a football party at a house across the street— yellow moon grows full chickpeas & brown rice . . . a spider climbs down a thread to investigate leaves are blown from trees— the driver with a flashlight asks for directions in the chicken coop a few mice scurry away . . . the cold autumn wind bare tree silhouettes against the cloudy night sky— the dog sniffs dead leaves crescent moon at dusk— the squirrels’ nests are revealed in the bare branches ------------- 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 poem, “to mask a little bird” was nominated for Best of the Net. Visit http://MadVerse.com for more information and links to his published work. His haiku blog is at http://JDNelson.net. Nelson lives in Colorado, USA.
Category Archives: CHAOS
Synchronized Chaos Mid-November 2022: Strength and Vulnerability
Welcome to November’s second issue of Synchronized Chaos Magazine!
First of all, we encourage you to come on out to Metamorphosis, our New Year’s Eve gathering and benefit show for the Revolutionary Association of Women of Afghanistan and Sacramento’s Take Back the Night. This will take place in downtown Davis, CA, at 2pm in the fellowship hall of Davis Lutheran Church (all are welcome, we’re simply using their room as a community space). 4pm Pacific time is midnight Greenwich Mean Time so we can count down to midnight.
The theme “Metamorphosis” refers to having people there from different generations to speak and read and learn from each other, challenging us to honor the wisdom of our parents and ancestors while incorporating the best of the world’s new ideas in a thoughtful “metamorphosis.” We’ve got comedian Nicole Eichenberg, musicians Avery Burke and Joseph Menke, and others on board as well as speakers from different generations.
Second, our friend and collaborator Rui Carvalho has announced our Nature Writing Contest for 2022. This is an invitation to submit poems and short stories related to trees, water, and nature conservation between now and the March 2023 deadline. More information and submission instructions here!
This month, our issue focuses on themes of strength and vulnerability.
Sreya Sarkar’s piece exemplifies this theme, comparing women protesting for change in Iran to the tendrils of a vine. While tendrils may look weak, they can eventually tear apart greater structures and claim a space.
Many other contributors draw upon nature for inspiration.
Channie Greenberg photographs staircases in different locations, many of which are becoming overgrown and reclaimed by plant life. J.D. Nelson creates small poetic snapshots of natural scenes.
John Culp probes the nature of love and intimacy through sharing his feelings about a rose in a vase on his windowsill. Mesfakus Salahin plumbs the depths of human emotion and bodies of water. Debarati Sen poetizes about poetry through floral metaphors while observing the change of seasons into fall.
John Grey writes of love and nature and incorporates modern science and climate change into old style pastoral poetry. Jim Force interposes haiku onto photographs of cracks in the sidewalk, places where the vulnerability of physical materials shows through despite our intent in their construction.
J.D. DeHart writes of nature, virtual reality, and his quest to figure out who he is and how he can most effectively live as a teacher and mentor.
Other pieces are more fanciful, yet still touch on the complexities of our world and our natures.
Bill Tope depicts a wild acid trip in psychedelic detail, yet suggests the dreamer is aware is experience is unreal.
Alan Catlin looks to his mysterious and foreboding dreams for inspiration, recollecting a conversation with a recurrent personage. Fernando Sorrentino depicts a friendship between a researcher and a mythical animal, suggesting coexistence with nature.
Nathan Anderson mixes up characters and text on the screen for artistic effect. Christina Chin and Uchechukwu Onyedikam create a collaborative haiku set, playing off each other to build scenes of nature and human culture.
Daniel De Culla’s earthy, risque piece entertains with bawdy humor.
Some pieces address personal and historical grief, loss, and remembrance.
Andrew Cyril MacDonald evokes scenes of mausoleums in his work, structures fading into memory along with their occupants. Naziru Sulaiman mourns his recent ancestors lost to a war of aggression, bringing them back the only way he can, in poetry.
Santiago Burdon presents a brave child who uses logic to confront his parents’ prejudice against Jews. Bill Tope presents a scene of raw suffering in a Nazi concentration camp. Cora Tate relates a tragic tale of a community leader who sought peace only to die from law enforcement brutality.
