A Kiss Through the Darkness

When I discovered I suffered from depression and anxiety, I decided to make peace with them. They became my companions, teaching me to avoid people, though not strangers. I often found myself in bars, drinking recklessly. I kept telling myself that each night would be the last. But night after night, I met different women. I drank without care, to the point of forgetting my own name, but never could I forget my depression and anxiety.

Sometimes, as I undressed women who wanted to be with me—drawn to my humor, I suppose—my eyes would fill with tears. They would kiss them away, offering me comfort that felt foreign. I was lonely, and my parents didn’t understand my struggles. When I told my mother I felt guilty, her response was, “Maybe you hurt a friend.” But I had no friends, just the bullies who tormented me. I longed for someone to hear the silent screams of my heart.

In those bars, some women pulled me into their world of lust. I became a slave to their desires, some of them married. I had to stop drinking, but I found myself offering something else—my body—to appease my sadness. I remember one woman dancing, and when she turned around, she kissed me as I headed for the washroom. Seconds later, she apologized as her husband, sitting in a wheelchair, laughed tearfully, saying, “You chose him over me, after all these years.”

She didn’t care. She grabbed my hand, led me to her sports car, and drove us to her house. We continued drinking, undressing each other. She saw my tears, smiled, and passed me a cigarette. We sat there, naked, smoking in silence. She stared at me as I coughed, struggling with the cigarette.

“Is this your first time smoking?” she asked.

“Yes,” I replied. “But drinking? I’m fine with that.”

“Are you trying to drink yourself to death, young man?” she pressed.

“Maybe. I’m always suffering alone, and no one at school wants to sit with me. My parents are too busy with their lottery winnings to notice.”

“Is that why you cry, like an orphan who learned the war was over only to discover his parents are gone?”

“I think I was adopted just so they could have someone to raise, a cover for their wealth.”

“Money doesn’t buy happiness, and you’re spending their fortune on your own slow death.”

“I feel like I was born with a lifetime of grief. Drinking numbs my sensitivity, my inner peace, and most of all, the masks I wear to hide the pain in my mind and heart.”

“Do your friends care about the person you are in these bars?” she asked.

“I think they’d prefer I sober up so I can decide whether to pull the trigger or keep cutting myself.”

“Are your friends alive?”

“I’m alone. Depression and anxiety gave me a second chance at life.”

“Are you happy to be alive now?”

“I’m not sure. I feel like I’ve been alive for too long.”

“Have you ever fallen in love?”

“I don’t think I’m capable. I’ve always felt unworthy of love, even from my family. The only person who loves me, though she doesn’t understand me, is my mother.”

“Can I help guide you toward healing? Toward confidence?”

“Thank you, but life has been wearing me down, slowly, like a candle melting its own wax.”

“Will you let me adopt you before I die?” she asked, tears welling up in her eyes. “I want to heal you because you’re young and deserve a better life.”

I was confused by her mention of death. As I dressed to leave, she screamed, “I love you! Please, let my remaining days be filled with the happiness of helping you become a better man.”

I turned back and hugged her. We both cried.

Because of her, I became sober and successful. She healed me in ways no one else could, and in return, I tried to help heal her. She overcame her illness, and we became the best of friends, forever grateful for that accidental kiss.

Now, I am happily married to a strong woman who chases away the shadows of depression and anxiety from my dreams. Together, we’ve built a life filled with love and understanding. I’ve learned that we must talk about our weaknesses and embrace the help offered by those we trust.

Read the first chapters here.

3

After the New Year, we have a new neighbor, Baba Katya. She was a short, plump woman with glasses, rather intelligent-looking, always wrapped in several layers of clothing. When she stopped by, a few creepy-looking men probably dragged all sorts of things for two hours: chests, parcels, some furniture into her room, which was as big as a hall.

The check-in process attracted Alexey and me’s attention, and we sat in the hallway and silently watched what was happening. At some point, one of these thuggish-looking workers barked at my brother and me, and we, frightened, retreated to our room. Here, to fill up the feeling of confidence, we began to sprinkle these two and our neighbor with curses and all sorts of nicknames.

– These two are savages! – I said, waving my arms.

– And the neighbor? She’s no better! Bourgeois! – my brother answered.

One day after school, when my brother and I were walking down the hallway, the door to the new neighbor’s room was open. It has been several weeks since she moved in. Torn by curiosity, we decided to carefully look in to see the treasures she was hiding.

