Dancing Peacocks

Dancing peacocks

colour in disarray

disheveled feathers

stare at the eye

I want to venture

into this electrifying dance

and it’s rapturous languor

won’t you tell me the secret

of this earthly dance 

your ruffled feathers?

dancing peacocks 

I want to fade into oblivion 

like your dance 

and the way you enliven

the music in and around

dancing peacocks

dance the way you want

I can’t build skyscrapers around you

only your body shall tell

how you dance in languorous ways

to

kill 

my 

stupefaction

And in these hills the peacocks dance

And in these hills the peacocks prance

All in the midst of oblivion

The peacocks the peacocks 

Cover mists in my eyes

Ananya S Guha

Memories

by Mahesh Paudyal

I never knew

Memories could be so torturous!

They come

Ripping through the curtains of cold, desolate nights

Squeeze in, right up to the heart

Shake me up time and again

Show a ghastly carmagnole of wounds

And still say,

“The night is yet to pass.”

Paudyal is a Nepali poet who writes in Nepali and English. Sunya Praharko Sakshi and Notes of Silent Times are his published works of poetry. He teaches at the Central Department of English, Tribhuvan University. He is also a noted critic and translator.

When I reached out to Sacks & Co., the publicity firm representing Philip Glass, I expected a simple professional interaction—either an interview or a polite decline. What arrived instead was a message from Krista Williams whose phrasing carried the unmistakable signature of a Glassian motif: a short, categorical phrase repeated with such structural finality that it resembled a musical cell rather than a piece of administrative communication. The refusal was not framed as temporal or conditional. It was delivered as a pure statement of closure, a cadence without resolution, a door shut with the kind of procedural certainty Glass often assigns to his arpeggiated figures.

“Mr. Glass is not doing interviews.” Period. No caveat. No wiggle-room.

As someone who has spent decades in Glass’s broader ecosystem—through long‑standing Vedanta Society involvement, through writing shaped by the avant‑garde lineage he helped define, through editorial and publishing work that often intersects with minimalist aesthetics—I recognized the pattern immediately. The initial refusal wasn’t simply a refusal; it was a phrase. It had contour. It had rhythmic insistence. It had the timbre of a line repeated until its meaning becomes structural rather than semantic. She had both gatekept me out of interviewing him as well as indicated in clear, unmistakable terms that he is not doing interviews. You don’t require a terminal degree in English to recognize the finality of that sentence. But I do, and it closes the gate permanently; not just for me, for everyone.

I responded with a dry, musicologically framed note acknowledging the decision and pointing out that the redundancy in the phrasing functioned as a kind of meta‑commentary on Glass’s own aesthetic. The exchange had already begun to behave like a piece of music: a motif introduced, repeated, and left to resonate.

A few minutes later, Williams replied with a clarification, which directly contradicted her previous statement:

“On background, I meant to say he’s not taking on any interviews currently as it’s not possible with his schedule.”

She then explained that she had not meant to imply permanent unavailability or a “welded‑shut door.”

The contradiction embedded in this new communication between the two messages was not merely semantic; it was musicological. The first message was a closed cadence. The second was an unexpected modulation. The first established a harmonic boundary; the second destabilized it. In Glass’s vocabulary, this was the shift from motif to variation, the subtle alteration that changes the meaning of the phrase without changing its shape.

The irony was that the correction reinforced the joke. The literalism of the reply—the insistence on clarifying a metaphor—demonstrated the very gatekeeping logic the original message had inadvertently performed.

The exchange had become an interview not with Glass, but with the structure surrounding him. The PR apparatus had become the performer; the email thread, the score.

Legacy‑artist PR, when functioning well, behaves like chamber music: each participant aware of the others, each gesture calibrated to the ensemble, each phrase shaped by context. It requires ecosystem awareness. It requires knowing who is inside the lineage, who has long‑standing engagement with the artist’s work, and who operates in adjacent cultural spaces. It requires recognizing that not all correspondents are equal—some are part of the world the artist came from.

In this case, the categorical refusal structurally shut the door on someone already inside the circle, not outside it. That is the professional misstep, and it is not personal. It is simply a failure of musical listening.

Williams did not recognize that she was speaking to a published author, editor, and publisher; someone who runs a magazine and a small press; someone whose work has long intersected with the avant‑garde; someone whose Vedanta Society involvement places him in the same philosophical lineage Glass embraced; someone who writes in the structural vocabulary Glass helped establish. This is not ego. It is ensemble awareness—the basic competency of legacy‑artist PR.

The paradox is that a PR firm representing Philip Glass inadvertently created negative PR for itself by mishandling a lineage‑adjacent correspondent. The exchange illustrates how gatekeeping can become performative: a ritual guarding of a door that may not need guarding, executed without awareness of who is standing on the other side. The representative’s repetition became a minimalist motif. Her correction became a variation. Her literalism became the punchline. The entire exchange became a Glass piece.

None of this is written in hostility. Williams apologized twice, and there was no escalation. But the exchange, taken as a whole, reveals something important about how legacy‑artist PR functions—and how it sometimes fails. Gatekeeping is not inherently wrong. But gatekeeping without context becomes a structural joke. And in this case, the joke was Glassian.