J.J. Campbell’s poems portray stagnation and the long shadows of trauma. Santiago Burdon shows a drug abuser turning to substances to distract himself from the desolation caused by his addiction.
Chris Butler’s short story highlights the trauma of sexual violence. This act strikes hard enough at the personhood of both victim and perpetrator that it colors their views of everything in the world surrounding them.
Other writers look at the social, emotional and psychological ways we can struggle or find our power.
In another piece, Sayani Mukerjee explores the cultural mythos of women as simultaneously beautiful and dangerous in a modern way, using metaphors from human society along with the natural references.
Jaylan Salah critiques our harsh criticism and disgust for women in film or popular culture who have “issues” or public meltdowns. She suggests that feminism has tried so hard to make women appear confident and competent that it has become difficult for women to acknowledge the human weaknesses that make us all real people.
Oona Haskovec wrestles with the human tension between loving our bodies and wanting them to change. Lorelyn Arevalo’s sensual poems convey the physicality of emotion, whether love or self-hatred. Amirah Abdulrahman mourns the limits of poetry to express feelings and change reality.
Vyarka Kozareva illuminates the drama hidden within ordinary life: clothing, birthday parties, holiday decorations. Chimezie Ihekuna continues with his semimonthly Christmas countdown.
Chris Daly’s readable, humorous poems about workaday life, taxi driving, and pigeons in San Francisco also capture the everyday, this time as something to enjoy.
We hope this issue will be a source of reflection, growth, and pleasure now and in the weeks to come.
Poetry from Debarati Sen
Peonies of poesy Peonies of poesy acting as a parasol from the scorching heat of reality. Amaltas dreams peep through gossamer veils. Emotional myalgia, somnolent hours, a sudden bazooka of rainbow syllables shot through the syntax of memory. Sunflower renditions, The wind in her hair. She wanted a bougainvillea I gave her dreams chiseled out of my bones, Epitaphs of proclivity, sands of time. A glass window and Autumn sauntering on my lacerated bosom. Ballistic oxymoron Seeping through leaked rhymes. The world is but a granule of sand seeping fast through my fingers. The mountains echoed luminous ballads on starry nights. Mist-wreathed hilltops hummed verdant dreams As October bid goodbye wrapped in a silken thread of memory. Clouds waltzed in front of my window. The turf is filled with leftover poems that fell prey to the sands of time. I bit the side of the moon and kept the rest for dinner. My poems lay tired like the old armchair. They gave me a weary smile. The smell of dreams percolated my senses; gestured me with a happy articulation. Life is a conundrum but we must move on Shaking off problems like the little girl shaking off the sand from her sandal. October bids goodbye October bids goodbye Wrapped in the discarded moiré thread of memory. The autumn leaves fall humming a baritone Of love and longing in tandem. The golden tinge paints a carnival like Van Gogh's acrylic landscapes. It acts as a placebo for my tainted soul. Amidst the concrete jungle of monoliths Autumn’s amber tincture renders an ebullient vista. The gleaming sun shimmering through the azure sky reminds me of our clandestine tryst on one such magnificent October afternoon. Verdant dreams glitter on mist-wreathed hilltops. I jettisoned my fears into the darkness of the night and waltzed with the wind's saccharine lullaby. Parable of forsaken dreams heap once again at my study table enchanted by an alchemy of reminiscence. As autumn gradually drifts away making way for the chilly Northern winds. Dreams flutter in unison. October bids goodbye wrapped in the discarded moiré thread of memory. Debarati Sen works in Presidency University Kolkata as a Junior Assistant. Her debut poetry book called 'Blurred Musings' has recently been published. Recipient of the Tagore Award 2022 and the Sylvia Plath Women's Literary Award, Debarati finds emancipation in her poetry! She has also been the winner of the International Poetry Writing competition held by the Elite Book Awards in November 2021. She has also grabbed the third position in the National Poetry Writing Month 2022 contest hosted by the Elite Book Awards. Debarati features in the Council Year Book launched on the occasion of Women's Day 2022 by Literoma in association with the Public Safety and Security Council of Bengal. She has also been declared as an Empalled Author in the International Author's Conclave held by Literoma in December 2021. She is one among the top ten poets of the Women;'s Day poetry contest organised by Delhi Poetry Slam. She has co-authored more than 15 anthologies and is recently compiling her first anthology as a compiler with the Quill House Publishers. Her poems have found shelter in prestigious websites like The Antonym, The Yugen Quest Review, The Kolkata Arts, Lapis Lazuli, The Das Literarisch, to name a few.