Through the slightly open door we could see several antique cabinets, statues, tapestries, paintings. Meanwhile, the hostess of the room came up to us along the corridor. My brother and I took a step back, expecting reproaches or threats, but something completely unexpected happened. Seeing our undisguised interest in the contents of the room, Baba Katya smiled slightly.

• Come on in, guys, – she invited my brother and me.

Her brother was more talkative, as always, and asked her a lot of questions. He had a talent for talking to people, so later he became a famous journalist and traveled a lot around the country and the world.

So, we managed to find out that baba Katya, as the whole apartment called her, is actually Ekaterina Vasilyeva, a well-known restorer with experience. For several years now, she has been engaged in restorations for the state museums of Leningrad, and what struck me most of all, she even worked at home, in conditions when museums were closed or even mothballed. And all these “treasures” are her works that have been restored or are just waiting in the wings.

– Why did you move in with us? Has your house been bombed?  Alexey continued his inquiries.

– No, it’s worse…  This is not a childish story…” she tried to get away from this topic.

– We are already adults, please tell us! – my brother and I did not let up.

Baba Katya stopped talking, looked at the window, then back at us. She went to the stove in the corner of the room, put a scorcher in it, put the kettle on and slowly began her creepy story.

– About a month ago, a story happened that changed my life and disappointed people forever. I used to live in the central district, also in a communal apartment. I had two rooms there – one bedroom, the second, a larger one, a workshop for restoration. Our apartment has always been friendly, we all knew each other for many years and were almost like family. Only one neighbor was weird, I don’t even want to call her by her first name. After her divorce from her husband, something broke inside her… But even then she had not yet poisoned our way of life. With the onset of the blockade, our apartment began to change, many left. The corridors began to empty.

In the autumn, the famine began, then it became even worse, our neighbors began to disappear. The authorities came to us a couple of times, and then our neighbor began to show incredible diligence in finding and assisting the authorities. She told all sorts of stories, saying that they had gone to their relatives in the village, and those had died in the raid. Strangely enough, everyone believed her.

Then she stopped talking. I saw a tear creeping down the wrinkled cheek of an elderly woman. After a moment of silence, gathering her strength, she continued:

– One day, I worked late and, as it seemed to me, I was not sleeping alone in the apartment. Then a disheveled and scared neighbor flew into my workshop, saying that some strange man of terrible appearance was walking in our hallway. I calmed her down by suggesting that we look at this stranger together. She agreed, on the condition that we take a poker for protection. So we left my room, I went ahead and carried a lamp, and she followed me with a poker.

We walked along the dark corridor for a while until I felt a blow on the back of my head and lost consciousness. I came to my senses, probably after a quarter of an hour, I was lying on the floor in my neighbor’s room, next to her bed. The first thing that caught my eye was the partially butchered body of the girl, which was hidden under the bed. It hit me like an electric shock, I immediately understood everything and hid, the neighbor was standing with her back to me in the other corner and, leaning over the table, sorting knives. I got up quietly, and the poker was lying on the bed.

Grabbing her, I slapped my neighbor on the back without looking at her and ran out of the apartment and onto the street with the last of my strength. My head hurt terribly, and my heart was pounding so hard that it seemed like it was going to pop out of my chest. So I ran through several streets until I bumped into two young soldiers who turned out to be NKVD officers. Through tears, I told them everything. After taking me to some kind of duty station, they hurried to our apartment…

She paused again, sighed, and finished her story with confidence in her voice.

– The remains of five people were found in her room, as the investigation established, for several months she had not only killed and eaten acquaintances, but also sold or changed the meat of victims in markets in different areas. As far as I know, she was shot on the same day, and I could no longer stay in that apartment and moved in with you.

The kettle whistled, Baba Katya covered her face with her hands. There was horror and shame on my brother’s face, and we both regretted our persistence, curiosity and prejudice about this brave woman. I went up to her and hugged her a little, she calmed down, poured tea for us and gave us one candy, it was an incredible rarity, my brother and I had not seen any sweets anywhere for more than six months.

• Go to your room in peace, – Baba Katya said to us at parting, – And be careful on the street, and in general with strangers.