Philip Glass, born in 1937, is one of the most influential composers of the modern era, known for his pioneering work in minimalism, his collaborations across genres, and his lifelong engagement with Eastern philosophy, particularly through the Vedanta Society. His music is built on repetition, micro‑variation, and procedural architecture—structures that have shaped generations of artists.

Alex S. Johnson, the author of this piece, is a writer, editor, and publisher whose work spans fiction, poetry, cultural commentary, and avant‑garde analysis. As founder of Nocturnicorn Books and Darkest Wine Media, he has published numerous writers and produced work deeply informed by minimalist aesthetics, structural analysis, and the cultural ecosystems surrounding artists like Glass. His long‑standing involvement with the Vedanta Society and decades‑long engagement with Glass’s work place him firmly within the composer’s extended artistic lineage.

Sacks & Co., the publicity firm at the center of this exchange, is a respected boutique PR agency specializing in music, film, and cultural figures. Known for representing major legacy artists, the firm handles media relations, publicity campaigns, and artist communications. Their role is to manage access, shape narratives, and maintain the delicate balance between availability and mystique that surrounds artists of Glass’s stature.

The Voice Unseen

A heart full of passion,

And eyes full of dreams.

Her voice so warm, so sweet,

Flowed gently like a stream.

She sang her best,

No soul could stand against.

They heard a voice,

Yet judged her face.

“Talent without beauty,

Has no place to begin.

Just look at every star,

They sing, and beauty lets them in.”

She left her hope,

With tears unseen.

Talent lost to beauty,

Like countless broken dreams.

……………………..

Poem by: Md. Naeem Aziz

Poem Note: The Voice Unseen tells the story of a gifted girl whose extraordinary voice is ignored because of her appearance. Despite her remarkable talent, she is rejected by judges who value beauty over ability. The poem exposes the unfair standards that silence countless gifted people. It reflects the pain of broken dreams and overlooked potential. Ultimately, it reminds us that true talent should never be measured by outward beauty.

(This poem reveals society’s Dark Side Of Valuing Beauty Over Talent.)

Poet Bio: Md. Naeem Aziz is a Bangladeshi poet, author, engineer, and photographer, born on 10 December 1998. He is best known for his poetry and photography. His literary works have gained international recognition, and one of his poems has been included in an English literature textbook in Italy. Through his writing, he explores themes of humanity, society, history, and emotion. (nknaeem14@gmail.com)

Location: Dhaka, Bangladesh

In a lonely city searching for Walt Whitman and Chris Abani

(for Virgil)

There are things

I don’t tell anyone. I blamed the sunlight

Secrets I keep to myself

I was young once

Ezra Pound’s Alba tell the truth. I go down to the sea

There are things to forget

I found a kind, my kind

A temple that I could worship, destination paradise

We’re somewhere on a beach

Under sunlight I am my true self

I am an African rising in the winter light

Musing

Please don’t forget me

My eyes, the hot potato with butter on the plate with flowers

My lips, the lull, my hands, these warriors

While you love another, the other woman

I am recovering, hungry for you

My sobriety gives me a warm comfort

It is cold

The clouds are made of plasma television

Don’t let me drink a sip of alcohol

Dear God,

The man with the knife in his beak

is gone.

Striving into soft and gentle

waiting hand. The man is given a script

I videotape the dendrite

It storms the experience

My father sits in the physicist’s chair

The tree manages the peach

My rival, my guru

I seek help from the church. This poem’s

matters have a deadline

I go swimming

My limbs have a life of their own

These branches

I have flowers for Sindiwe Magona

I read the poems of Kobus Moolman during this autumn

I sit at the seat of their feet

These fine intellectual eagles

Their country made of meat, honey and milk

My prayers are compulsory

I am guided to the philosophy of

the straight path. No utopian illusion is this.

I am becoming mentally strong

Look at this blueprint

This blank page. The journey within to my mind

I find order in solitude.

In Cambodia the anchor falls

off the shore, to the handsome wind that blows

through every creek, nook and cranny at the docks

I have reached my goal. The destination

that beckoned.

The world is a lonely place

filled with Van Gogh’s sunflowers.

I think of the man’s dirty underwear that his wife washes.

Oh how his mother loves him and his children.

My love has gone to war.

He enjoys his work.

Killing men. Killing the cannibals. The humanities motivate me

to embrace this planet and the rays of the sun.

I stare at his shotgun. I open the book of poems by

Dennis Brutus and read.

I find myself

on the page. Between the blue lines I find lies there

frozen to the touch. I keep finding glaciers and

equality. The personal freedom of Milan Kundera

there in the narrative’s river

All I have in front of me is this.

Is this diary of an insomniac. When their daughter

came into this world  I immediately became her  teacher.