Poetry from Nathan Anderson
Sugar Window
it [comes]
[tripping]
[tripping]
[tripping]
DOWN THE...
#####################
along again along with machine
a marching band
and a
H*O*R*S*E
quaalude to take the cake
the wheel has come off the
[FIT]
[FIT]
[FIT]
[FIT]
######################
###############
#########
.
.
.
Nebulous Time[stamp]
////////////////////////////////////
////////////
////////
////////////////////
this is the sound of THUNDER (something)
only on the better
spring
clouded
semaphore
semaphore
semaphore
semaphore
[[[barked down in
nightdress as the soldier
grovels with
lids in the basket]]]
WHAT A case:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
Insubstantial Lamplight Callisthenics
hoof and
hhhhhooooooooopppppppppp
waging on the shore
B
L
A
N
K
MISS-ALIGNED
[soup][swing]
!
the coast is cold
&
volume is apprehension
&
&
&
.
.
.
Glass [half] cut [half]
brother can you spare a...aluminium aluminium aluminium...
a constant swab of...falalalala...how much is the cash back...
long long long long long long long...sheepskin rug...I
bbbbbbbbbbbbbbbb
uuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu
bbbbbbbbbbbbbbbb
uuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu
!!!
and the same to you
/////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
////////////////////////////////////////
////////////////////////////////////////////
--lift--[to say it[[
--left--[leg[[to say it[[
--lift--[to say it[[
--right--[leg[[to say it[[
ARRANGE IT ALL AGAIN
Anxiety Measure (wa wa)
consignment
ever
t
h
i
s
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
a l
i
n
e
in the
u
p
p
e
r
c
a
s
e
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
crustacean
i want my elbows back
i want to stand in summer
i want a nightdress and a telephone
i want
i want
i want
i
i
i
i
i
i
i
i
i
w
a
n
t
what
you've
..................
..................
..................
Bio: Nathan Anderson is a poet from Mongarlowe Australia. He is the author of Mexico Honey, The Mountain + The Cave and Deconstruction of a Symptom. His work has appeared in Otoliths, BlazeVox, Beir Bua and elsewhere. You can find him at nathanandersonwriting.home.
Story from Chris Butler
The Terror of Tulips
By Chris Butler
The cock of the walk. The early Saturday morning's sun beamed through the gray overcast of night with the rays of golden gods. The college campus's freshly barbered lawns glistened. The acoustic melodies of an older generation echoed from the insomniac stoners' room, playing the soothing soundtrack for coming down. The birds chirped their harmonious courtships. A college junior, with his combed hair parted to perfection across his head and his brand new satin shirt hung across his plateaued shoulders without a wrinkle, had the stride with the pride of a royal lion as he smirked fondly across his kingdom.
Leo strolled past the mailbox built within a block of individually selected bricks and up the winding driveway of his fraternity house. Alpha Beta Gamma was a century's old mansion that was formerly the home of the university's founder and first dean. His body swaggered with the fluid swing of each arm. He inhaled deep, free puffs that filled his bagpipe lungs to capacity. He skipped up each of the three concrete steps that led to the massive oak door. He paused for a moment, the sly smile of the recollection of satisfaction smeared across his face, lifting the corners of his lips just below his bloodshot, bright blue eyes. His sure hand gripped the iron doorknob as he took one last breath of fresh air.