Roman Holiday                                                                                

I dreamed and found you young again somehow transported across the Atlantic, past Gibraltar then Corsica, over the waves of the Mediterranean. I arrived quite dashing in a light linen suit and polished Italian shoes, in a little white sportscar, over ancient brick streets and through Di Chirico piazzas and skewed Zeffirelli perspectives at your flat in Rome set curiously in the forum at the edge of the Palatine Hill. I took you in my arms, circled your waist, and my palm found the small of your back.

You twirled for me, flipping the hem of your dress, a black and white print in tiny cubist abstractions. We danced spinning through your bright rooms with the high ceilings like a chiesa expecting Raphael above our heads – an Assumption or an Ascension. You’d arranged vases of flowers, and the tables and chairs were strewn with opened books, chipped china, and the remains of bread and the dregs of wine from the night before. The windows were tall and opened wide, curtains drifting in the breeze, and allowed the shouts and cheers of scruffy boys kicking a soccer ball outside. And there was a jumpy, comedic Italian tune playing from the phonograph – the kind of music that makes you want to whirl around the kitchen with your mother or gambol with your little sister balanced on your shoes.

So pretty and poised, you were Audrey Hepburn in Roman Holiday after she got her hair cut short, raced Gregory Peck on a Vespa, and stuck her hand in the Mouth of Truth. Giddy, we laughed and ached and wept, immediately in love again. Your bedroom walls and the quaint watercolors you bought of the Pantheon, Colosseum, Spanish Steps, Trevi Fountain, and that little temple of Portunus near the Tiber – the very ruins around us seemed to laugh too, happy for us. But when I leaned in to kiss you, our lips refused to touch, to meet as willing participants in a prelude to desire. I heard, “Remember, you’re married.” Instantly I returned flying back across the ocean in my little white convertible to that other bliss I’d live after waking. And that was all. That was enough.

Progress Toward Victory

I wrote a lot of poems in my 20s.

They were all bad.

Everyone said they were bad.

The keyboard stank like sweat and rotten fruit.

There was a great outcry among the editors.

So I gave up

And then 20 years later I tried again.

And my poems were better!

Everyone said they were better.

Among the editors there was a great sigh of ambivalence.

I will quit for another 20 years.

When I come back my poems will be truly great.

The keyboard will smell of roses and triumph.

The editors will scuttle around my feet like beetles.

I will go to my grave like an apotheosis of Pulitzers.

And on my headstone I will write with my luminous hand,

“That’ll show ‘em.”

A Whole Afternoon of Terror  

Before dusk arrives, skeletal horses

loom outside the darkness, lingering off the road.

I encounter ghosts in the mirror,

the wind sniffs beneath fallen leaves, through a door-crack,

scenting the faint glow of flesh revealed.

Axes, slingshots, cleavers all line the window sill painted blue,

even my stiff six-year-old elbows bear the grain of wood.

The yard’s pale wooden gate is locked, the door to the cottage too,

I stare at every tremble of the wooden gate

and the passing sound of the whistling poplar trees.

Mother hasn’t returned yet, I don’t know how many years

how many winters have passed, I hear the door handle softly turning,

the quiet voices of family members, and the slow movement of a golden lamp.

But I can’t wake up, can’t bolt that door wrapped in a sack.

A Near-Forgotten Craft 

Destruction is space, allowing new horrors to emerge

yellowed pages can no longer be turned

invisible ghosts make you cough incessantly

the painted landscape keeps shrinking

until real places become indistinguishable:

a century-old iron bridge as dark as a bagpipe

now creaks like a knee by the water’s edge.

Punish life by writing everything down

let the sunset hover forever in a still cave.

As long as this book is opened once

everyone will be resurrected, the precise machinery of hell

will start again, with wild winds, hail, and flames

with the asphalt stiffening their joints, the suffering of others continues

unbeknown to anyone.

Reliant on the reader’s sympathy and testimony

time continues like dashed lines in the snow.

Snow falls, falling forever,

yet never falling on the bent heads of pedestrians

always walking in the same place, never avoiding a snowfall.

Few believe in these kinds of games anymore.

Perhaps it’s just a harmless game

which offers us the image of time

like a watchmaker with weak eyesight in his workshop,

where metal parts and various-sized gears reflect the dusk light

through the carved glass revolving door, candlelight, flickers

at the door, an unidentified white horse appears

snorting with contempt, carrying the decay of generations.

Encounter with a Cat on Midnight Streets

You lay sprawled in the centre of the street, eyes half-open.

