the derkes sea, hard no sound piece or clam to found
coul and tamoil spinning round
from blow light biging to raise.
I was lost but returned with strength.
Found a fact of life fill truth in lose.
Asma’u Sulaiman is a poet from Gombe State, Nigeria. I lives with my brothers and sisters in a close-knit family rooted in love and culture. My father, Sulaiman Ibrahim, and mother, Aishatu Sule, have been strong influences in my life. I finds inspiration in my surroundings and expresses my thoughts, dreams, and values through poetry. With a voice both humble and reflective, I uses my writing to explore themes of identity, hope, and purpose. My work reflects a deep sense of awareness and a passion for storytelling.
There are so many things which turn irrelevant when they become outdated, and are, therefore, dusted out. It is very important for every young man to decide what is of relevance and what has lost it. Prioritizing is a very professional game in the present milieu, and even where things seem to be irrelevant, we make a list of the irrelevant, the more irrelevant and the most irrelevant. The most irrelevant things are considered obsolete, and then consigned to the dustbin. Our minds too have a trash box where we place most of the things which are not required in our daily transactions. Sometimes, when we have time, we sit and delete them.
The Relevantia
What is important for this society and, therefore, relevant? For a common man, the essential issues have often been associated with his living, his survival. When survival is assured, he starts thinking of living beautifully. Aesthetics comes in, when he has free time to think for himself. The third stage which often does not come in the case of majority of people [because the second phase draws on too long] is thinking dutifully. The second phase was the phase of self-decoration, self- enjoyment and self-improvement. In majority of cases, things stop here.
In fact, in case of millions of people, things stop with gaining a capability to make both ends meet. If they have shelter, a wife, a few kids, and work, they are satisfied. They can lead a life of eighty years without thinking a word about others. Religion plays a great role in keeping them subdued, and under fear of the gods, and it makes them do some good deeds also. If they do not think too much, it gives them a coarse happiness too. We can think of those also, who are born in torn families now a days, who do not have a home, who do not have siblings, who do not have complete set of parents, and who do not own a home [living on rent in flats] which means they have no permanent affiliation with any place. They belong to no village, no city, such is this age of transition and trans-movement. Those who are denied these basic certainties of life, often turn loose, and start their forays into the underworld. There is no one to check them. Parents can stop them, but parents, who are victims of this ‘surplus economy’ which denies them essential services, themselves indulge in wrongful deeds, and have no moral authority to stop their kids when they go astray.
What is relevant for the lowest strata? Food and a poisoned mind, against those who have everything. Those who can manage these foundational necessities, have a little bit time at their disposal, in which they try to make their living aesthetically fulfilling. Education, art, culture lend beauty and charm to people who have modest means, coupled with a hazy understanding of what they have and what they have lost. These people are thinking beautifully, and all their efforts are centred at their self.
Thinking Dutifully
The third phase sets in when people start thinking dutifully. If seventy percent people belong to the first category, twenty percent to the second, then only ten percent people are those who belong to the third category, the people who think dutifully. These are the people who have transcended the limiting boundaries of knowledge, and realized their interconnection with the superior forces of creation, which are benefic to all creation including animals, birds, and rivers, winds and mountains.
Darkness
These people know what is darkness. When the light has gone, and you are running for a matchstick, it is not darkness. Darkness is the absence of light. Even when you can see, still there are things which you do not see. This is darkness. If you see injustice before your eyes, and you move forward, this is a cryptic case of darkness. We have within us vast reserves of darkness. Education, knowledge, and all training which makes us insensitive to the created universe, add to the universal darkness.
If we look closely at ourselves, we will see how many of us are living, growing and dying in darkness. Light belongs to the Buddha. Light means you know what is where. If you become aware of your priorities, if you know what is necessary and what is unnecessary, you have light. Knowledge should have this property, but alas! Knowledge, as it is the preferred domain of the Devil, does not let us pass into the domain of light. It closes our mind to impulses which are divine in origin.
