I’m three three three one-two-three and nobody knows I’m up up up – Mommy sleeping sleeping sad in her big bed. Daddy at work – work work work in town at the dry cleaners after bacon and eggs and coffee at Ohio Restaurant. Love Daddy – I’m Daddy’s little girl.
Climb one-two-three shelves for cereal in the cupboard – bowl spoon milk from the frigerator sometimes smells bad. Then turn the knob all-by-myself open the big heavy door open the screen door out the door. No shoes no socks my feet my toes wiggle in the grass wet wet wet. Run run run to the barn pee in my big girl training pants take em off and toss em in the weeds every-Mommy’s-bad-word-morning-when-will-she-learn. Bare bottom who cares I don’t care no one cares maybe grandma cares.
Horses are waiting for me me me at the gate one big one nice one mean one brown one white and a pony-just-my-size. And I pet their noses oh my gosh soft so soft and I feed them green grass even the white mean-to-grown-ups one who could eat my tiny fingers anytime it wants to snap-just-like-that but it doesn’t never never never did never never never will. My big brodder’s watching me from his window thinks he’s the boss of me but isn’t the boss of me. Face scrunched and big frown always worry worry worry.
Then my dog friends are waiting every-morning-same-place-same-time for me me me. Black white and brown but mostly black Smokey knows only one trick shake shake shake the neighbor boys taught him a long time ago when he was my brodder’s dog not anymore. And Sammy also black with curly part-poodle hair. And the next-door-neighbor’s big big big red Ireesh Sitter with eyes that say something to me every day. Just us we all go running in the tall green grass field – green grass taller than me and when I fall down my dog friends wait for me to get up and catch up. I know lunch time just-know-it lunch time and cartoons and fight-every-Mommy’s-bad-word-day-driving-me-crazy-brodder time – who’s not the boss of me.
(But he makes me laugh laugh laugh so much I pee my pants accidental not on purpose. When I dunk Oreo cookies in my milk and my mouth is full – makes me laugh so I spray it all over the table. Laugh when he makes the squeaky mouse voice when I try to bite a pickle I can never eat my pickles. “No! No! No! Don’t eat me! Please please please don’t eat me!” And he pushes me around the driveway in my old junky I’m-too-big-for-it-stroller again again again! And of course he showed me how to swing a swing and slide a slide. Keeps my bare feet away from rusty nails and sometime makes me Froot Loops even if I think I-did-it-all-by-myself. And he said he would look after me when I ride the school bus for the very first time. And he looks for me when no one is looking for me and he makes sure I get home for supper. Okay my brodder loves loves loves me even if he isn’t the boss boss boss of me.)
And at nighty-night time Mommy awake – not a morning mommy. And Daddy’s home – I’m Daddy’s little girl Daddy’s home! Brodder shuts up but sometimes a story. Mommy finds at bath and toys in the tub and towel time tics in my ears burrs in my hair from the tall green grass time. Daddy mad Mommy says nothin’ Brodder told-you-so. Tics and burrs just like Smokey Sammy and the big big big red Ireesh Sitter who don’t get baths or towels or cartoons so what’s the big deal?
David Sapp, writer and artist, lives along the southern shore of Lake Erie in North America. A Pushcart nominee, he was awarded Ohio Arts Council Individual Excellence Grants for poetry and the visual arts. His poetry and prose appear widely in the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom. His publications include articles in the Journal of Creative Behavior, chapbooks Close to Home and Two Buddha, a novel Flying Over Erie, and a book of poems and drawings titled Drawing Nirvana.