Leo reminisced of the evening before, and massive celebration at his friend's parent's house, who left their son in charge as the caretaker of their home as they flew south for a lavish vacation. His friend had decided that the Friday evening of that week was the opportunity of a young lifetime to throw the perfect keg party, along with a shapely array of plastic bottles of clear and brown alcohol. Since Leo the had the earliest date of birth of everyone in his class, he had been placed in charge of procuring the drinks for the epic celebration. Most of the girls who had arrived at the party with promises of free liquor and beer had already spent an evening with Leo, and were aware of his predatory ways. They were lionesses, and knew all too well that it was the female of the species who brought home the dead meat. They were more interested in spending their precious evenings with anyone else.
But from across the room appeared a girl Leo had never seen before. She was as fully fulfilled and developed as a woman, yet naively younger than college age, she must be eighteen he thought to himself. But these numbers weren't of any concern to him on this evening. He seduced her with a special cocktail of his own concoction, mixed with his special secret ingredient of a little white pill. After she chugged his drink of choice as he whispered in her ear his favorite rehearsed lines to impress girls with a lower maturity level than their age, he offered to give her a refill. As her cup drained down her throat and below halfway mark of the plastic container, her body began to sway and she had to use his dominant body to help her equilibrium stay balanced. He had no intentions of carrying a passed out girl upstairs in front of the rest of the party's participants. He lifted the cup from her hand and placed it on a table. He grabbed her by the hand and pulled her towards the stairs that led to the second floor. She said something about her friend Lily, and Leo assured her that they would find her. And they should start their searching upstairs. With minimal resistance, he pulled her into the dark guest bedroom. He assured her that they would find her friend, just as he plopped onto the bed, pulling her down on top of him. Frenetically pulling off her sweater and jeans, he kept saying sweet nothings over her drifting voice. Flipping himself onto her, he pried open her legs. After the climax of his conquest, he pulled his underwear up and put back on his jeans, and as she squirmed in what he assumed to be as blissful dreams. He left, closing the door as quietly as a home invader behind him.
As Leo turned the iron knob to enter his fraternity home, a honeybee landed on his hand. His other hand went upward to callously swat it, when the bee's wings lifted it towards the bushes that grew around the exterior of the lavish house. He noticed that the annual tulips had spread open their closed petals for the spring season. The bee flew into the moist center of the flower. It crawled up and down and all around the sweet, sticky insides, fleeing with the bright yellow pollen clinging to its appendages. He nodded with approval towards the busy bee in its desire to master all the flowers in all the gardens around him. He removed his hands from the knob to smell the sweet, sticky insides that were still clinging to his fingers. He opened the massive door and disappeared from the daylight.
-----
The walk of shame. The Saturday morning sun hid behind a tarp of gray cloud cover. The spring air was moist, leaving a foggy glaze on the car windows across the suburban neighborhood. The early birds chirped with the hunger of hunters. A young high school sophomore, with long, bedraggled hair, strands dangling from the ponytail barely held together by a scrunchie, and her brand-new turtleneck sweater with a tear across her shoulder, she shuffled her feet down the street, arms crossed, her eyes staring downward at the asphalt before her feet.
Rose almost walked past her home before she noticed the mailbox painted with an array of colorful floral arrangements at the end of the driveway. She hugged herself harder until she wasn't inhaling enough air to catch her breath. She stepped onto the brown, worn welcome mat with "Home Sweet Home" embroidered in black lettering laying before the front door. She paused for an eternal moment, taking prolonged, bottomless breaths, until her head felt like a helium-filled balloon. Her shaking hand clenched the doorknob to steady her body tremors.
Rose hesitated. She remembered through the hammering headache, the queasy nauseousness in her stomach and the thorny pain in her groin about the lie she had rehearsed the night before. She had convinced her parents that she was spending her Friday evening at a slumber party at her best friend Lily's house. They were going to binge watch the newest episodes of their favorite show about fashionable, quick-witted high school girls and their everyday high school girl problems that claimed complete control over their lives, record themselves jokingly following the latest social network trends and uploading the results online, and staying up until dawn talking about the clear-complexioned boys in class they thought were cute, the girls they thought were sluts or bitches and the homework assignment they had to finish before Monday's classes were back in session.
