from "The Second Book of Job" I. Everyone gets to be Job for a year. Or more. Gets to feel that trembling and fear of losing it all, watching it get lost. Everyone learns that lesson. Knows that cost. You’re not alone when the divorce lawyer warns about the marital home. Or you’re not alone, when you learn another boss governs the universe – and not you. Loss is inevitable. But it’s what’s next that no one remembers. We get the shit. We forget the growth. So never forget that in the end you might just get a sexed up mate who loves you more than anyone who ever did. With all those others done. * from "The Second Book of Job" II. Job Junior lost the marital home when He and his Ex- were in arbitration and this clause became paragraph 3 (B), in the Clerk-filed dissolution decree, cause 49 dash 33, CV, and a “you” and an “I” replaced a “we.” He transferred thirty-eight thousand dollars, and he intuited things could be worse, much worse. Put one thousand books – poetry, Literature, drama, philosophy – Into storage. He took the last unit, next to the dumpster, the only model not re-modeled. Sat down with a bottle on the porch. Impoverished and moonlit. * from "The Second Book of Job" III. Job’s losses left him as blind as Homer or Milton and now he is the owner of very little. Someday his awareness will match that of the poets. He has less to carry homeward, and has no homeward to speak of. It’s impossible to look back without becoming frozen. His Book is closed. To lose faith, okay, but the Word? It was lost as well. So at the machine, for a spell, staring at the keys, the screen, and his hands, it all came out gibberish: “NIGHT OLD MAN HATE MONEY WHITE LUSTY DISH. . .” For now, it was just blindness, no insight. That spirit of Homer would have to wait. * from "The Second Book of Job" IV. This particular Job, losing ‘The Word,’ just let it all rip and let it all out. Typed away. Just squeezed out every turd that fell out of his mental ass. About midnight he filled three pages’ worth: HOTEL BILLS . . . SAME ROOM . . . WEDDING NIGHT . . . HORSE TRACK . . . ROUTE TO THE HEART . . . MILLIONAIRE . . . HE GETS IT . . . FREE LOVE . . . MONEY FOR THE PONIES . . . YOU SAY MORE ANAL . . . TALK ABOUT THE SECOND BIRTH . . . I WAS NOT THERE FOR THE FIRST . . . TAKEN BACK IN TIME . . . DIRTY UNDERWEAR . . . ODD DEBTS . . . SHIT . . . WHAT’S HAPPPENING . . . DO I DOUBT . . . DO I PRAY . . . HELL . . . PURGATORY . . . PURGATORY . . . HELL . . . But she was gone. He knew things would end well. * from "The Second Book of Job" VI. Another Job lost seven days with each of 2 sons out of every two weeks. “Fifty-fifty fair” made it hard to bitch but he did anyway, however weak it left him feeling. And the Ex- would switch this day for that day so many days that he recognized a slow, distinct leak in his clock, his calendar, in his haze. Sanity was a thing now out of reach. There was no point in trying to talk her into paying back time. This was not her M.O. And he couldn’t pay the lawyer. He recalled the man in the coat, the wind, the Sun . . . that fable would win in the end. * from "The Second Book of Job" VII. Another Job lost his credit rating. His wife decided to have an affair with Neiman-Marcus, or women’s clothing, generally speaking. A millionaire was the last affair. It was spending power. That was the deal. In an icky hour in a hotel room beneath his pay grade he allowed her equal status: she paid. Savings accounts and college funds went down. He learned her weakness was the winning horse. Wads of fives and tens turned up in drawers. (It takes a lot of paint to paint the town) This Job inherited: a millionaire. Grew bored with the track. But loved the clothing.
Category Archives: CHAOS
Poetry from Patricia Doyne
TWO CHEERS FOR TREASON
January 6, 2021
A mob stormed the Capitol
killing five police, wounding over 100.
Some were blindly loyal to Trump,
taken in by his “stolen election” line;
others were simply spoiling for a fight.
But-- despite the gallows prepped and ready,
Mike Pence didn’t get hung.
Despite Senators willing to double-cross voters,
replace electors with puppets,
and kiss the incumbent’s ring,
each state’s votes were ratified.
And despite Trump’s sore-loser grousing,
he wound up a lame duck.
December 12, 2022
MTG boasts to the NY Young Republicans Club:
“I gotta tell you something.
If Steve Bannon and I had organized that,
we would have WON.
Not to mention, it would have been armed.”