Poor little thing, what happened to you?

Your gaze seems to ask me, what is life?

I had just returned from a meeting discussing the meaning of life,

drunk on wine because life is so beautiful,

though the discussion was dull, led by zombies.

I never expected to meet you like this,

“Death” lying on the path I, “Life,” must take.

As if questioning me, unknown death, how to understand life.

The midnight street suddenly falls silent, and I hesitate for a moment,

thinking to find a branch to move your flattened body to the roadside,

where passing cars will crush it repeatedly,

until your emaciated pain is swept away by the sun’s custodian,

or it becomes a golden beehive, dripping with blood honey.

But in the end, I did nothing, exchanging a meaningful gaze with you.

I turn away, like a soul leaving its shell.

“Here”

“Here” is a signpost, not really here,  

the earth beneath your feet is a vertical, transparent void,  

you can only recognize here by its “non-existence”.  

You’re familiar with these signs, a street, a road,the house behind houses,  

a date, a name, the sound of poplar leaves brushing each other,  

and songs from the last century playing on a radio hanging from a branch.  

You can no longer make out their lyrics,  

as if they’ve been encrypted at the far end of time,  

that’s fine—no words to smudge this perfect balm,  

no other you, old, young, or in between,  

walking out of this maze of “here”,

to watch a sunset elsewhere,  

or see another autumn rain falling in another realm,  

another of you, nose buried in a colour-blurred map,  

collar wore the wrong way round, searching for a “here” you’ve been before.

Ma Yongbo was born in 1964, Ph.D, Since 1986 He has published over eighty original works and translations. He is a professor in the Faculty of Arts and Literature, Nanjing University of Science and Technology. His studies center around Chinese and Western modern poetics, post-modern literature, and eco-criticism. His translations from English include works by Walt Whitman, Emily Dickinson, Ezra Pound, Wallace Stevens, W.C.Williams, John Ashbery, Henry James, Herman Melville, May Sarton and others. 

In India when a daughter gets married they need to wear a red veil and red bindi on her forehead. It’s a symbol of married women. Also I would like to add that in India we call our mother Maa. Whether it is India or any other country, mother and daughter emotion is same.

THE QUEST

I’m in my autumn my child,

Your father’s departure made my life hollow.

My heart weeps when I recall him.

Now, I am stacked with responsibilities.

My eyes are craving to see you in a red veil.

My lifelong wish to see,

The vibrant red colour on your forehead.

My child, I searched a lot

But the suitable boy is in a remote, untouched land.

Is it my fault that I gave you birth ?

They tarnish our race.

‘Unity in Diversity’ is confined to papers.

They criticize on your shadowy tone,

Your knowledge is your gem,

And they ridicule it too.

Murky world, disgrace your devotion towards me

A devoted son is an honour,

Then why not a devoted daughter?

I begged at every door,

To search a suitable boy for you,

Sad folks always gave false hope.

Me too wish to nurture my grandchild,

Who will sit on my lap,

And I will wrap her tight.

With her, I will revive my childhood.

I asked to God:

Why a dummy smile people,

Enjoying an ecstatic life.

We have wisdom to be simple,

And thus our hearts are distorted every time.

Waiting for the new dawn,

In every verse there are some,

Unspoken silence.

(Answer To Mother…….)

MOSAIC of EMOTIONS

Be good, do good and receive good,

The age old phrase.

In this broken mixed-up world,

Do we always receive fruit ?

I am a scapegoat in the hands of time.

I longed to pass marital bliss.

A hand who will hold my hand,

A soul- soothing warm hug and worries disappear.

I pine for his presence.

Me too wish the paradise of motherhood,

That feeling when I will hold you in my arms, my child,

And embrace you in my chest.

I will play with you like a toddler,

Till we burst out with laughter .

Those precious moments when your grandma will sing a lullaby for you.

I am longing to see.

I hate mirror Maa,

Every time it reminds me of single shaming.

The lines on your forehead write the tales of an agonized mind.

I curse myself Maa to see you in pain,

And knowing the reason is me.

I know you are aching to see the luminous red vermillion on my forehead,

Will it fulfill in this birth?

The voyage for a suitable match is just an illusion.

They abandon me to see my worship towards you .

Pity mother with only daughter in the family.

In her declining years should I leave her all alone?