Jacques Fleury is a Boston Globe featured Haitian American Poet, Educator, Author of four books and a literary arts student at Harvard University online. His latest publication “You Are Enough: The Journey to Accepting Your Authentic Self” & other titles are available at all Boston Public Libraries, the University of Massachusetts Healey Library, University of Wyoming, Askews and Holts Library Services in the United Kingdom, The Harvard Book Store, The Grolier Poetry Bookshop, Amazon etc… He has been published in prestigious publications such as Wilderness House Literary Review, Muddy River Poetry Review, Litterateur Redefining World anthologies out of India, Poets Reading the News, the Cornell University Press anthology Class Lives: Stories from Our Economic Divide, Boston Area Small Press and Poetry Scene among others…Visit him at: http://www.authorsden.com/jacquesfleury.–
the wind was something. I could hear it rattling outside and at least little parts of the sky blue showed themselves. I had a problem with the boot laces and changed them, using a lighter lace, a running shoe lace as I forgot to purchase proper laces. but I remembered going to Seneca College summer hockey camp and they showed us a video of Gordie Howe giving a few suggestions on equipment. he tied the lace before you do the loops, not once around, but twice, saying that if you do that it won’t come loose. I picked up on that then and always did that and felt I knew some secret about laces. Think about it and you will probably remember seeing someone in life holding down their laces with a finger or fingers in the middle of tying them. That’s because they can become loose before you are done. better to do Gordie Howe’s trick. I wonder how he learned it or discovered it himself. the old time people and figures sometimes know much.
I ventured out and made my way to some
fields. I saw some leaves on trees and they seemed lonesome and strange, burdened by life. I imagined, a pure shameless projection, that they would rather be in Florida on a beach. I myself would have been. I imagined verdant palm fronds in a warm wind, talking slightly in their own way. How would it be? I would walk down some place and easy landscape and read campy pulp novels for fun, enough big thinking about literature and philosophy, spirituality and ideas. but sometimes I’d read a bit of Alexandr Solzhenitsyn and things to remain soulful and as sharp as possible. I’d head back to a patio and order a turkey club sandwich and a diet soda if I was getting hungry. maybe the next day I’d choose to eat at home and fix a sandwich myself. Outside I might hear the sea, and then take a break from eating that lunch, and go glance at the wondrous and whimsical ocean and coastline.
but I had to concentrate on the present and brought myself out of my daydream about the southern shores. I kept on and went over a small bridge. one could hardly discern this bridge from the ground as the snows that had come over the weeks of the middle winter were that high. but some planks wooden were still there, confident and reliable. I stood there for a bit and the wind got stronger, almost vexatious, and I took a few big gulps of it. I had read that Knut Hamsun had gone on top of a train when he was sick and was gulping all the air and helped cure himself. whatever the case, fresh air couldn’t hurt and could only help. then I composed a more ‘verse’ poem in my head:
those leaves/
crinkled and old, staying/
nobody notices such/ and beyond the
winter wind makes the evergreens move/
the working boots talk their talk I see/
and the white collars too/
a bird appears/ somehow displaced from home/ looking/ not at ease like the birds of the summer poet/ no/ looking for something lost
I didn’t have a title for the words then. but I would end up calling it simply, Leaves
there was a series of hills and I went up and then down them, bumps in an otherwise pretty vast and plain area. there were some spots near the far purlieu where some wild sumac lived, retaining that deep inspiring colour in all months. the snow had stayed on some of it, and the white/red made an interesting picture for its juxtapositions. when I had begun nature walking everything looked the same. as time went along I learned that there were hundreds, probably thousands of pictures and poems and stories to be had from woodlands and fields, even the sky and water. we had become friends, and my friends seemed to teach me through time not only photography and writing, but mysticism and maybe…do you know what is beyond mysticism itself, all forms of mysticism, and is the true and most noble and important goal? it is Enlightenment
, Moksha, Freedom, Awakening. Pick your word. I walked and walked. I had to take my time as the snow was deep. The main paths were too busy though. I’d take the snow. Like in life, the main path is easier but paved with mediocrity and predictability. I would make it my own way, somehow, in the snow, in the arts w/my work, and in spiritually and life itself. but, though on the monomyth journey, and the fool’s journey of the tarot, that entire seeker’s trip, i was also no fool, and so would remember to tie my laces like the great Gordie Howe did.
Examine close reading of The Hound of the Baskervilles: Another Adventure of Sherlock Holmes with textual references and critical perspectives.