Here’s a Representative from Georgia
bragging that she could have pulled off
a better insurrection.
She would have brought more firepower,
blasted her way through those cops.
She would have marched over the dead and wounded,
defeated Congress, and forced their hand.
She would have WON.
Backed by guns and slogans,
she would have awarded Trump the oval office,
perhaps President for life.
Is this payback for Appomattox?
Rebellion not quelled, just postponed?
Trump’s infantry was a mix of malleable misfits,
Proud Boys, Oath Keepers, Q-Anon fruit-loops,
and politicians with an eye to the main chance.
January 6 was the day they’d change the world.
If a cult figure mouthing MAGA
could be enthroned at gunpoint,
kingmakers would hold undisputed power.
We would have won.
January 3, 2023
MTG places her hand on a bible
and swears to uphold the Constitution.
Are her fingers crossed?
She bragged she could bring the US to its knees--
if she led that mob;
if she armed the rioters
so they could gun down law enforcement;
if she took possession of the Capitol
to thwart Congress’ Constitutional job.
Her victory? Sabotaging a presidential election.
It makes one wonder:
should a person who cheers for gun-toting thugs
be running our country?
Should a person who brags about trashing ballots
be making laws?
Georgia’s white, rural 14th District thinks so.
They re-elected her,
despite her off-the-wall statements--
Jewish space lasers cause California wildfires.
Vaccinations are the devil’s “mark of the beast.”
Black Lives Matter protesters are terrorists.
Undocumented immigrants are rapists.
Transgender individuals are predators.
Abortion seekers and providers are murderers.
Democrats are pedophile-coddling Communists.
MTG hopes to be Trump’s running mate in 2024.
Trump, too, thinks his defeat so outrageous
that it justifies suspending the Constitution.
The two are salt and pepper shakers
showering spite and bile on a fragile democracy.
Abetting a taste for hate.
Copyright 12/2022 Patricia Doyne
TRUMP’S VIRTUES
Trump’s gung-ho to run again
in 2024.
He says it wasn’t fair that he
got booted out the door.
Many think him crass, it’s true.
Self-serving. Prone to lies.
But maybe narcissistic traits
are virtues in disguise.
He is, despite his girth and weight,
a physical fitness buff.
Visited golf links 308 times,
spent a quarter of his term on golf.
When shooters shoot up schools and malls
we know guns aren’t for Trump.
Five times he dodged his country’s draft.
Said casualties were chumps.
And family values is a realm
where Trump does truly shine.
Jared and Ivanka flaunt
his regime’s family line.
Forget two dozen rape reports
and Stormy Daniels’ book,
‘cause family pride glows in third wife
Melania’s well-dressed look.
What’s more, he reaches out a hand
to one-time foes. (Don’t groan.)
He sends love notes to Kim Jong-Un,
gets an $18 million loan.
When journalist Khashoggi died
at the consulate in Turkey,
“Bin Salman ordered it,” said the CIA.
Trump said the facts were murky.
And when Trump won, a Russian hand
pulled strings. The CIA spied it.
Said, “Russia, leave our elections alone!”
Shrugged Trump, “Putin denied it.”
Yes, Trump extends a welcoming hand
to strong men he admires.
Sells airplanes, crude oil, tanks and guns
to somewhat shady buyers.
And Trump’s an open-minded man.
When Neo-Nazis march,
he sees good people on both sides,
beneath free speech’s arch.
When Ye claims Hitler’s misunderstood,
and Fuentes flat denies
the Holocaust was real, that’s cool.
“Respect their views,” Trump cries.
His bosom buddies—Roger Stone,
Steve Bannon, Alex Jones—
show how Trump welcomes one and all,
especially pale skin-tones.
He disses “shithole countries.”
He tried to build a wall.
Just goes to show that Trump was true
to MAGA’s siren call.
And Trump’s unique. Never before
a President twice impeached.
He’s going down in history—
for January 6th, at least.
So if you want to bad-mouth Trump,
Please take careful note
of all his virtuous qualities
when you step up to vote.
Copyright 12/2022 Patricia Doyne
Q-ANON MEETS QVC
Mirror, mirror on the wall,
reveal the winner I really am—
not a fat old suit with a long, red tie,
tan from a tube, hair fussed and sculpted.
No, show my base their favorite President--
Better than Lincoln!
Better than Washington!
Show the whole world the superhero
who should have won.
A MAJOR ANNOUNCEMENT:
(Drumroll)
Digital Trading Cards!