Can a groom do the same?

Our society is rooted in orthodox ideology,

Which need to be structured.

(Is it so difficult to give her a little space in son -in -law’s nest?)

Deepika Singh is an Indian native from Margherita, Assam. She holds an M.A. and a B.Ed. degree, by profession, a teacher. Her writings are a reflection of the everyday experiences she has. She thinks the correct words have the power to transform our culture. Her works were featured in various publications, including Sipay Journal, The Poet Magazine, Womensweb, Journal of Macedonia Scientific Society, Poetry Zine Magazine, Archer Magazine, etc. Additionally, her writings were translated into Hebrew, Chinese, Macedonian, Spanish, Serbian, Tajik, and Turkish. She also recited poetry on Kent’s BBC Radio.

Haiku by Maurizio Brancaleoni


bagno all'alba:
la scia del sole tra alluce e illice

bathing at dawn —
the sun glitter between hallux and index toe

*

mattino calmo:
un mosaico d'impronte di piccioni

quiet morning —
a mosaic of pigeon footprints

*

luna calante:
vespe e formiche su carcassa di pane

waning moon —
wasps and ants on bread carcass

*

mattina presto:
cammino nei solchi del SUV sulla sabbia

early morning —
I walk in the ruts of the SUV on the sand

*

rough sea —
the cat's lapping
in the plant saucer

mare agitato:
il lappare del gatto
nel sottovaso

*

luna di tre dì:
il pomfo della puntura interrotta

three-day moon —
wheal of the interrupted puncture

*

mare calmo di mattina:
le zampe rosse dei piccioni

calm morning sea —
red feet of the pigeons

*

malato al sole:
le zampe fredde della mosca

ill in the sun —
cold feet of the fly

*

cirrocumuli:
la chiave dell'auto
fa da cotton fioc

cirrocumuli —
the car key
serves as a cotton swab

*

ascelle al vento:
l'insetto non riesce
a rigirarsi

armpits to the wind —
the bug can't
flip back over

*

dopo il mare
anche sporche le mani
sembran pulite

after the seaside
even if dirty
hands feel clean

*

restless wasps —
the lonely old man
from person to person

vespe irrequiete:
il vecchio solo
di persona in persona

*

ora di pranzo:
condizionatore di
sopravvivenza

lunch time —
survival
conditioner

*

notte d'estate:
centro zanzare
mentre il sonno mi elude

summer night —
I hit mosquitoes squarely
while sleep eludes me

*

mese d'agosto:
anche le case rosse
si spelleranno?

August —
will even the red houses
start to peel?

*

niente acqua per
le labbra secche:
lamiere lucenti

no water for
dry lips —
shining floor plates

*

vento in spiaggia:
una mano sul cell
l’altra sull’ombrellone

wind at the seaside —
one hand on the phone
the other on the beach umbrella

*

Pronto soccorso:
la zanzara bruna
non trova l'orecchio

Emergency Room —
the brown mosquito
can't find the ear

*

bocca sdentata:
alcune case senza
tenda da sole

gap-toothed mouth  —
some houses have
no awning

*

vespa vasaia:
una solitudine tranquilla

potter wasp —
a tranquil solitude

*

nascondendosi
nell'orto il gatto
svicola indisturbato

hiding
in the garden the cat
sneaks away undisturbed

*

primi rovesci:
sotto la giacca a vento
la canottiera

first downpours —
under the windbreaker
a tank top


Maurizio Brancaleoni lives near Rome, Italy.

He holds a master's degree in Language and Translation Studies from Sapienza University. His haiku and senryu have appeared in Dadakuku, Lothlorien Poetry Journal, Under The Bashō, Horror Senryu Journal, Cold Moon Journal, Scarlet Dragonfly, Memorie di una geisha, Rakuen, Haiku Corner, Pure Haiku, Five Fleas, Shadow Pond Journal, Haikuniverse, Asahi Haikuist, Plum Tree Tavern and Wales Haiku Journal. In 2023 one of his micropoems was nominated for a Touchstone Award, while a horror ku originally featured in the Halloween-themed issue of Scarlet Dragonfly was re-published in this year's Dwarf Stars anthology. 

Maurizio manages “Leisure Spot", a bilingual blog where he posts interviews, reviews and translations: https://leisurespotblog.blogspot.com/p/interviste-e-recensioni-interviews-and.html