Arthur Conan Doyle’s crime novella is a canonical work of speculative fiction and detective literature that explores the hellhound of the Baskerville legends as a diabolical agency, huge creature, luminous, ghastly, spectral devil phosphorus painted baying werewolf spirited beast haunting the legacy of Baskerville estate and suburbians of Dartmoor Grimpen mire. In reality the mystery behind this superstitious supernatural phenomenon is a death entrapment laid down by Rodger Baskerville II in the disguise of Jack Stapleton. However the antithesis of superstitious mythicism is shrewdly contested by the skeptical detective Sherlock Holmes, and thus supernatural gothicism is challenged to the core of realistic cosmos. Selden, the absconded convict, kinsman to the Barrymores, is suspiciously implicated for his fiendish notoriety of Notting Hill case “ferocity of the crime” and “wanton brutality of the assassin”; but lately acquitted from allegation through befallen excruciating death perpetrated by the baying hound. “Barren waste moors, chilling winds and darkling skies” foreshadows saturnine funebrial macabre as envisioning of the literature of gothicism and foretelling chronicles of sublime detective fiction.
The popularity of the impeccable detective hero Sherlock Holmes foregrounds intuitive logic, astute observations, perspicuous inferences to reveal the murder mystery of the heir to the Baskerville fortune in The Hound of the Baskervilles. Diabolical supernatural agency of the hellhound is a core paradox fabricated within the threads of this occultist murder mystery. Sherlock Holmes cast as the voice of reason and rationality to challenge the swashbuckling psychorama. In this detective fiction, archetypal plot twists occur along with the progression of the storyline, in anticipation of a reverse chronology, in which the murder mystery of Charles Baskerville is committed surrounding a close circle of suspects before a gradual reconstruction of the past. Contemporaneous detective novels of Arthur Conan Doyle is diversified canon of hybridized and fluid genres involving stereotyped characters within middle class family settings, duelling and feuding in all likelihood for identity and individuality, vindictive salvation and retributive justice, freedom and equality, importance of knowledge and the discovery of buried family ties. Central characters and formal elements of the Hound of Baskervilles is a conglomeration of thrill, mystery, suspense, horror, terror, spookiness, creepiness, grisliness and wonder. However, unlike Gothic literature, wonder and terror of the supernatural, fantastic and romantic worldview: suspension of disbelief is silhouetted into obscurity; ie, the murder mystery spectacle of Gothic tradition. Afterall, the real monsters weren’t the supernatural beasts of legends but the darkness hiding within human hearts.
Howcatchem and whodunit of the Devonshire is interwoven by scientific empiricism and human psychology, bringing to the fore: epistolary chronicles between duo Holmes and Watson; weathering the taste of time; entrenched within themes, motifs, settings and psyches of Victorian England. Sherlock and Watson formulated after all, Rodger staged as Stapeton in order to get rid of the competitor rivals to the family estate and legacy of Baskerville fortunes. However, the fin-de-siecle of the prophetic rhetoric implied in the diction of Dr. James Mortimer is lucid and succinct, “there is a realm in which the most acute and most experienced of detectives is helpless.” The shoplifting of money in South America by Rodger as the imposter Vandeleur of preparatory educator of East Yorkshire and entomology research fellow of the Museum is the retrospective foreshadowing of the modern detective fiction. Jack Stapleton is the aftermath of his wedding with Beryl Garcia in Costa Rica and simultaneous settlement in England upon the voyage home. Vandeleurs occupied the Fraser’s fortune and eventually sank from disrepute to infamy. Fallaciousness of the specious identity of Vandeleur and/or Jack Stapleton alongwith the baronet’s ‘mastiff hellhound’s flaming jaws and blazing eyes’ limelights fin-de-siecle detective masterpiece.
