artists are always filled to the brim with ideas they have to express and in my experience that hasn’t been true. For me, the urge to write comes and goes, and sometimes I’ll go weeks or months without writing. But I don’t stress about it because I know it’s something I’ll always have and that the stories and words will come to me when they’re ready.

Sometimes feelings drive me to write but sometimes it’s also an idea! For that essay, it was something I said to my fiancé and thought it would be an interesting essay title. I sat down to write not knowing where it was going and it naturally just went in the direction of vulnerability. That’s not always how my process goes but it just kind of developed authentically from there.”

As a fellow trauma survivor and a writer interested in exploring the impact that PTSD and depression has had on her creative journey, I had to ask Shorr how she perceived navigating trauma from a healing perspective versus exploring the traumatized side of her through art,

“I think writing can help navigate trauma but it shouldn’t be the driving reason behind it. I think it’s good to have a certain distance from trauma before writing about it, or else it can be all-consuming. I opted to draw this essay because I thought the visual element would help set the tone for it. I love giving readers a variance in the form and I think images can be effective and helpful in breaking up the monotony of a standard essay.

I think certain kinds of art can romanticize mental illness but fortunately, we as a society are moving towards more honest depictions of what living with mental illness is like. It’s important to write your truth as honestly as possible because although it might not speak for everyone with that, it will likely connect with many. I’ve found that the more honest/vulnerable/personal you are, the more people relate.”

In a critique of one of my guilty pleasures, a movie titled Frankie and Johnny starring Al Pacino and Michelle Pfeiffer, the female -quite a shocker to me- critic disliked how Pfeiffer was cast as a lonely, physically abused woman. She as well as many other critics mentioned that she was too young and too pretty to play a lonely, down-on-her-luck waitress whose chances at love are scarcer as days go by. Not only did I find this ridiculous, but also sexist, as if beautiful women should only be presented as Amazonian winners who always get what they want. I’m glad these critics do not exist in a time where a gorgeous woman like Nicole Kidman plays a battered, sexually abused wife who abandons a successful law career to “wipe runny noses and organize playdates” in Big Little Lies. I mimicked the ignorance of 90s era critics and asked a gorgeous Shorr what she thought of the concept, writing about physical abuse herself,

“I think anyone is vulnerable to toxic relationships, and that unfortunately, nobody is exempt from potentially falling into physically and emotionally abusive relationships. Abuse is so calculated that even if you know your worth, you can still be taken advantage of. I have been with partners who have not been good to me, and in retrospect, good enough for me, but because they were able to make me doubt my worth and what I knew to be true, I stayed. I think a lot about the role of withholding in abusive relationships, and what that can do to a person. When a partner is withholding affection/attention/or love from us, that is a form of emotional abuse. I know now because of the healthy relationship that I am currently in, that a good partner will never make you feel like you’re starving.”

Shorr was a mystic creature, quartz that eludes your definition and defies your expectations. Her admiration for poetry slams stems from the adrenaline, the connection with the audience. She has never been a competitive person so slam was the exception, but beyond the competition aspect, it also gave her a sense of community and confidence. Her favorite literary world to exist in was memoir because -in her words- truth never goes out of style. If she could exist as a poem she’d be a haiku, short and sweet. Her interpretation of how artists perceived the artistic process was too interesting to miss,

“I think it depends on the person honestly. I appreciate the connection aspect of writing but I don’t need recognition or fame to feel satisfied with my work. I do however really value connecting with individuals through art.

I do think a lot of people create for recognition but I also think many simply create for themselves and their sanity.”

By the time our conversation came to an end, Shorr expressed interest in reading my translated work and her affection for works by non-English speaking writers,

“I’ve loved translated poems. Pablo Neruda’s work for example. I think translations can be so powerful and that art can cross cultural boundaries. Some parts of human existence truly feel universal and poetry/art, in general, is a great method of communicating that.”

Danielle Shorr is a force of nature and the world will be her stage someday, just waiting for her to shine.

Humans

They give you 
happy pills
to make you "feel" safe
while they manipulate you
with cookies
to steal your mental freedom
so that you trust people
you never met
or will meet.

Humans.




Porn blows your trust

Porn uses
the ancient Oxytocin 
trust building blast
in this day and age
as a tool
to build trust
with media
you shouldn't trust,
rather than building bonds
with real human beings
that want to live 
together with you
instead of through a screen.



Unconditional Love

Unconditional love:
love beyond measure.

the worms 
eating your flesh
as they crawl into your casket:

be their nourishment
end their suffering,
let them take your body.



True love




What’s More Insane?

What's more insane?

Shamanic wisdom,
Choosing a direction
based on the way a stick falls,
the earth's rotation,
and interaction with living DNA?

Or 

"Culturally accepted knowledge,"
choosing a direction
based on some A
I embedded in a digital map
whose very existence
was created by corporations 
who want to 
turn you into 
an Orwellian product?





Prepare the youth

The APA recommends
babies remain alone
on their back
in crib

not for their health persay
but to prepare them
for an isolated
cold
digital future,
"warming them up"
for the lonely 
digital winter
to come
with no human connection:
the singularity



TBHQ for Freshness

Keep the citizens
marching alone,
getting their 
comfort from food 
grown to ensure
the most satisfying pain,
sweet to the taste buds:

The members of 
a preserved society 
don't know
pain and death 
give life.

TBHQ for freshness,
keep the citizens
"fresh" and asleep
unaware of the suffering 
embedded in their tasty treats,
how the American dream,
the dream of comfort,
is always realized
at the expense of 
someone else's pain
and exploitation.

And don't you dare
let the citizens
know.
Keep them meek 
and asleep,
yet alive --
marching forward 
in the game of 
trading death
without 
rational consent.