MULBERRY TREE
Mulberry trees should not be planted near the house,
Not even a walnut tree.
Their veins are demonic
And if they scatter, the house will ensure to stay deserted...
In the morning, the mulberry tree was wounded.
Shadow lay dead beneath him for hundreds of lost birds.
Only goats ate his flickering tops,
Which are until yesterday
It could only be reached with the eyes...
Azemina Krehić was born on October 14, 1992 in Metković, Republic of Croatia. Winner of several international awards for poetry, including: Award of university professors in Trieste, 2019.,„Mak Dizdar“ award, 2020. Award of the Publishing Foundation of the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina, 2021. „Fra Martin Nedić“ Award, 2022. She is represented in several international anthologies of poetry.
HOSPITALITY
I came to school very early that day. I went to a teahouse to pass the time. When I looked, a plate of "gumma" was placed in front of me, and my neighbor Abdullah, who studied one grade above me, was sitting.
"If you're hungry, bon appetite," I said sarcastically.
Hey, Aziz, you came on time; who can I invite? He stood up and pointed to
the chair next to him. I hesitated.
"Don't hesitate; there will be more than both of us," he said with a smile.
For example, like those who are hungry,
I am on duty at school today. I have to come early and leave after everyone
else. I wasn't hungry. But many are doing it.
Let's sit and eat before it gets cold.
"Now I'm eating the food with appetite; two more classmates came to help
me... After we were full, we thanked Abdullah and got up. Abdullah went to ring
the entrance bell.
We have a wonderful friend; he is very generous, - said Botir.
Even if I don't eat at home, I'm not afraid of going hungry. I trust Abdullah, -
said Hojiakbar.
"A great boy, no problems, a real gentle and kind boy," my classmates said.
I agreed with them and nodded my head.
But then I thought: Is Abdullah doing the right thing? After all, he is not making money yet. He sometimes takes money from his elderly grandmother, sometimes from his father. Abdullah has a big family. He is survived by three brothers. Therefore, if he spares the elders and does not ask for money in vain, his father's money will be saved. And the saved money will be spent on the kindergarten of his brothers to cover their lack of livelihood!
Isn't that so? What do you think, dear reader?
To deflesh,
the shaman,
the seer,
the mystic
lacerates,
purges,
starves,
punishes,
isolates
the body
of the self.
The poet,
inventor,
entrepreneur
concentrates
the body
of the self
on the solution
of a problem
like a laser
microscope,
to deflesh.
An ordinary,
to deflesh,
removes from
the flesh
of the body
by reading,
by dreaming,
by jogging,
by gaming,
by giving,
by loving.
SACRIFICES, ALL
That pilot brags about
the size of his payload
and he forgets about
chasing a horizon.
He imagines himself
to be a volcano.
Will you permit yourself,
then, to be the virgin?
Oh, those gladiolas
that brightened Pilate’s halls,
like those gladiators,
distractions from trials.
RICHARD FIRST
Across geographies
maintaining emperors
by cults and soldiery
has been a commonplace
matter of procedure
against the populace.
Richard had good PR
since he was popular
among the troubadours.
And today, presidents
who can stay in power
are liked by journalists.
SIGNS
The philosophers,
poets, and scholars,
workers of the mind,
invented Mankind.
They made Being firm
by creating terms
and categories,
the mythic stories,
right words and patterns:
They shaped God Saturn
and then mere planet:
Elements: Senates:
Beauty: Gram: Language:
Society: Beige:
History; Prisms:
Patriotism:
Sin: Geography:
Self: Heredity:
Time: The unconscious.....
The list is endless.
These concepts define
our world by their signs.
THE CONJUGATION OF AGING
Years are no series of jumps across gulfs.
We pass through life on a conveyor belt,
paying little notice to the timelets
that pace our course on the running machine.
We only slowly accept we're the guests
of Is, Are, Was, Were, Be, Being, and Been.
Our exercise machine slows then ends
before we realize we've reached the When.
Too Late
I have not been nominated for a Pushcart Prize.
I have not been nominated for Best of the Net.
I am not an American Book Award.
I am not a MacArthur Grant.
I still haven’t been nominated for Best of the Net.