Further Reading, References, Endnotes and Podcasts
The Hound of the Baskervilles pp. 75
Chapter Title: In the Closet of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle: The Private Life of Sherlock
Holmes (1970), Book Title: A Foreign Affair, Book Subtitle: Billy Wilder’s American Films, Book Author(s): Gerd Gemünden, Published by: Berghahn Books. (2008)
Studies in the Literature of Sherlock Holmes, Robert Knox, Bluebook, Oxford lectures, (1910)
Introduction: What is Crime Fiction? Charles J. Rzepka
Degeneration, Fin-de-Siecle Gothic, and the Science of Detection: Arthur Conan Doyle’s The Hound of the Baskervilles and the Emergence of the Modern Detective Story, Nils Clausson, University of Regina, December 2005, Journal of Narrative Theory 35(1):60-87, Eastern Michigan University, pp. 1-25
Sherlock Holmes Codes the Social Body, Rosemary Jann [George Mason University], ELH, Vol. 57, No. 3, Autumn 1990, Johns Hopkins University Press.
Once upon a time there was a girl full of dreams and hopes.
He liked mountain climbing and walking in the mountains.
Iro was a great soul, she loved animals, birds, trees, nature, and exploring the forest.
So one day in Politika, she discovered a Hero’s Path, unique, that no one knew about…no one had walked it except her.
Iro decided to share her path with friends and confided in her parents about her big dream.
I would like to create a path where everyone can take a walk in nature, but they will be able to admire the trees, the birds, children will be able to come into contact with nature and play, and climbers will be able to do their favorite sport.
“We’ll do it,” both parents said happily.
But the evil wizard who lived far away on a rock, did not let the beautiful Hero live her dream. He sent a dragon darker than him and wounded her in the chest with disease.
Our Hero fought, as a heroine, every day, every moment, every minute with armies of dark forces.
Unfortunately, her heart was weak…she didn’t make it.
But her soul, by the grace of God, transformed into a butterfly
and she stayed on her favorite Hero’s path, along with her parents, greeting passersby.
So one summer month, I and other friends met, with the aim of reciting poems about Irene, at the Hero’s Theater.
We had a great time and everything was done with love and respect.
When at the end the abbess of the Monastery of Panagia of Perivleptou, Mariam, sang a wonderful song dedicated to Iro’s mother, Giorgos Chryssi Marangou, we all gasped.
Our story does not end here, I had to, as President of Greece, representative for the Mil Mentes Por Mexico association International, share the wonderful event that we organized with the help and support of George Pratzikos, Iro’s family and all the wonderful poets who took part…
I should have shared it with the President.
DrA Jeanette Eureka Tiburcio of the organization and of course I talked to them about the Hero’s Path, Hero’s parents, their wonderful work who, with effort, love and respect for their child’s dream… have created a wonderful marked path, friendly to everyone.
In November at the largest event, held in Rome by two organizations
Global federation of leadership and high intelligence Mexico and Unacc India, at the Pontifical University Antonianum, Rome
50 important women from around the world were awarded for their contributions to culture and literature, as well as for their general contribution to their country.
Chrissi Marangou was among the 50 important women and I feel proud to have nominated her for this very important award that has now found its place in the
Path of the Hero.
I feel proud to be an Ambassador of the Hero’s Path, and I continue to promote all the events and all the needs of …
I feel proud and deeply grateful that my own poem dedicated to the heroine, for me Hero, also found its place, and the visitor, ascending for the first route, can read my poem, The Butterfly
Then, leave a few flowers or say a prayer at the Hero’s monument and then let his soul fly there among the trees.
Thank you to everyone who did this wonderful job, including the graphic designer Ms. Kanari.
the people who continue to work on the Hero’s Path.
The parents of Giorgos Chryssi Marangou who continue…and dream
Abbess Mariam
I suggest you take a trip to Politika, Psachna, Evia.
Give a big hug to Chrissi Marangou and George
Go to the Monastery of Panagia Perivleptou and light two candles.
Waving its delicate wings for a while, An elegant butterfly flies from flower to flower. It doesn’t fit in the happy one at all, He is like a hawk with white wings.
Everyone will taste the sweetness of the flower, Although his life is short, he is happy with life. Seeing him in the flower garden in the morning, I fell in love with Harir’s wings.