Only $99 each.
Send your money, we’ll choose your NFT.
Take what you get; what you get is virtual.
It exists in the ether,
like the image, like the “very exclusive community”
I’m selling.
See me in a cowboy hat and duster,
a western lawman.
See me dominate the room in a black tuxedo.
See me suited for space, two feet on the moon.
See me alone on a bleacher-ringed field,
owning that football.
See me speeding to the rescue on a white horse.
See me in a mild-mannered blue suit
ripping open my shirt to reveal a red “T”
and scald the world with laser eyes.
The face is mine, but photo-shopped bodies
are all young and buff.
The world needs superheroes.
But the world’s got me.
Mirror, mirror on the wall,
show the world I’m what they really want
virtually.
Copyright 12/2022 Patricia Doyne
Poetry from Nilufar Rukhillayeva
On the wings of dreams
Nilufar Rukhillayeva
a student of the National University of
Uzbekistan named after Mirzo Ulugbek
Dreams are a way to get into a world where you are happy.
Some people think that dreaming is stupid, others just live with it. Scientists have come to the conclusion that the ability to dream is one of the main characteristics of a successful and happy person. Probably, there is no person in the world who has not indulged in dreams at least once in his life. It all starts from childhood – thoughts about the future appear in our clear heads. Psychologists say that in this way the formation of the child’s thinking takes place, the imagination of a small person develops. They also point out that most children’s dreams are illusions that are unlikely to ever come true. But this fact does not bother the little ones, they have a short memory of blessing and disappointment. Thought streams are formed in their heads, and what is happening now, right now, is important to them. Everything else flows like a river without a future or a past.
It’s hard to live without a dream,
There is a consequence, everyone step.
Good, bad, big, small,
Everyone has their own dreams man
So that a person does not get tired of living, a world of dreams is given to his heart. There is a human race that wants to satisfy the dreams that he was born with every moment. To live in life, only the dream itself is lacking. If you are asked, “What is your biggest dream?”, you will be silent for a moment. I wonder if the dream can be big or small? as it changes depending on how it looks. A dream is not a whim. It is the pillar that has caused humanity to reach the present day. What is the human dream not good for, you say?!
I have heard a lot that “Everything depends on the intention”. As a person grows up, his desire to “return to childhood” replaces his dream. A person with big dreams requires effort to achieve his dreams. As for my dream: Patience to man! If the element of Patience leads a person, then there is one step left to achieve the dream and achieve success!
Dreams,
Dreams that are stretched to the height of the sky,
In flight, the falcon smelled
Dreams.
bursting like fire
stung like a deer
The wave hit and swam like a wave
Poetry from Wayne Mason
Lost In Empty Worlds And Metallic Beats
Dismal gray like prisons of icy
steel in the natural world
Keep your eyes closed pretend.
Living breathing dreaming hum
of memories like ashes spread out
Clanking steel bebop ding people fussing.
Flesh hanging the mood silent
amid the vapor of smoke and guilt
Sitting within prison of bleak nothings
Bad trip, We Are The Nightmare
Karmic phantoms feeding on
everyone in Bardo Hell
Burning angels, remember?
We lit the fire and started to burn
They are squeezing all they can
from our brains like a dingy sponge
“It’s true that you are in dreamless sleep?”
The clank of the door…
We can use your blood in purgatory
Discarded Dream From Apocalypse America
O’ America…
I give you a prayer so you may cut it up:
I am a literary scrap man
Hopeless transmissions from (secret)
dark dream factories
(discarded) I’m an idea
>>>>error
Shadow People Might Even Be Music
Shadowy music approach
groping
time absence
light & shadow
physicists draw ghosts in the dark
ghosts
to smoke
One
person is
they
interdimensional musicians’
making ectoplasm &
shadows
Industrial Poem
Tick, tick zzzzzzzzzzzz
hiss clank boom moan
groan howl gnarled
fingers reaching into
the sky… click
clack thud
curling up like buzzzzzzzzzzz
pow shhhhhhhhh tick
crack snap hiss smokestacks
belch vapors clink slam
Poetry from J.D. Nelson
a rainbow halo around the bright moon tonight— somewhere, a dog barks neighbors’ Christmas lights . . . Orion reclines as he rises in the east cold, dark December— is that a jet way up high or the space station? power lines ripped down by high winds before the storm— first day of winter eleven below— the two chickens have to sleep in the humans’ house silence at midnight . . . six inches of heavy snow weighs down the tree’s boughs ------------- bio/graf J. D. Nelson (b. 1971) experiments with words in his subterranean laboratory. His poems have appeared in many small press publications, worldwide, since 2002. He is the author of ten chapbooks and e-books of poetry, including Cinderella City (The Red Ceilings Press, 2012). Nelson’s first full-length collection is in ghostly onehead, published by Post-Asemic Press in December 2022. Visit MadVerse.com for more information and links to his published work. His haiku blog is at JDNelson.net. Nelson lives in Colorado, USA.