The Relevant and the Irrelevant
The milieu in which we are living is not the making of one day or of one person. Year after year, decade after decade, country after country, and leader after leader, have contributed to this collective blindness of human race to the impulses and urges which are divine. Knowledge, books, libraries and teachers are used to check all the sources of inspiration so that the reserves of natural wisdom among the students remain untapped, and ultimately go dry. Finally, we have to decide what is relevant for this milieu which has turned absolutely irreverent to the things which still have divinity around them. Here is a list of the irrelevancies which our young men can skip without hurting their career prospects. Tick out Parents. Tick out Teachers. Respecting parents or being obedient to them, tick it out. Knowledge is the most preferred item on the agenda. Wisdom, a dangerous proposition. Tick it off. Goodness, Honesty, Integrity – all apply brakes on your speed. Tick them out. Remember, this world basks in the glory of power, success, wealth and fame. Good bye to all great traditions of the past which believed in humanity, human dignity, human goodness, and godliness. If you consider yourself a good man, there is fear of your son or daughter moving you in the trash box. Beware!
Dr. Jernail Singh Anand, [the Seneca, Charter of Morava, Franz Kafka and Maxim Gorky award and Signs Peace Award Laureate, with an opus of 180 books, whose name adorns the Poets’ Rock in Serbia]] is a towering literary figure whose work embodies a rare fusion of creativity, intellect, and moral vision.
Are you still 66? I’m 60 now. I’ve done the best I could since your death.
Do you remember when you told your friend that “only Leslie is unsettled”? I was 30 then, the night before you died. That’s when you said it, at the theater; I overheard you. I know you meant that you wanted me to marry and have a family. Later I broke up with Dany. I married Val, the one you thought had a nice voice, from Iran. You had a conversation with him once in the living room while I was in the kitchen. You told him that you had a relative from Iran, and I walked in when you said that, surprised.
Dad was very lonely without you. I thought he would never let me go. He convinced Val to move in when we got engaged. And after the wedding, he made it nice for Val to stay. Too nice! We finally moved to 53rd and 8th Avenue, all the way up on the 20th floor. I wish you could have seen it. I was close to Central Park and Lincoln Center and Coliseum Books and Lechters.
Debi and I used all your tickets to the opera. We didn’t like it at first, but we’d make a day of it: lunch with Susie, Martha, and Anna Burak, and sometimes Tower Records afterwards to get the CD of the opera we’d just seen. I wore your fur-lined coat and mostly took naps in your seat. Then, one night Placido Domingo sang Nessun Dorma, and I cried so much, but I was really crying for you. I feel, when I am at the opera house, that you are near me. It is almost unbearable.
Beatrice dated Dad for a few months. She wore your clothes, used your Dooney and Bourke wallet, like she wanted to be you. She even offered to brush my hair and I let her. They broke up, and a few years later her cancer returned and she passed away.
Aaron was born in the same hospital where you had me, and – can you believe it? – my OB was trained by Dr. Landsman. When I went into labor, I had to fill out forms at the hospital, and where it asked for the mother’s name, instead of writing my name, I wrote yours.
Aaron looked just like you when he was born, and I gave him the middle name Yves in your honor. I was out-of-my-mind in love with him. In all the blissful moments of his babyhood, I felt like you were a part of me, delighting in him.
Oliver is your last grandchild. Again I was in love. We moved to the Parker Towers, a rental across the street from Debi’s building in Queens. It reminded me of our old Kew Gardens apartment. It was the same set-up: two-bedroom, two-bath, eat-in kitchen, balcony, a friendly doorman, the same whoosh of air when you closed the front door. I had a view of the World Trade Center, your favorite place to take out-of-towners.
Val and I split up soon after Oliver was born. Everything about being with Val became too difficult. Also, we didn’t have any help, and I had to do everything you did for me and work in an office as well. He moved out, and I was a single mother until Oliver’s fourth birthday.
Those were difficult years, with little money and a lot of loneliness. Debi was my constant companion, like a mother to me and also my best friend. Dorian was kind, leaving me cash in my junk drawer and paying for my airfare to visit him. He called me all day long. Once when I was in California visiting him, his cellphone rang and everyone looked around wondering who it could be because I was right there.
Dad married Anna Greenberg’s cousin Nina. After that, we were no longer welcome at his house unless we were expressly invited. If we were invited, I couldn’t even get a glass of water without asking. Once, when my boys were with Val for the weekend, I called Dad to see if he wanted my company. “Another time,” he said. He didn’t know that I was parked outside. Then I saw Anna’s son pull up with his family. He had Chinese food. He walked in as if the house were his.