Immaculate and delicate, an angel is an example, Butterflies are harmless. They are a small symbol of goodness, Don’t hurt your wings.
Shodiyeva Mehribon Amin’s daughter was born in 1998 in Shofirkon district of Bukhara region. The young artist’s poems have been published several times in newspapers and magazines such as “Shofirkon ovozi”, “Buxoroyi Sharif”, “Istiqlol g’unchalari”, “Buxoro adabiyoti va san’ati”, “Bilimdon”, “Dono word”. Collections entitled “Nurli manzillar”, “Beg’ubor orzular” have been published. Currently, she is an independent student of the Bukhara State Pedagogical Institute.
RETURNING HOME: A VOYAGE OF MEMORY, LOVE, AND BELONGING
I often find myself reflecting on the moment I first entered this world. I struggle to recall the exact beginning – what it was like to first recognize my presence in this vast, spinning universe. The earliest memories blur into a soft haze, but one place I know for sure remains vivid in my heart: Dalat. It is both a memory and a dream, a place I once called home but can hardly remember with clarity, like an image shrouded in mist, delicate and fragile.
I lived in a large house on Tang Van Danh Street, nestled along a slope, where my aunt’s family occupied the upper floors. The ground level consisted of two small apartments, one where my mother and I lived, and the other where my cousin and his wife resided. My mother worked, and I was left in the care of Aunt Duong, a slender woman who did everything for us with quiet grace. She was more than just a caretaker; she became an extension of my world, a constant during a time when my mother’s presence was often out of reach. But my mother, the one who filled my world with warmth, was always hustling through life, running errands, working tirelessly to provide for us. Though she wasn’t always physically present, her essence lingered in every small act of love – whether in her quick, reassuring hugs, or the way she spoke, her voice soft like a lullaby.
I remember, even in the hazy blur of childhood, a profound sense of love for my mother, an unspoken adoration that transcended any physical presence. She was like a fairy, a guardian angel who, even in her absence, enveloped me with an unshakeable sense of security and warmth. And it was this love that would carry me through the years, even as the world around me shifted in ways I couldn’t yet understand.
But life, like all stories, moves on. At some point, Dalat and all the warmth it offered faded from my life, as I was taken to Quang Tri, where I attended preschool. I barely remember the transition, but I do remember the sudden absence of my mother. The sense of loss that came with her departure – like a winter wind that strips away all warmth – was deep and unsettling. Her figure, once so vibrant and nurturing, vanished from my life, and with it, a part of my innocence.
In Quang Tri, I was left to navigate a world where my mother’s warmth no longer hovered over me. I remember feeling abandoned, though I was never truly alone. There was my father, who appeared like a fleeting figure in my childhood memories, always dignified and polished, returning from his travels with books and gifts, attempting to bridge the gap that my mother’s absence had left behind. It was through these books, through the written word, that I began to find solace, to build a connection to something greater than the small, isolating world of my childhood. Through books, I made friends with authors, with poets, with characters who understood loneliness, longing, and loss. And in doing so, I became less alone, though I never stopped feeling the absence of that deep maternal connection.
Despite the changes, despite the distance that grew between my mother and me, there were moments when she returned, even if only briefly. She would bring candies and small gifts, things meant to fill the empty spaces of my life. I remember her hands, rough yet tender, as she packed my belongings and prepared for her journey back to Dalat And even though she was only gone for a short time, the absence she left behind was suffocating. It was during those moments that I realized how much I depended on her – how she was my anchor in a world that seemed so uncertain.
The years passed, and I eventually made my way to Dalat to continue my education, to find my way back to her, to that love that had once filled my life so completely. Walking through the streets of Dalat, I felt the warmth of the city, as if the town itself was alive with memories, each street corner and alleyway infused with a kind of magic I couldn’t quite understand but could certainly feel. And there, in the embrace of my mother, in the comfort of her presence, I found something that I had been searching for all my life: the feeling of home.
But like all things, this too was fleeting. Life has a way of carrying us away from the ones we love, of taking us to places we never thought we would go. Yet, even in those moments of departure, there remains a part of me – like the little child I once was – longing for the warmth of my mother’s embrace, for the safety and simplicity of those early years.