Short story from Fernando Sorrentino
The Power of Words
1.
My name is Susana Silvia Siciliano. I teach language and literature at the Noble Wood Preparatory School, a coeducational, secular, bilingual institution that charges staggering tuition, located in the Belgrano R neighborhood of Buenos Aires.
Yasmín Magalí Corbatta, one of my fifth-year students, was a contestant on a certain televised quiz show based on questions about Hispanic American literature. The girl, despite being saddled with her parents’ original sin of punishing her with god-awful names, had always been an excellent student, and as such, had enjoyed my highest esteem.
The following conflict arose:
Standing before the TV jury, Yasmín Magalí was asked to cite any three works of her choice published by the Ecuadorian author Juan Montalvo. Being especially well-prepared (in great part, it must be said, thanks to my pedagogical skills), she declared, without the slightest hesitation: Catilinaries, Moral Geometry, and Seven Treatises. According to her, the three members of the jury (a bunch of good- for-nothing bestseller writers) exchanged glances, shuffled some papers around, and mumbled inaudibly. At last, the head of the tribunal announced that the answer was incorrect because, according to his data, Montalvo had never published any work with the title Moral Geometry.
And with that, Yasmín Magalí was eliminated from the contest and unable to proceed to the next round.
But that was not to be the end of it.
On my advice, Yasmín Magalí, accompanied by Dr. Tomás Toledano (who, in addition to being a lawyer, has been my husband for eons), arrived at the television station a few days later in a litigious mood, fueled by a healthy amount of righteous indignation and armed with an A4-sized envelope containing two photocopies, described below:
1) Page 162 of A History of the Literature of Hispanic America and Argentina, by Fermín Estrella Gutiérrez and Emilio Suárez Calimano; 2) page 211 of Authors of Hispanic America, by Rodolfo M. Ragucci. Both of them confirmed that Juan Montalvo had indeed written a work entitled Moral Geometry.
The three dim-witted bestseller writers deliberated among themselves, and having not the slightest idea what in the devil to do, lobbed the whole mess at the television station’s administrators, who promised to “review the situation and proceed accordingly.” What the higher-ups did next was to “take a corner kick,” as my husband described it, using a soccer metaphor. In other words, they tried to wash their hands of the problem without seeking a solution.
Motivated by the circumstances (that is, by the five threatening registered legal documents drafted by Tomás, my above-mentioned lawyer-husband), the director general of the station met with him and Yasmín Magalí. He argued, with malicious sophistry, that the question referred to works published by Montalvo and that Moral Geometry had been published in 1902, long after the author had left this earth in 1889. Therefore, the contestant’s answer could not be considered correct.
Tomás told me that at that point he stopped the insolent executive (who was attempting to ensnare him in a game of words) in his tracks, and threatened to take punitive action ipso facto against the program, the station, and the multimedia company that owned it. While he was at it, he let it be known that the fearsome Tirso Toledano, union boss at the Bulldozer and Borer Operators’ Guild, was none other than his big brother.
Then—this is all still according to Tomás—the executive was quite intimidated, and in an effort not to further escalate the conflict, proposed a compromise solution that would do double-duty as a kind of “cultural promotion”: Yasmín Magalí would need to obtain the written opinion of an Argentine academic, who would certify that, in their view, there was not now nor could there ever be any difference between a work published during an author’s lifetime and one published after his death. On this simple condition, Yasmín Magalí would be reinstated in the contest and automatically advance to the round that she had previously been denied.
2.
Being the excellent teacher that I am, I made it my business to procure the exculpatory document.
Because I have never been a mother, I feel that all of my students are, in some way, the children I never had (with the exception of an insufferable few who would have driven me to infanticide).
I described the situation in the teachers’ lounge, where my colleagues (the vast majority of them ignoramuses) provided a variety of insipid opinions that were of no use to me at all.
