changed his mind

still chasing your

dead father’s love

dig him up, see

if he has changed

his mind

embrace depravity

and understand this

is the new bottom

there’s this old black

soul that likes to tease

me

she shows me some leg

when she’s feeling sexy

i ask her nicely to take

her high heel and dig it

into my chest as she

hikes up her skirt and

does whatever she

pleases

she usually laughs

explains that at her

age she would have

to remove the diaper

i kiss her hand and

explain to her that i

don’t mind anything

simply looking to

be broken in two

she gave me the

number of a guy

down on third

oh, the twists

and turns

———————————————————————-

to ever repair

snow on the first

day of spring

somewhere the world

is on fire and no one

gives a shit

only personal tragedies

register on the soul

anymore

beaten, blinded

broken into too

many pieces to

ever repair

live long enough

and every hero

will disappoint

you

somewhere your dead

father starts to laugh

another endless night

of wondering how to

sleep while in pain

there surely must be

a pill for this

wash it down

with vodka

water from the

old country

but this was

made in texas

exactly

—————————————————————

one too many rainbows

sometimes i imagine

my shadow holding

a gun

where did he get

that thing

i suppose i have chased

one too many rainbows

now, in the twilight of

democracy, still thinking

hope exists

she’s disguised as misery

an easy whore that can’t

get any work

baffling

sometimes i imagine

my shadow holding

a gun

sometimes, an AR-15

he likely knows that

the first shot probably

won’t kill me

————————————————————————

saw something different

kissing under the blood moon

rekindling a flame that just

won’t die out

she haunts my dreams

all these years

raise a glass and pretend

that any of this matters

living in this hell is sacrifice

enough

these are the nights you

dream about all the women

that got away

and here you are with the one

that saw something different

she tastes like a better tomorrow

of course, we’ll cross that

bridge when we get there

tonight is for the lovers

the dreamers

the sad fucks that deserve

a little moment of happiness

there isn’t much else left

in this world

————————————————————————

never fall in love with me

i always tend to fall

in love with the ones

leaving soon

the ones already

married

the ones that will

never fall in love

with me

i have tried to break

this habit as i have

grown older

i should have thought

of that long before i

gave up on people

i suppose

J.J. Campbell (1976 – ?) is old enough to know better. He’s been widely published over the years, most recently at Horror Sleaze Trash, The Dope Fiend Daily, The Beatnik Cowboy, Lothlorien Poetry Journal and Disturb the Universe Magazine. You can catch him most days on his mildly entertaining blog, evil delights. (https://evildelights.blogspot.com)

With the 1979 album “Bela Lugosi’s Dead,” British rock band Bauhaus thrust themselves firmly into the goth-rock scene. The anthology “White on White,” edited by horror writer Alex S. Johnson and released nearly 50 years after Bauhaus came together, pays homage to the spirit of the band and the broader Gothic sensibility. 

“White on White” contains a mixture of poetry and prose in various styles and genres. Writers from different national backgrounds and literary traditions, including several whose work has been translated into English, contribute to a mashup of different sensibilities. Some poetry addresses the experience of listening to Bauhaus and plays off of song titles, others are more impressionistic takes on the band’s themes and aesthetic. 

Common threads include shaky and fluid personal identity. In one piece, just the touch of pills on the ground obliterates and transforms a character and his dog, a young woman loses herself in her romantic obsession with a strange pale man and his diary, a man steals another’s train ticket and finds the other man’s face staring back at him through a mirror. Many characters live on the margins of their world, people who wouldn’t normally serve as main protagonists. One narrator is a groundskeeper on a historical estate of immortals, another is a lovelorn woman in her forties seeking oblivion and companionship in goth clubs, yet another has her last wishes disrespected on the day of her funeral.

The anthology probes power dynamics and the corruption that can come with extreme power imbalances. In one story, a woman with a gift for healing helps many, then carries out destruction after becoming world famous. In another, a clever grad student turns a spelunking expedition into spooky revenge on a professor who has exploited and discarded a string of women. The uncanny and supernatural sometimes become means for achieving justice, other realms where those who have been excluded or wronged can defend themselves. We see a murdered woman’s son, reincarnated through biotechnology, poetically avenging his mother, and a murderer whose goth-girl love interest sets him up to be arrested. One man seeks to destroy his own kind after realizing that he is something much scarier than the drug dealers and criminals who surround him, hoping to eliminate the threat he poses to innocent humans. 

“White on White” takes place in a variety of settings. Inspired by Bauhaus’ music and the 1939 Dracula actor Bela Lugosi, we see a selection of tales within goth clubs and old buildings at night where vampires tend to lurk. Other pieces, though, are set within a biotech future where guitars and bedrooms come alive, in urban settings such as Little Italy, within caves rumored to hold Indiana Jones-style ancient relics, and an ordinary apartment building where a young female academic befriends an elderly gentleman with an active mind and tenuous grasp on reality. 