As I reflect on my life now, here in Perth, I realize how much of that child remains within me. The longing for the simplicity of those early days, the comfort of knowing that love, unspoken and constant, would always be there to catch me when I fell. Even now, as I teach, as I write, as I translate the words of others, I am still searching for that sense of belonging, for that warmth, that sense of home that is both deeply rooted in my past and yet always just out of reach.
The challenges of our past – wars, separations, the struggles of everyday life – may never be fully understood or reconciled. But through it all, we carry the love and memories of those who shaped us. We carry them in our hearts, in our words, and in the stories we tell. For me, the journey of returning home is not just about finding a place; it is about finding the love, the belonging, the connection that transcends time and space.
So, as I sit here, in this city that has become my home in a different way, I think back to my childhood and to the love that guided me. I think of my mother, my father, and all the figures in my life who, in their own ways, have shaped me. And I know that no matter where I go, no matter how far from home I may travel, I will always carry with me the warmth, the love, and the memories of those early years – forever a part of who I am.
But there’s a strange thing about memory: as much as we carry it with us, we are forever reaching back for those moments when life seemed simple, when love was all around us, when we were whole and protected. Every time I return to those moments, they shift and morph – filling the void in new ways, transforming me as I revisit them, like an endless cycle of reflection, longing, and reconnection. Those memories, at once joyous and painful, are pieces of a puzzle that make up the intricate tapestry of who I am.
And though I may never be able to fully return to those days, to that home in Dalat, I carry its warmth within me, like a light that will never dim. It is my constant companion, guiding me through the most challenging of times. As I continue on this journey, through my writing, my teaching, my life, I know that no matter where I go, no matter how much time passes, I will always find my way back to that sense of home – the love that enveloped me when I was small, the love that still resides within me, and the love that will always guide me back to where it all began.
Vo Thi Nhu Mai, born on March 18, 1976, in Quang Tri, Vietnam, is a poet, literary translator, and dedicated educator currently living in Dianella, Western Australia. Holding a Master’s Degree in Literature, she has been a primary school teacher in WA since 2006, after completing her postgraduate studies at Edith Cowan University. Her teaching career began in Vietnam as an English teacher at Ngo Quyen High School in Ba Ria – Vung Tau (1998–2003), and since moving to Australia, she has worked at Dryandra Primary School and currently at Maylands Peninsula Primary School. Deeply involved in community service, she volunteered from 2015 to 2023 at Hung Vuong Vietnamese Language School, where she also played a crucial role in securing government funding for community education programs.
As a literary figure, Vo Thi Nhu Mai has published four poetry collections in Vietnamese, with a fifth forthcoming, and her poems have been set to music and performed widely. Her translations of poetry, prose, and short stories have introduced Vietnamese literature to international readers, including bilingual editions of works by notable Vietnamese poets and writers published in Romania, Canada, and beyond. In 2023, one of her English poems was selected for publication in a WAPOET anthology, marking a milestone in her bilingual literary journey. She is also known for her active support of fellow writers, assisting with book promotions, writing afterwords, and designing layouts for poetry collections.
Frequently performing bilingual poetry readings at cultural festivals in Western Australia, she bridges linguistic and cultural divides with grace and passion. She is the editor of two major bilingual anthologies (THE RHYTHM OF VIETNAM, THE GRACEFUL FOLDS OF TIME) featuring her English translations of poems by over 250 Vietnamese poets from both within the country and the diaspora; these works have been introduced and celebrated in various locations across Vietnam and in Perth. Beyond literature and teaching, she enjoys traveling to tranquil, culturally rich destinations, taking long walks, and reflecting on life for creative inspiration. For her, literature is not only an art of words but also a bridge of empathy and connection, a means to spread love and understanding through writing, translation, and literary advocacy. Her work can be found at: http://vietnampoetry.wordpress.com. Her website has been established for 15 years, where she promotes Vietnamese literature combining the beauty of Vietnamese and English language.