Gabriela Irene Laguna, even though she teaches incomprehensible subjects like math and physics, is a good friend of mine (in spite of certain defects that need not be mentioned here).
“No problem, Su,” she chirped. “Benito Benvestiti, the academic, lives right around the corner from me. He’s a frail, slightly senile old man who does his shopping at the corner market and bakery. He’s a friendly fellow, always laughing and saying hello to everyone, although that’s never happened with me. I don’t think he’d mind drafting and signing the requested document. I live on Picheuta Street, and the old codger lives on Barco Centenera.”
I thought it a good sign that we had already found the right person to put our plan in action, even though, despite being exceedingly well-versed in literature, I had never even heard the name Benvestiti.
Indeed, the very next week, Gaby informed me by phone that she had already arranged a meeting with the “renowned scholar” (as she hyperbolically referred to him). He would be expecting us on Saturday the 18th at 11:00 a.m. at his sixth-floor apartment on Barco Centenera street in the Parque Chacabuco neighborhood.
The news inspired a mix of joy and irritation in me; joy because our goal was well on its way to being met, and irritation because, since I live in Olivos — on Catamarca Street to be more precise — it’s nothing at all for me to drive to our school on Estomba street in Belgrano R, but I loathe having to travel to other neighborhoods galaxies away like Pompeya, Soldati, Lugano, or in this case, Parque Chacabuco.
Nonetheless, after consulting a map of Buenos Aires and with a brief geography review with my husband (who knows the city streets quite well despite being useless for many other things), I got in my car (we have two of them, a white one and a black one, same make and model), gripped the steering wheel, and with the help of the GPS, headed toward the apartments on Picheuta Street. I arrived with little time to spare, at ten minutes to eleven. Gabriela was waiting for me on the sidewalk.
She said:
“Want to come up for a cup of coffee?”
What a completely useless and counter-productive invitation. Why would we waste time drinking coffee when, just two blocks away, the academic was expecting us at eleven o’clock sharp?
By way of a reply, I tapped my wristwatch three times with my index finger, and with that we set out for Barco Centenera.
Gabriela and I, without any previous discussion, had both groomed ourselves to look at once attractive, yet at the same time, deep and intellectual. I had done so with my customary restraint and taste.
Gabriela had overdone it. I had never seen her wearing glasses before, but now she was sporting a pair with thick black frames that gave her the unmistakable air of a left-wing sociologist, made all the more believable by her lack of lipstick and her slightly spiked hair. Nonetheless, the combination of her long Chanel skirt and a rather rigid jacket, riddled with pockets and zippers, made her look a little like a nun with aspirations of joining the volunteer fire department. When all was said and done, poor Gaby, with all of her limitations, was actually a good person, but with a great propensity for the ridiculous.
I was used to my Scandinavian-style chalet in Olivos, and the ugly grayish grey building on Barco Centenera, typical of a downwardly mobile middle class, struck me as particularly unpleasant. It had eight storeys, according to the apartment intercom. Since Gabriela was from the neighborhood, it made sense for her to be the one to ring apartment 6A’s buzzer.
She did so with her thumb, not her index finger. After an eternity of at least three minutes, we heard a muffled voice:
“Who’s there?”
In an attempt to show how poised she was, Gaby, ever histrionic, smiled theatrically, and in a singsong soprano voice, trilled youthfully:
“We’re the school teachers, here to discuss the Juan Montalvo matter with you!”
At the sound of the buzzer, we pushed open the door and entered a hallway that smelled like chicken noodle soup. We stepped into the elevator—where someone had scrawled WHOEVER READS THIS IS A PUSSY on one of its walls—and arrived at the sixth floor.
The academic was waiting for us, dressed in a shabby robe the color of a sewer rat, smoking in the doorway of his apartment. He was a short man with a head of messy white hair and a poorly groomed, unattractive beard. A dreadful stench of cigarette smoke wafted out into the vestibule.
He extended a pallid hand resembling a cod fish fillet and gestured for us to have a seat on a threadbare sofa.
The old man was smoking what appeared to be his eleventh cigarette of the morning. There were at least ten brown-filtered butts crushed in an ashtray shaped like a tractor tire. Next to it sat a framed photograph: the author in his Paleolithic period, standing next to a woman with an evil expression on her face, possibly his deceased wife.