The night before Rose's long, lonely walk home, the best friends had learned of a kegger hosted by college men at a house only a few short miles from Lily's house. Not boys, but men. The allure of leaving the same old high school boys that made juvenile jokes and always talked about subjects that made the girls' eyes roll around in their heads and instead spend their Friday night with a gathering of mature, intellectual men. It enticed their imagination of a party without lightweights who could not hold their alcohol inside their teenage tummies and by the end of the evening wouldn't spread sprinkles of vomit onto their shoes. But once Lily became separated from her friend, she met and conversed with her first college man. Tall, with golden hair perfectly parted to the left side of his handsome head, a man named Leo introduced himself to Rose. He offered her a drink, returning from the bottles of booze with a red solo cup full. The drink was cheek sucking sweet, but with a strange aftertaste. She noticed the college women staring in their direction, likely glares of jealously because they weren’t flirting with the hottest piece of man at the festivities. From then on, the rest of the night was a spinning blur, as the young virgin eventually found herself away from the crowd she was so interested in meeting, to a private room with a guest bed, the first time she had ever been alone with another man, or boy. She had tried to say no, more than once before and after she fell onto the bed, but she wasn't aware that her words slurred when they left her lips. But her refusals didn't slow him down, but instead sped his libido up by a thousand horses of power. Her pushes were too weak to express her displeasure. She thought of screaming, but his tongue was licking her tonsils as her lightened head spun out of her control.
Rose remained still at the front door of her home. She released her grip on the knob. She collapsed on the mat with her back against the door. She saw the crotch of her jeans glimmered with a spot of fresh blood from her hymen that was busted by that man's battering ram. A buzzing began between her ears. A honeybee hovered over her head for a long moment, looking like it was ready to sting. It then flew around the flower bed next to the concrete path from the mailbox to the front door. It landed on a tulip next to her. The bee penetrated the unpeeled petals and burrowed its way inside onto the virginal anther. It began molesting the unadulterated stamens until it was caked in yellow pollen. The hairs covering its twiggy legs pillaged the pollen. Then the bee's wings fluttered as it flew away, hunting the next flower for a taste of nature's nectar.
Short story from Santiago Burdon
When I was a kid I got invited, to my buddy Marty's Bar Mitzvah, it was for his thirteenth birthday, his parents were throwing him a big party, to celebrate a rite of passage, ya see Marty was a Jew. I told my parents and was so excited, the Bar Mitzvah was at Shedd's Aquarium Downtown Chicago, my Old Man said he didn't care, if it was at fucking Disneyland, I wasn't going, and forget about being friends with Marty, he didn't want him hanging around, ya see Marty was a Jew. I was more than disappointed, I was righteously pissed off, the only reason he had for not letting me go was because of his religion, ya see Marty was a Jew. His family didn't seem to mind that I was a Christian, you're telling me that's why I can't go, what's so bad about being a Jew, my mother put in her two cents worth, did you know Jews don't believe in Jesus, what does that have to do with anything, why does it matter, maybe Jews don't believe in Bigfoot, it's not a logical reason, I knew somehow in some way Jesus would get involved, why in the hell would Jesus care if Marty was a Jew, and there's more pressing world issues Jesus should be attending to, hold on here just one minute, you both have your facts mixed up, you don't want me to be friends with Marty or go to his Bar Mitzvah, just because of who he doesn't worship, Marty is a Jew Yet we go to church every Sunday, except the Old Man, and pray to Jesus, who died on the cross for our sins, and both of you should be grateful he did, because what I'm about to say, you may find it hard to believe, I guess you forgot this Messiah named Jesus, or maybe you just never knew, I read it in the Bible, so I'm sure it must be true, ya see Jesus just like Marty, was a Jew.
Poetry from Amirah Abdulrahman
AM NOT A POET Don't call me a poet, I cannot write the pain that flows through my veins Nor draw the chains handcuffing my body Don't call me a poet, I'm afraid to use my blood as ink and my skin paper Tangled in this life too A slave to my emotions. Afraid to let out my voice which unwittingly quivers when I speak. Don't call me a poet Because I cannot make out words of letters I therefore personify my sorrow Though I pen my own story I cannot give myself a happy ending So, don't call me a poet. Amirah Abdulrahman. (JAWAHIR'S PEN)