No Pulitzer. No Ruth Lilly. No Robert Frost medal.
No Pushcart Prize. No Pushcart Prize.
I do not teach. I have no residency.
I have not won the award you have not heard of.
When I write my poem on paper
the paper’s value plummets.
The paper is useless garbage.
I am a font of useless garbage.
My arms twist like twisting things, my legs twist
like twisting things.
My head tips back, my mouth opens
and useless garbage pours out.
It will drown the world.
They will give me a prize to stop.
A special prize for stopping the poetry.
But it is too late.
The Last Resort of Love
The sand laden winds,
Lacerate wounds of the heart,
The chain of breath snaps,
How much indignant is the harsh wind.
O! The last resort of love,
Take me along to such a beach,
Where I may wash mistiness of my heart,
So that dust of the brutal city,
May vanish from the mirror,
And I should keep on running for a long time
Towards a far off of land, to a green forest.
So that I may get out
Of clutches of the demolishing city,
Trampling all memories and promises,
Far away from the city splashed with
The pollution of heart and mind.
The wind beckons me
Humming the song of peace and love,
To put on my soul the silk of consolation.
Aasma Tahir is a poetess from Lahore, Pakistan. She is a poetess of English and Urdu both. She has done Masters in English Literature. She is the member of World Nations Writers’ Union. Her writings have been published in several Anthologies and national and international literary magazines and websites. Recently her poetry book “A Lantern in the Forest” has been published.
Her interview along with fifteen English poems have been selected in an Anthology “Postmodern Voices” published from India.
As an internationally recognized poetess, she recently achieved membership of World Nation Writers’ Union, Kazakhistan and an award “Paragon of Hope” awarded by World Nations Writers’ Union.
She was invited in World Peace Summit, Nigeria by World Institute for Peace to present her poetry.
Her English poem “Woman of Art” has been selected in an Anthology of English Poetry ‘Emerging Horizons’ published from India.
Moreover, her English poem “Blood Festival” has been selected in an Anthology ‘Jallianwala Bagh Poetic Tributes’ published from India. Her poems “Daemonic Tales”, “Breathing in Love” and “Imitation of Life” have been published in BHARATHVISION.INFO (online magazine, affiliated with ‘Motivational Strips’). Her acrostic poem “Romance” got the first position in Tunision Asian Poetry contest and received winner certificate.
Moreover, her English poems “A New Moon of the Deep Chasm”, “Imitation of Life” and “The Lost File of Love” have been published by Sir Sajid Hussain in his book ‘A Bouquet of Triple Colours’.
Furthermore, her several poems have been translated in Bangla language and published in the newspaper ‘The Daily Gour Bangla’.
This is a short instructive article about one of the leading university which is established in the district of Surkhandarya province, Denau Institute of Entrepreneurship and Pedagogy at the Republic of the Uzbekistan.
DIEP is one of the youngest university which established in 2020 but in today’s situation, more than 7000 students are studying at this university. The essential thing of this university divided into two main faculties: 1) pedagogy, philology and teaching language, Russian language and literature, Foreign language and literature, history, primary education and sports, preschool education, Mathematics and informatics, methodology of teaching informatics, applied mathematics and computer science.
2) entrepreneurship, physics, chemistry, biology, economy, accounting and auditing, business management, finance and financial technologies, banking and auditing.
In general, There are four faculties which is listed as follows:
philology faculty,
pedagogy faculty,
entrepreneurship and management faculty,
faculty of exact and natural science.
Entrepreneurship is the most vital tool in economy of the country. In addition, world needs highly trained professionals who mastered different skills. Students who have studying there which is develop their pedagogical and entrepreneurship skills, this is all about preparation for the future job. Moreover, language is also one of the essential thing among people and countries. There are five languages which are taught at the DIEP, which are English, Russian, Korean, Chinese, Italian and Arabic.
DIEP provides students with endless opportunities for the students, such as: university students have access to the library and it is the fact that there is more than 15,000 books in library and there is also perfect atmosphere and you can take energy while reading or sitting in the library. Additionally, students can use the full advantage of the technology at university.
As one of the most talented and active student of this university. I highly recommend you to come to Uzbekistan and study with us. It can be provide you with endless opportunities to study, learn, research as well as practice everything you learned.