Both Gabriela and I were “reformed sinners”: we had been heavy smokers when we were young, but now, having quit the vice for good, could not bear even the slightest whiff of cigarette smoke within fifty feet of us. And it was even worse in that cramped, undoubtedly very dirty, and one might even say squalid apartment that we navigated about in the gloom.
Gabriela started to cough, albeit timidly, so the man would not think that the smoke from his cigarette was bothering her.
“Well then, ladies, what brings you here? I’m all ears,” he said, gazing severely at us.
As the literature professor, I felt it was my job to explain:
“We are both teachers at the Noble Wood Preparatory School…,”
“Yes, I know that. The person who rudely interrupted my naptime and made me get out of bed to answer the phone told me so.”
“That person was me, I’m so sorry,” Gabriela admitted.
“I have merely named the sin. I have no interest in the sinner. Carry on with the story, I don’t have all day to waste on piddling details!”
“Well, as I was saying,” I resumed, a little frightened now, “I am a teacher of language and literature at the Noble Wood Preparatory School, and Gabriela here teaches math.”
The academic waved his right hand around:
“Hurry, hurry, get on with it! I haven’t the slightest interest in autobiographies, much less in professional resumes, which tend to be riddled with lies and falsehoods.”
I swallowed hard:
“What happened was that one of my students participated in the well-known Who Knows It Best? quiz show on channel 73, Your Gratification Station…”
“I don’t know why the contest is considered ‘well known,’” said the academic. “I’ve never heard of it. As if I had time for the kind of low-brow stupidity so attractive to the ignorant, disgusting hoi polloi.”
For a moment, there was silence. Mustering superhuman strength, I continued:
“…and then they asked her for three works by Juan Montalvo and, because there was some kind of discrepancy between my student’s response and the jury’s criteria, they recommended a compromise solution in the form of a validating document be presented, that would certify, if not precisely, then approximately, the authenticity of that answer, which was in conflict with the facts gathered by members of the jury from perhaps dubious sources, but…”
The old man rose to his feet and, for a few seconds, covered his ears with both hands:
“What makes you think I can possibly understand this insane nonsense, this labyrinth of students, juries, and documents? Since you call yourself a teacher of literature the very least one could ask is that you express yourself with a modicum of clarity.”
My cheeks stung as if they were on fire, and a torrent of sweat poured from my armpits. Gabriela’s face, on the other hand, had been overtaken by a corpse-like pallor.
“In short—” This, in a massive effort to regain control of the conversation, “what we need is for you to graciously provide us with a document that certifies that Juan Montalvo…”
“Enough!” he exclaimed. “This must be some kind of terrible joke, and let me tell you why. In the first place, the only thing I ever tried to read by Montalvo was a dense and stultifying book wherein he made up god-knows-what absurd new adventures for Don Quixote. I found it so awful that I stopped reading it on page ten. As you can see, I have nothing to say to you about that insufferable author.”
“We’re so sorry,” interjected Gabriela, “we did not intend to upset you. We’re just a couple of teachers who…”
“In the second place, I do not think for an instant that the two of you are “teachers”. You’re swindlers, quite possibly with an international warrant out for your arrest. And if you are teachers, given your manifest ignorance and your ridiculous appearance and clothing, my heartfelt sympathies to your students, who will never learn a thing from you!”
“Well, in that case…”
“In that case, nothing! The best thing you can do is remove yourselves from my house and never, ever return with all of your idiocy and tall tales and claptrap about contests, montalvos, and noble wood.” Flabbergasted, frightened, and outraged, Gabriela and I clutched our respective handbags like rugby balls, and then, running as if to score a try, we exited stampede-style from the building on Barco Centenera.
We made it half a block away. Gabriela’s face had regained its color, and her hands were balled into fists with her fingers dug into her palms.
“Let’s go back,” she said. “I forgot something.”
She didn’t say what, but I had an inkling of her intention. I know from experience that Gaby can be a force to be reckoned with.
Using her thumb, she pressed at length on the buzzer for apartment 6A. After another eternity of at least three minutes, we once again heard the muffled voice:
“Who’s there?”
In a display of confidence for my benefit, Gabriela smiled, once again as if she were on stage, and in a melodious voice, baritone this time, she said:
“Is this Mr. Benvestiti?”
“Speaking. What can I do for you?”
“What can you do for me? Here’s what! You, your whore of a mother and the horse she rode in on can all go to bloody hell, you lousy old goat! You decrepit, senile, half-dead son of a bitch!”
We don’t know if the object of her ire did as requested because, instead of responding, he put down the intercom receiver.