After we divorced, Val and I fell in love again. He moved back to the Queens apartment, and Debi and Dad didn’t speak to me anymore. I was disowned. Birthdays and Jewish holidays were particularly painful. I once saw from my kitchen window Dad entering Debi’s building with flowers for Passover. When I turned 40, Val told me I had a call, and I ran to the phone while asking him if it was my father. The look on his face was pure pity, so I knew it wasn’t. Dorian was my champion, tried to mediate, and took my side as my protector. He always picked up the phone when I called him. It took three years before I convinced Dad to let me back into his life. Debi followed soon after.
Val and I bought a house together in Westchester. We remarried in the living room, our sons our only witnesses.
Aaron is grown now. He lives with his girlfriend in Washington Heights, and they talk of getting married. Oliver is 24 and home with us. He graduated from Queens College, like you and me.
I have a dog, Rhoda, whom I love more than anything in the world.
At the end of Dad’s life, he was sick for a month in the hospital. Every day the nurse asked him for his birthday, and he would proudly pronounce “3/25/25,” but on his actual birthday he couldn’t remember. In his delirium he called for you. “Ou est Yvette?” He is buried next to you in Mount Hebron. Soon it will be his 100th birthday.
We sold the house after Dad died. That was hard. Debi and I packed 40 years of memories with nowhere to put them. I still regret throwing out the shearling jacket you bought me in Italy and Dad’s certificate from the New York Institute of Technology.
Sometimes I wonder what you would make of the world I live in now:
Manicures and pedicures can cost $85 with tip.
Donald Trump is President.
The Twin Towers are no longer standing.
It is fashionable to live in Brooklyn.
There are no more phone booths and fewer and fewer parking meters.
Coins are insignificant.
Loehman’s and Lord & Taylor don’t exist, but Saks does.
No one dresses up or wears pantyhose. You would think they leave the house in their pajamas.
People hardly go to the movies. Miraculously, the Paris Theater is there. That’s where we saw Crossing Delancey, or maybe it was Cousin Cousine. The Ziegfeld, too. We saw Star Wars there with Dad on a hot summer night.
I get my hair colored by Javier, your colorist. I sought him out because I always loved your hair color.
I still go to Carmel on 108th Street to get lebne and pita and kashkaval cheese and sambousek.
All your friends are gone except for Vally. Do you remember when Val and I met you and Vally at the theater to see Three Tall Women, and we thought it was so funny that they had such similar names. She looks the same, by the way.
May died of cancer; all your sisters, too. They died after you, even though you were the baby.
Debi lost Stanley, and he is also buried in Mount Hebron.
Dorian will be 75 next month. He is still in Walnut Creek, although in a different house. He and Claudia had twins.
Debi is 70 and is in the same apartment. Alix Austin lives with her. Remember how she broke his heart when they were teenagers?
You have a great-grandson, Benjamin. He is three and looks like Chloe, and a little bit like Debi.
Dany never married.
I write a lot about you. It is like having you with me, especially how you laugh or the sound of your gold bangles. How you got mad at me for imitating your accent when I said, “When you are right, you are right.” How you couldn’t stop yourself from eating cheese and drinking the whole container of kefir.
I can cook almost all of your food, like gratin and mejadra, but not the rice pilaf.
I live in New Rochelle. I remember you used to go shopping there for clothing, and I thought it sounded so fancy. My house is shelved with all your precious books, and on the walls is the artwork you collected. I framed your library card with your signature, and I have it on my desk.
Laurie Anderson is still performing.
Spalding Gray died by suicide.
Pavarotti died, too. I had a chance to see him on stage at the Met.
Woody Allen continues to make movies, and he married Soon Yi.
I went to a dinner and Salman Rushdie was there. He wore a patch over one eye because he had been stabbed.
I won a prize for my writing. That was one of the times I missed you the most.
I also missed you when I got married and then when I got divorced. I missed you when I had Aaron and then Oliver. I missed that they didn’t know you. I missed you when I got fired from the bank because I couldn’t do it all, at least not well.