These pieces blur the boundaries between the past and the present. People’s pasts catch up to them, people forget and remember who they truly are. History, memory, and decay show up as continual motifs: there’s a whole town of empty, dilapidated buildings, a dis-used broadcast tower in the midst of a shiny new city, and a radio station where a late night DJ plays Bauhaus and encounters the ghost of a guest murdered long ago in that room. 

We see the interplay of past and present most clearly in a story near the end of “White on White,” where an aging actor dreams up the final performance of his career in a theater that’s now unused and decrepit. From his chair in his senior care home, this experience allows him to look back over his entire life and find meaning in all of his memories. He achieves his lifelong dream of acting where he saw his first old silent movie with his parents. 

The Goth aesthetic is often linked with death in people’s minds, but this story is a celebration of life, all the more poignant by the protagonist’s acknowledging his mortality. This entire anthology embraces the grotesque, the marginal, the deathly, the traumatic, and the just plain weird with openness and curiosity. By doing this, the writers and curator point to an expansive world where there’s room for all sorts of people and where we can look beyond our fears and our pasts to fully welcome ourselves and each other.

White on White: A Literary Tribute to Bauhaus is available at your local bookstore through Bookshop.org.

It includes original pieces by such rock stars as Kari Lee Krome (The Runaways), Athan Maroulis (Spahn Ranch), Tara Vanflower (Lycia, Type O Negative), pieces by Bram Stoker Award-winning authors John Palisano and John Shirley (who also wrote The Crow screenplay and songs for Blue Oyster Cult), former Swans co-leader Jarboe, Caitlin R. Kiernan (two-time World Fantasy and Bram Stoker Award-winning author, Nebula award finalist), with a foreword by Poppy Z. Brite, the iconic author of Exquisite Corpse, and much more. The anthology is endorsed by David J. Haskins, the founding member of Bauhaus and Love and Rockets and writer of the song “Bela Lugosi’s Dead”; Haskins is also a Nocturnicon Books contributing author.

Chapter 1: The Current State Of Being

We live in a time where it would be difficult, extremely difficult, to live and lead a normal life.

Back in the day, the need for normalcy, decency and modesty in every area of Interests was being looked out for. The family, community, work-place and general society would prioritize character in relation to any engaged endeavor.

However, modern-day situations hold different narratives. What was seen as morally upright in the days of old is frowned today. What was seen as evil in the past is revered in the present. Being a person of integrity seems to portray limited relevance as it has been substituted with the exact opposite: deceit. From family to society, the culture of what was seen as “good character” has now become a complete shadow of itself. The pop culture of falsehood, which carries an aesthetic outlook, is given a warm embrace by vast majority of people in today’s world.

Consequently, it is without a doubt that the world of today is so wrong that what is left of it is not right and what should be right is not left!

Whatever led to such transition of value, has constituted the current state of being of most people of today, regardless of income bracket, status and even conviction.

Bottom line:

The Current State Of Being: Being abnormal is the new normal!

An Ottoman label for Cleansing (1915-1923)

An Ottoman label

An Ottoman branding.

To uproot my human development.

A human development of two millennia 

once flourishing in Anatolia.

I was labelled Armenian! 

I was branded Armenian!

By whom?

by merciless Ottomans!

I took a long hike to my own graveyard,

accompanied by the Ottoman funeral cortege.

They played the dead march for my own interment.

My interment in the Syrian desert.

My offence was my identity, and 

a global conflict and its attendant heavy losses.

A conflict I knew little or nothing about.

I was preyed upon by men of beastly testestorone.

Coercively I became a sunni proselyte,

and I was dispossessed of everything vital.

Terribly weakened by an inflicted famished state, I was laid to rest in the Syrian desert.

Flawed

Orchids are delicate,

a passion,

an obsession.

Roses are appropriate

for love

or death.

The Buttercup is overlooked

and the Easter Lily

is always acting

to entice you.

Know

that I love lilacs.

They are not bashful.

They announce their presence

even before being seen.

I am careful or careless

depending on one’s

definition.

Simply self-assured or selfish,

depending on my mood.

Flowers are intriguing images,

like a dazzling ring on a finger

or a glowing branding iron

about to touch your heart.

Lost thoughts gather

among the clouds

and then disappear

when the Sun

breaks through.

That same Sun

that nourishes flowers,

turns them pale yellow

and

brittle at the edges.

I can’t seem to grasp my actions,

I love,

I lose.

I buy flowers

they die.

I once had dreams

but they were flawed

often centered

on sight and scent.

Picture me in a garden

surrounded

by beautiful flowers

celebrating summer.

I was among the Tulips

and

unprepared for

the wrecking ball

about to smash

into my desires.