We went back to Gaby’s apartment, which, by the way, was tastelessly furnished and filled with atrocious decorations on the walls and shelves — basically a cosmic bordello. But the last thing on this earth I would ever do is speak ill of Gabriela because, despite her shortcomings, she is one of my best friends.
“Héctor and the boys went to a Papi futbol tournament,” she informed me as we went inside.
“Ah, what a shame. I would have loved to see them again,” I replied, thinking: Just as well they’re not here! That husband of hers is a crashing bore and her kids are a pain in the ass.
The humiliation that the abominable Benvestiti had subjected us to had a diuretic effect: seized with the overwhelming need to pee immediately, Gaby rushed to the bathroom. I was right behind her. I noticed that the toilet paper in the little refuge was of appallingly low quality and that the four toothbrushes had long outlived their usefulness.
We went to the kitchen (sky blue tile, some of it cracked) to recover from our battle with the old man, and had coffee with slightly damp cookies (no doubt because they were not properly stored).
Then, with a kiss on each cheek, I bid her farewell until the following Monday when we would meet again at school.
3.
On the morning of Monday the 20th, I explained to Yasmín that Benvestiti the academic, a very charming man, had treated us with the utmost kindness and courtesy, but had politely declined to draft the requested document because that very same week he was going in for a delicate surgical procedure, which he preferred not to discuss in detail.
Yasmín did not appear to be overly concerned:
“Well,” she said, “surely he’s not the only academic alive. We could look for another…”
“Of course we could,” I replied. “But, in any case, you take over the matter. I am very busy now and I don’t have any time to pay visits to academics.”
4.
That same Monday afternoon, I was sipping my yerba mate and leafing distractedly through La Nación when I came across the following notice:
Benito Benvestiti, A Cultural Titan
The academic and intellectual communities are in deep mourning following the sudden death last Saturday of Dr. Benito Benvestiti, the Latinist and Hellenist scholar deep with roots in the classics. The cause of death was a heart attack. Dr. Benvestiti passed away at home in his storied Parque Chacabuco residence, a gathering place for leading artists and writers who would frequently come to hear the master speak.
His unfortunate demise was a great shock to all. At the age of eighty two, he was at the height of his physical and mental capacities. A true Porteño, he was born in Buenos Aires in 1938 and raised in the bosom of a family of poets, painters, and musicians.
His expansive, rich body of work originated in 1965 with the publication of his book of essays Latin Poetry and its Influence on Hispanic-American Lyricism. He went on to publish over forty works, including his most important and defining book, the classic An Overview of Juan Montalvo: Poet, Author of Prose, and Essayist for All. It is the most comprehensive and exhaustive survey of the prolific Ecuadorian author, for which Dr. Benvestiti was named an honorary member of the Montalvian Literary Society, headquartered in Quito.
This was followed by a list of author’s honors and recognitions, ending thus:
There will be a viewing at the Argentine Authors’ Society, followed by burial tomorrow at the Cementerio de Flores at 10:00 a.m.
I immediately picked up the phone and called Gabriela. She barely had time to say “Hello?”, before
I blurted:
“Gaby! Listen up, I’ve got something interesting to read you.”
I read her the entire La Nación obituary, from A to Z.
“Well, well,” she replied. “It goes to show you the power of words. Looks like the old goat took my advice and went right where I told him to go.”
“That’s exactly what it looks like.”
“And there’s not a damn thing we can do about it. May he rest in peace.”
English translation © 2021 Kristin Siracusa Fisher
Poetry from Mahbub Alam
I Do Wrong I do wrong while going to draw a rose every time Every time my absent mind flickers and falters Back to the darkness Swim on the bed No sight of night queens No scent of tuberoses Touch my head or mind Only in the vacuum I watch and fight I do wrong every time, no chance of drawing my love bird The light of the day sometimes covered with The brown ashes of gunpowder No greenery getting the pass I'm standing here for long in chain Can anybody come forward to free my chained condition? Oh! The beauty I like most. Chapainawabganj, Bangladesh 30/12//2022 Riot That started years and long years or decades ago The insect never permits to bloom the flower You can see no bud having any fruit We live in such a place where we cultivate the land But without any harvest back to home in silence Not that the land is barren, watered or desert Something unexpected always harms the crops We frustrate and blame our fate How should I go on such hungry life? Life spoils the lives staggering on. Chapainawabganj, Bangladesh 30/12//2022