I miss you when I read a really great book and I can’t share it with you. Do you remember how we read all of Paul Auster’s books, one after the other? He is gone too.
I used to be afraid that I would forget your voice, but I now know I never will.
Love,
Lellybelle
Leslie Lisbona was featured in the Style section of The New York Times in March 2024.
Aside from Synchronized Chaos, the first journal that ever accepted her work, she has been published in JMWW, Smoky Blue Literary & Arts Magazine, and Welter. Her work has been nominated for Sundress Publications’ Best of the Net 2024 contest and won the nonfiction prize at Bar Bar Magazine (2024 BarBe Award) https://bebarbar.com/2025-barbes/
She is the child of immigrants from Beirut, Lebanon, and grew up in Queens, NY.
ALL-PURPOSE FACILITY
You were a noted venue
and I would often rent you
for some special attraction.
Equipped to meet any need,
enhance any intention,
sometimes you’d be my circus,
or you’d flaunt a convention.
But my business wore you out.
Now you’re vacant and condemned.
DEPOSITION
Thinking’s rearranging information
will displace
thin kings rear-ranging in formation
THE DAY I FRUIT BASKETED
In morning I wore a peach.
The sun oranged me at the beach.
Evening brought me raspberried.
How fruitful! How varied!
REPORTING FOR DUTY
Like the Snowy Egret,
at any given second--
always you will entrance.
To your brushy entrance
I am ordered to second.
I obey. I regret.
DEAR DEPARTURE
Reason, in fact, is irrelevant --
Treason does occur, despite intent.
Butterfly, goodbye -- your flitting's lost its power.
Sigh and sigh, flatter, flirt. Flutter your eyes by the hour.
Fear of your favor's loss finally dissipated,
"Dear," and I learn how grossly lonely is overrated.
...
When you passed, thoughts of you only occupied my mind.
I held my pillow at night tightly, and during the day,
I busied myself tirelessly to keep from falling apart.
People say you feel like your heart is going to break.
Mine broke into such small pieces that I wondered
if it would ever be put together again.
I would look up at the sky at night sadly.
The stars used to make my wishes come true,
and the moon used to make me feel hopeful.
But then, they brought only memories of us.
The sun, I hoped, would warm me,
also turned away, leaving me cold inside.
I thought I would shrivel and die with you.
You could not run to me as I held out my arms.
Only in my dreams could I find you.
In my sleep, you wiped away my tears.
The presence of your spirit still wraps around me
when I miss you most.
Years later, I now think of you without such sadness
and bask in beautiful memories of us together instead…
Even though I am walking without you.
__________
Love is Perfect
You need never give up your life
nor give up all wins or costs for me
For no monetary value can be placed on love
And in the end, riches will mean nothing…
Only love will remain and never die
because my destiny you are
What God puts together can not be shaken
For it is through him that all good things come
In this life, things are given and taken away
And even a heathen can change his life
For love is perfect, and our prayers were answered
on the day we met, and will certainly remain far beyond death.
_________________________
Kristy Ann Raines was born Kristy Ann Rasmussen in Oakland California, in the United States of America.
She is an accomplished international poet and writer. Kristy has two self-published books on Amazon titled, “The Passion within Me”, and an anthology of epistolary poems, written with a prominent poet from India, Dr. Prasana Kumar Dalai, titled, “I Cross My Heart from East to West”.
She has one children’s short story book coming out soon, titled “Tishya the Dragon”, and a few other children’s stories to follow.
Kristy is also working on finishing two very special fantasy books that have been in the works for quite a few years, titled “Rings, Things and Butterfly Wings” and “Princess and the Lion”.
She is also writing her autobiography titled “My Very Anomalous Life”.
It is her life story that few know about, and the many transformations she went through. She reveals every interesting and sometimes tragic aspect of her life. She shares her failures, victories, tears, joys, losses, heartbreaks, and how she changed, by the grace of God.
A loving family and how two wonderful children stood by her through her transformation to who she is today.
Kristy has received numerous awards for her distinctive writing style and her work as an advocate and humanitarian around the world.
Kristy also enjoys painting, making pottery, writing song lyrics, and being with her family.
She is married, has an older brother and sister, two wonderful children, and is a proud grandmother of three beautiful granddaughters. with one great-grandchild on the way!