It only took

a few words

and what was colorful and stunning

and what was not

became questionable and gray.

Leaden gray.

Gray, the blush

of no garden.

I notice Marigolds now.

Golden Marigolds.

They are polite

not intrusive.

They give one permission

to see beyond

what is staring

past them.

Philip received his M.A. in Psychology from Simon Fraser University, Vancouver, Canada. He has published five books of poetry, Mirror Images and Shards of Glass, Dark Images at Sea, I Never Finished Loving You, Falls from Grace, Favor and High Places, and Forever Was Never On My Mind. Three novels, Caught Between (Which is also a 24-episode Radio Drama Podcast https://wprnpublicradio.com/caught-between-teaser/), Art and Mystery: The Missing Poe Manuscript, and Far From Here. Philip also has a column in the quarterly magazine Per Niente. He enjoys all things artistic.

The Worst That Could Happen

I was that awkward girl who did not get much interest from boys. I was gangly, tongue-tied, unattractive, and I was okay and fine. I helped my mom in the market to sell her perishable goods. I was hardworking, and people would always tell my mother, “Oh your daughter works so hard like a boy. You are so lucky.”

My mother would smile and nod, and I would keep my face blank.

It was almost a good thing that I hardly got serious attention from boys, until Chima appeared. Chima with his dark muscular build and charming smile. Chima had machines that ground things in the market for him, things like pepper, tomatoes, corn, cassava. His shop wasn’t far from my mother’s, and he even had boys working for him, boys who did most of the messy work for him. It was either they were learning work, or they were hired as proper workers.

I had always been happy with myself, gangly or not, beautiful or not. I didn’t bother about makeups, it just wasn’t my thing. If anyone would ever have something to do with me, that person should be acquainted with the real me. Not hating on people who use make-up, though. I’m just saying it wasn’t my thing. The highest I did while going to church on Sundays was to apply black tiro – the ones I imagine Nollywood actresses used in their epic, culturally-rich movies, and on some dramatic Sunday mornings I would stand in front of our large mirror and mimic the voices of Nollywood actresses. I would start with Ngozi Ezeonu commanding a palace maid, and I would end with Chioma Chukwuka flirting with a cute, muscular black man beside a quiet stream.

I didn’t know that Chima was interested in me until I gave him an envelope for our church harvest. Every year we were given large envelopes in church to share with people we knew, family, friends and well-wishers, and they were supposed to put money in those envelopes for the work of The Lord. When I went to take it back, Chima had put ten thousand naira in it. Other people had put five hundred naira, one thousand naira highest, but Chima put ten thousand naira. I was startled. I had never been interested in anybody’s money, except for business. Right from a young age I was getting money, I hustled with my mother in the market. What else did a young girl need? I was properly fed, I had come out of secondary school. Nobody was talking about going further, my mother wouldn’t afford that, so I was content with myself, doing business with my mother, trying to be a succor to her soul as a woman who left an abusive husband – my father – many years ago. I was twenty-two when Chima picked interest in me, but never been in a serious relationship before. Somehow I thought things would unfold on their own, but the way mine unfolded scared me.

Chima started giving me money every weekend, without me asking him for it. I never knew how to ask, by the way. I had always been satisfied with my mother’s financial coverage, and with the little income I made. I took Chima’s money for weeks. I saved it. Because of Chima I added a little more effort in the way I dressed to the market. At least I tried my best. The market wasn’t a place where one needed to dress extravagantly while going out for the day, but I tried my best to look very good or sharp, in the Aba slang.

Ahịa Ọhụrụ market wasn’t like working in the bank, or in an office where you could dress yourself daintily. Here in the market you dress in a certain way, in a subtly rugged way because anything could happen. A fight might break out. A barrow pusher might hit you, somebody might look for your trouble, a rogue might try to steal your goods, so one came to the market with a certain kind of dressing void of superfluity.

Chima got more friendly with my mother, and I wondered if my mother suspected anything.

Then I started visiting Chima in his house. Many months had passed, and yet Chima was still giving me weekend money as though I was working for him, as though I did anything for him. It started with him saying, “You never ask me where I live. You never bother to just pay me a visit.”

That was how I started visiting Chima, me the unattractive, skinny girl. The first day I visited him was the day I took a proper look at myself, really observed that I didn’t have a robust nyash – buttocks – like a proper girl should have, a proper Igbo girl, if there was any such thing. I just observed it, but I did not pity myself. I was not the type that wallowed in self pity. I was ready for anything. What was the worst that could happen? The worst that could ever happen was Chima to stop being interested in me, to stop giving me money, and to stop grinning too widely when he spoke with my mother. That was the worst that could ever happen, and I was ready for that, in case it happened.

So on that first day of me visiting him in his house I prepared myself and went, wearing a new gown I had bought in Ariaria market. It was a bit loose, the gown, modern, and a bit churchy. And I went, feeling confident and reserved at the same time.