BREATH
I go through from inside to the outside deck via the automatic doors of an impossibly large ship. Just beyond handsome wooden slats beige that meet white painted wrought iron dividers topped with a teak rail, are nothing but waves, the waves of the salt sea. I sit down and watch the horizon line. Some birds appear birds that are tropical and that follow the ship. I wonder then where and when they rest, and it puzzles me. I sit in a chair with faded orange cushions. A woman comes out and her dress is long and is a print decorative and unapologetic.
The wind makes it to dance.
I wish I had a camera, she says, because I would get you take a picture of me. My dress is part of the wind and I look like a bird. Can I sit next to you? I don’t want to bother you.
Sure.
The woman says she is from the Carolinas now, but lived most of her life in New York City. I am no Southern Belle. Her intonation denotes that she is not below such, but rather more expansive, even cosmopolitan.
She remains on my left. A man approaches from the right but I don’t see him. She does. She says to him, You are one fine man. I have had my eye on you. And what a head of hair. Every time I lay my eyes on you I can’t take them off. Other men just don’t compare.
I look over, turning my head right to a forty five degree angle. He is a bit shy. He has flyers in his hand and is smoking a cigarette. I handed out these flyers advertising a party and I put the wrong information and now I have to go around and hand out the new ones. A pain. But I’ll get it done.
He takes a long drag of smoke into his lungs and exhales. The woman and I look at him and then glance out to the sea. By the way, he says to me, pointing to a table messy with wine glasses and beer bottles, an industrial strength ashtray with half its metal lid missing, I don’t know you but wanted to mention that you handled yourself really well in the midst of that fiasco last night. My husband and I were watching the whole thing. Bravo. Admirable.
I have no idea what he is talking about because he has mistaken me for someone else, which is a pattern, which is something that happens often.
Thanks but it wasn’t me. I wasn’t even near here.
He is surprised. I breathe in smoke. The woman breathes in smoke. He breathes in smoke again. We are all thinking.
Say, I say, What was it all about anyway? Sounds intense.
Abortion.
Abortion?
Ya. There is a group of women here that think the new anti abortion laws are great. I could hardly believe it from anyone, but from women makes it worse in my mind. I was so angry.
He is political. The non-Southern Belle with the beautiful dress nevertheless says something but I can’t make it out for a gust of wind, wind somehow like a breath exhaled by the sea skies. I am generally apolitical, though I have a few ideas here and there that lean left. I let them talk.
He listens to her and is upset about something and then voices his disagreement... They continue on though and are friendly but there is still some problem. Yet, they seem to find common ground on other things, more than not. Their voices fade out. I am thinking. I wonder what will happen if someone mistakes me for a person other than one that had a gift of oratory in debate, or attended an information technology training weekend, or someone who worked construction in the north of towns for a company that I, in reality, had never even heard name of. I wonder some more, about other things similar that have also happened, like the man who identified me as the person who Did not deserve one bit what Lisa and them did to you…no way, not you, who is a good guy and they are wicked evil and I am sorry you had to go through that..
I don’t know any Lisa or group like that.
But so far the reviews of the persons that are not me but look like me are good reviews.
I wonder what would happen if some authorities approach and say simply, Can you come with us please, and though it is a question on paper, is not a question in real life but a statement, and I have been mistaken for someone who did something, well, bad, untoward.
Two men come out and sit beside me on the right. One is of German descent. He told me this before. He chews on his cigar. I am a fisherman, from California, he says, as if simply continuing a days old conversation.
There are many rules where I come from, about fishing, I offer. If you get caught out of season they can impound your car, your boat, basically anything.
That’s right. Where I go also it is the same. Your Canada country population can fit into my California by the way. And, he puts his hand in front of him to help his point, and makes a gesture of some sort, There are rules for a reason, and they should be obeyed. It’s to protect the poor fishies.
I laugh inwardly at hearing this big and otherwise tough guy, chewing on the thickest cigar I have ever seen, say, ‘fishies,’ instead of ‘fish’.