To the man,

(I want back in my life)

It is never going to happen

He will not return to me

Years will pass and I will grow old

He will still not return

So I think that he is dead to me

But not to another woman

He buys flowers for another, he kisses another, has children with another,

makes love with another

She has a spacious house to raise their children in, their cherubs

She drives a very smart car

She does not care for feminism or equality of the sexes, only birthday cakes

She enjoys his hand in the small of her back

This ex-soldier who was stationed in the Congo, my voice studies him

This ex-military man

He was in the air force

One day I won’t want him back in my life

One day I will say, ”I forget you,” and starve my body of him,

of his memory, the memory of his touch

I want my life back

But a woman who loses in love has painful thoughts

Tonight I am inside this poem and this poem

gives me life.

In a lonely city was the winner of the 2023 Sol Plaatje European Union Poetry Award Winning Poem.

Dear Starry Night, The Ukraine-Russia War Is The Interview Of The Week

Am writing

Green Jalapeños In War during an invasion

Am reading

Emily Dickinson in war

Charles Bukowski in war

This war life has broken me

Challenged me in war

Purple beetroot in war

Green spinach in war

Orange carrot juice in war

Bittersweet naartjie on my tongue in war

The divine matters in war

secrets of poetry matter in war

We don’t have forever in war

And that’s the truth

Blood turns into pomegranate seed

Truth finds exits out

We pour the salt into the wound

Bullets are like razors

Driven into the ground like a fever

The clock works like magic in war

The lonely dragon

and the dogs have skinny legs

I turn books during this war

into old friends

I call it “natural progression”

I sustain these books

as night turns into war

and day turns into hell

like relationships in my inner circle

Inside the mind of this poet

is a classical mind

a third World War

Tendai Mwanaka and Montgomery Clift

are men on a mission

taking the practical approach during war

They embrace art

during combat maneuvers

If the paradigm remains in control

and does not shift

In this blue reality

all the chairs are empty

Everyone is gone

Only I’m a captive locked

in this lonely place

I pray for serendipity, a son

I long for a song

Happiness and its pursuit

I meditate. I give. I hope

It will always be this way

because of the choices I made

That does not escape me

Now after all this time

Hours and and the silence

Maybe it’s supposed to be guiding me

I keep busy and distract myself in war

Practice good. Do good. I tell myself

Read

Navigate

Soon this war will be over

Or the illusion of it

Soon

We’ll still have the knowledge

of the wildflowers

Hunger mirrors sky

lonely in a minor key

War has a thin laugh

The woman in that mirror

her head is filled with starlight

Refraction takes place

Light bends

The Ukrainian woman

ties her hair back

with a black ribbon

The trees are unhappy

They have lost all their joy

The sea is green

The sun is lonely

An echo falls to the ground

A child is crying

An old woman left behind in war

is strong

Like magic she comes to life

in front of the journalist’s camera

Win or quit river phoenix

War is a novella

Suffering is a galaxy

Everyone has a fractured identity

We’re living inside the suicide

of a glacier

ascendance

mysticism

young constellations

We’re in interplanetary alignment

The paper is brittle

The sun is brittle

Cold and lifeless is the night

Inert is a better word

I blame the sunlight

The wasp found sadness there

This second poem was shortlisted for the Writing Ukraine Prize in early 2023.

Thirst

Yehuda Amichai

Marina Tsvetaeva

Nadine Gordimer

Han Kang

Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

Remember these names

Nadia Davids

Mongane Serote

Khaled Juma

Refaat Alareer

Although there are too many to mention

please, please I beg you

to remember them

If you have the time

Write these names down

Study what they have to say

They are writing for the future

Thirst appeared in a Canadian anthology, Unsilenced Poems for Palestine, and in the poetry collection Songs For Palestine: Struggle Poems).

Where I live

When I went fishing, the sea seemed small and monotonous to me, 

and I quickly grew tired of the monotony of the fish and seaweed I caught.

Sometimes the sea seemed large to me: during a storm, 

when everything around me merged into one – 

the sea, the rain, the sky, and the shore.

My boat sank into this infinity mixed with the abyss.

Now I don’t have a boat.

I’m an old man, but no one will write a book about me,

No one will know about my sea stories and adventures.

Because I’m lying: nothing ever happened at this damned end of the world.

The biblical Leviathan or the mythical cachalot never swam to me:

Only loneliness swallowed me in its mouth.

And the waves…

No: I have nothing to say even about the waves.

And my shore…

Yes: my shore is divided into two.

The first reflection of my shore is loneliness.

The second reflection is solitude.

I don’t even remember the moment

When the surf washed away my name.

I don’t even remember the moment 

when the surf washed away my bones.

I am without myself: without name, without shores.

Perhaps I feel calm

And I no longer need my boat – my boat is like a fifth wooden paw for a monkey.

How much wood have we wasted on our planet,

How many fish have we caught in vain,

and how many times have we died – also in vain.

Someone still believes that their shore 

is a noisy beach full of visitors and expensive apartments.

But all shores are the same: all shores groan during the monsoon season –

It is the first cry of a newborn and the last breath of the dying.

Tomorrow the sun will rise and the sea will become the sea again,

The sea will become itself,

The sea will become a community –

The community we never became.

House

The little house lived under a huge sky

The crying sunbeams imprinted themselves on the glass

The glass imprinted itself in the silence of the sun
The little house died under a huge sky