Isaac Aju is a Nigerian writer whose works have appeared in Poetry X Hunger, Writers’ Journal -New York City, The Kalahari Review, and is forthcoming in Flapper Press. He lives in Aba where he works as a fashion designer.

FREEDOM OF THE SOUL 

I was a prisoner behind the fence of fear,

Searching for a window in the wall of night,

But the moon was pale,

And the wind tore through the silent branches.

I cried out:

O sky, open your gate to the light!

A star exploded in my chest,

And the birds returned to their nests.

But the chains tightened around the dream,

Draining my cry,

As if the earth refused to listen

To the echo of footsteps fleeing toward the light.

O freedom, are you a mirage

We chase through dark alleys?

Or are you a sun born

When we shatter the shackles buried in our veins?

I will write your name upon the wall of the wind

And let the echo carry

My voice to the coming dawn.

One day,

I will stand atop the sun

And dance with the light,

Free

As the wind was in a pure time!

—

 THE AGE of CHAINS DOES NOT LAST 

Stretch your hands toward the horizon,

Like the surge of waves rising against the shore.

Do not fear the darkness,

For stars are born from the womb of night.

Tell the wind to carry your song

And scatter it over the balconies,

For when a branch is broken,

It grows from pain flowers that never die.

I am the child of open skies,

I do not belong to fences

Or closed doors.

Freedom is rooted in the soul,

Not in locked squares.

I will walk on water if the earth narrows,

And I will carry in my wound

A flower of dreams.

If you are imprisoned today,

Tomorrow is your meeting with the light.

Give hope its wings,

And walk beneath the rain.

Freedom is not granted—

It is seized from the jaws of time!

—

A DREAM UNCHAINED 

Freedom has no door,

Nor does it love walls.

It recoils from iron

And despises the color of chains on the wrist.

It is a wave racing toward the horizon,

Breaking yet returning stronger.

It is a cloud refusing to trap its rain,

A flower blooming in the palm of the wind.

Do not ask where it dwells,

For it lives in the eyes of birds,

In the breath of children’s laughter,

In the voice of a song that knows

No language of submission.

Every wall,

No matter how high,

Will one day be nothing but a fleeting shadow.

And the river, which embraced the soil for too long,

Will return to the sea at dawn.

If you cannot find it around you,

Search within yourself.

Perhaps you are the bird

Who has yet to discover his wings!

Short Biography: 

TAGHRID BOU MERHI is a distinguished Lebanese-Brazilian Poet, Author, Essayist, Editor,  Translator, and Media Professional known for her profound literary contributions across multiple languages. She currently resides in Brazil, where she has built a remarkable career in poetry, translation, and cultural journalism.

With a Master’s degree in Law, Bou Merhi has established herself as a versatile intellectual figure, seamlessly bridging the worlds of literature and academia. She is fluent in five languages in addition to her native Arabic, which has enabled her to translate and publish an impressive body of work. Her translations include 43 books and over 2000 poems, and her writings have been translated into 47 languages.

Bou Merhi has authored 23 books, both in print and digital formats, covering a range of genres, including poetry, short stories, haikus, critical studies, articles, and children’s literature. Her literary influence extends beyond writing, as she serves as the editor of the translation department for 12 Arabic magazines and a Spanish magazine Azahar Poetic and Reverence Cultural poetry. Additionally, she has written introductions for 40 books and contributed to more than 220 National and international books and anthologies.

Her exceptional contributions to world literature have earned her numerous international accolades. She was named among the top 50 women shaping modern literature in Asia and one of the top 20 media professionals in the region from Legacy Crown. Chinese television CCCV ranked her among the top 10 poets globally for her mastery of language and poetry.

Currently, Bou Merhi serves as the head of the Lebanon branch of the International Chamber of Books and Artists and holds key cultural relations roles in five international and regional organizations. She has also been an international judge for the Walt Whitman competition for three consecutive years.

Taghrid Bou Merhi has received numerous international awards, honors, and certificates for her literary and translation work. Some of the most notable include:

•Naji Naaman Award (2023) – Recognizing her excellence in literature.

•Nizar Sartawi’s Translation Award – For her outstanding contributions to translation.

•First Prize in the Nian Zhang Cup (2023) – A prestigious international poetry award.

•Top 50 Women in Modern Literature (Asia) – Honored for her impact on contemporary literature.

•Top 20 Media Professionals in Asia – Recognized for her influence in cultural journalism.

•Top 10 Poets Worldwide by CCCV (China) – Acknowledged for her mastery of language and poetry.

•Judge for the Walt Whitman International Poetry Competition – Serving for three consecutive years.

Additionally, she has received many certificates of appreciation from international cultural organizations and literary institutions for her contributions to poetry, translation, and cultural exchange.