Beside him I see another man. His face and affect, clothing and something about his general aura remind me of an old friend who committed suicide. Joseph Campbell said that once you reach over thirty everyone you meet will remind you of someone else you already met. True enough. And then what about fifty? What happens then? Maybe unless you are an extrovert, you don’t want to meet anyone else. This man looks like the suicide had he lived another decade or two. The man wears a collar shirt, a golf shirt or something close to one. Non-descript haircut, average height and weight if there are such things. I sense he is not an asshole though, but rather an okay guy. The suicide was also kind, especially as the world goes. Golf shirt is thoughtful but thinks about worldly things. He is talking to someone on his right about points, aero plan, miles, and he keeps glancing at his phone. This mediocrity consumes many people, perhaps the majority.
I breathe deeply, drawing the tropical air as if right to my stomach. Then I take a drag of nicotine and chemicals in smoke and bring them just as deeply in. I don’t really want to talk to any of these people, one way or the other, but there is nowhere else to go to smoke. Its hard maintaining, to coin a phrase, ‘lonership,’ upon a ship. Someone apparently caused a fire on a balcony and there is no smoking any longer on such personal outdoor spaces. Everyone pays for the sins of one. Plus it’s gotten late, and alcohol is a strange thing, - it loosens the mind otherwise inhibited and lubricates the lips. People say things they otherwise would not. I don’t know that I want to see or hear or know what waits dormant in most peoples’ minds and behind their lips.
The ship continues at eighteen to twenty knots, but it feels much faster than that in my guts and blood and bones. Maybe I am too sensitive, empathic towards the immediate and not so immediate environment. Luckily, a song sounds, and it’s Fleetwood Mac. It’s somehow soothing, a calm against the cacophony. Almost everywhere I go, they play Fleetwood Mac, because there is something universal about it all. I listen. I listen then to Stevie Nicks as she sings Dreams,
Oh, thunder only happens when it’s raining
Players only love you when they’re playing
The wind picks up. A storm is beginning but they don’t close the area. The man with the exemplary hair excuses himself and goes inside. I am back with the bird-dress lady, who is kind and articulate, animated and eccentric and quite beautiful, statuesque. She speaks of many things seemingly at once. America. The Black experience. Diasporas. Education. Employment. Travel. Relationships. Even diet and nutrition. And hens, ‘Hens,’ which I sought clarification on, and was her designation for women that, as she put it,… talk gossip, talk cheap talk, talk nothing but shit and lies about others, people that spread darkness and not light, not realizing that their darkness is going to come back and visit them double-fold in time…
It begins raining hard.
That warm tropical rain.
The wind pushes it into the deck area.
We stand up together. She is tall by any metric. But I am taller. She asks me if she can hold my arm to go inside, and it is windy, for the breath of nature has become much more pronounced.
I guide her inside at her request.
Where is the woman’s washroom, she asks.
I don’t know. I know the men’s is here. But I have never gone to the woman’s washroom. She walks with me to the stairs and I ask her if she will be okay to find one.
Yes.
I ascend the steps and she disappears down a hallway. I would normally offer to help her a bit more, to get there, but I have then begun worrying about many things, half formed fears, mistaken identities and the faulty perception of people, even of good people. I was thinking of storms, of politics and division, of life and no life, of health problems and health care, of alcohol, tobacco, and vessels that travel in the night through tropical storms strong.
At the top of the steps I was not out of breath, yet I paused and took a deep breath anyhow.
Then I began to make my way to my room, walking alone under one green electrical sign after another that illumined the way. I could feel the ship rocking back and forth more than usual, a ship perhaps five or seven stories high and housing more than three thousand people.
The night storm had gathered so much strength by then that I could hear the winds whistling even from the inner corridors of the boat.
They sounded like spirits calling out diatribes, rhetoric, pleas, strange joys plus metaphysical pains and warnings, all songs and long wild unabridged strange poems in the middle of a living dream. It all mixed together in my brain and spirit, and I thought of the sea and its vast expanse, of the Atlantic, the Caribbean, of how it rains, the sometimes pregnant sky birthing endlessly through time and cycle its own waters, and how the wind often takes these and places them everywhere, blows them with a breath, and they land sometimes in drips and drops like tears across and down windows, mostly never seen or noted, but having existed nevertheless.
There are spirits simply everywhere, and I think to myself then that many of the dead so-called are more alive than the living.
