Dreadlock Rasta;
No like informa,
No like imposta,
**** smoke; burning da trees
Mango scented leaves,
Burnt grapefruit scented breeze.
Wolly mammoth size locks,
Steal wool, *****, tied in a knot,
Jamaican colors wrap tie; sitting on top.
I and I, believe it or not.
No woman no cry,
No problem;
Him cool as a rock.
Charles Dickens by his side,
Studying stanzas, deciphering plots.
Prayer's meeting;
meditation- never stop.
Water’s blue waves,
Fresh fish after 12’o clock.
Under the bridge, find my spot.
By his sweet Sugarcane from,
Miss Parker Sugarcane shop
Burning a spliff, because the ****
is his only green; pastures plot.
Mary Jane, his only queen be,
Never leaving he; love him or not.

Carefree in leisure time, one blasé tourist,
almost happy, I once had collected a complicated stone;
after the sunny hours had ended and last opportunity
for keepsakes began.

In my hand the stone had kept all of its mouths sewn shut,
holding its amalgamated story, and likewise in the car,
on the plane, through US Customs where it was not
in the least suspected.

A thumbnail identity I now should guess at, marking an old date,
and fixing it to, with reasonable estimate, a map location:
Plot No. 243, East end of the island, slave sugar plantation,
the stone from the corner of a ruined sugarmill stair—
broken free by my criminal hand.

The stone like a bleached out mini-monolith,
square rectangular, could be stood on end;
was swollen at its center like a pulled cork.

What could have moved this sequestered world to opening?
That was not for me to exactly discover,
except what came on Christmas Day,
two days after my returning.

Slave watercourses, the sight of innumerable Dutch ships,
ballasted with human flesh and hewn rock
for sugar works buildings.

The drop at-arms-swish of the Driver’s bullwhip.
Flecks of spirit splayed on vegetation.

A mongrel dog barked beyond the windless wall of sugarcane
in centipede and mosquito heat.

Seaside, beautiful seaside impressions;
distant coral light shadows, etched deep azure;
snowy colored breakers that pencil-marked the sea.
The staid, vibrant, mocking power
of visual symphony backdrop.

So little of aid for the slaves, but for those dangerous secrets,
un-housed in the fallen coolness of the night:
demonstratively crystalline heaven of stars;
a ragged moon, clouds scudding eastward toward Africa.
And there -- Orion’s Belt, mid-sky, illustrious bright,
with its three centering star points in rational line,
as if Hope could have flung its anchor onto Life
engendering sanctified resistance.

Christmas morning, 5 a.m.
I had awakened from a stuck place, shapeless and dark,
half in dreaming and half knowing I was in no dream.

I was sobbing, yet strangely, because there were no tears.
I had only put the stone inside my pajama top onto my heart.

Frequently
I imagine
Unwrapping you
slowly (softly) a gift that
I have dreamed of
Feeling your skin again (and again)
I am grasping for moments
(for you)
I want to cement in me the
softness of your (living)
the sharpness of your bones
sweet like sugarcane
below your surface.
I am here to catch
every breath between my
tingling fingers
caramel tongue
slowly unwrapping (me)
Frequently.

Seventeen I Was ! Much  Stupid To Be Called Sane ! Yes like every other girl I too had a dream world where I was “Marzi Ki Mallika” the very thought of being matured haunted me & being a teenager you just can’t avoid the driving crazy adrenaline rush that you get when you fantasise stuff of being in love. My fantasies resulted in prettily adorable pieces of poems and bits of stories where A Boy fell in love with A Girl. I had dated my dreams since forever & it was amazing & what justifies this statement of mine is that they never disappoint ! talking to people knowing stories making new friends and sharing memories with old one’s that was indeed perfect to me ! I always tried to describe that perfectly adorable moment of falling in love in the best possible way I could fantasise ! Not too soon I realized that moment cannot be emphasised !

THAT MOMENT IS A CAPTURED MEMORY

Turned 23 Yay ! Loads Of Birthday Presents ! Wishes ! Hearty Felicitations ! etc etc 6 years passed since then & I remained the same still much stupid to be called sane ! Maa smiles while she still wakes me up in the morning saying Kobe Boro Hobi (when will you grow up). I giggle and hug her knowing not when !! I see the beautiful stock of my soft toys which helped me remain childish when suddenly my mirror reported about how messy my hair was ! OH GAWED maaa… my instant reaction was !

I was told love happens when matured ! I herd the same but fortunately dared not to believe ! Th0 I knowingly knew that dating a girl like me a guy will have to fall in love with my messed up stuff he needs to constantly date my love for 3a.m coffee & my craziness for maggi accompanied with coke ! My idiotic obsessions with vampire & songs of Nusrat & Kishore & perhaps tolerate the constant humming of those part of songs which I loved ! Questioned my self quiet frequently about will my love accompany me while I trek through the mighty mountains will he accompany me in my best moments of life will he even accept me the way I am !?? such questions did nothing but made me fall asleep which ended up in GOOD MORNINGS with Bournvita !

Usual mornings and unusual days thereafter ! mobile rings I ran to pick up the call it was none other than my beloved going to be husband AASHIQ

Good morning ! come lets plan out something crazy  ! Adrenaline rush  What About A Trek At Ladakh ! Readily agreeing to the proposal I said yes ! We drove together as I discovered his playlist matched mine ! with each passing moment I got the answers to much awaited stupid questions ! while I was unanswerable to his lone question why I had smiled while he drove ! We got down  amidst green surroundings   he picked up a piece of sugarcane and nervously began to chew on it as he was humming one of my favourite songs, He looked at me like I was the only **** thing that’ll ever matter to him looking constantly into my eyes he blurred out ILOVEYOU&WANTTOMARRYYOU;

I always valued crazy memories but this was the craziest one perhaps ! I started laughing unwantedly pointing at his face ! His front tooth had broken! He had been trying to be a stud only to impress me he tried to peel the sugarcane with his teeth & somehow ended up loosing the bottom part of his front incisor !

I Blushed later ! My face betrayed two expressions – Amusement & Shyness !

I Fell In Love Unknowingly Without A Parachute ! much madness was added when I couldn’t resist saying ILOVEYOU

His eyes met mine with a sparkle of mischief  AKHO AKHO ME PYAR HOGAYA

Committed !  Not Confused !

Start Of A New Journey Hands In Hands We Start Our Trek ! !

So proud to live in Queensland, for all it has to share
For anywhere else, in this great land I really just don't care.
I love the smell of burning cane
The ash flying through the air.
This sunburnt state was my home before I went away.
My wife and kids I left behind, hoping to see another day
I answered this great nations call when I was just nineteen.
That didn't stop the enthusiasm, boy I was so keen.
Timor, Iraq, Afghanistan, before I turned twenty five.
On return home to this state my life then took a dive.
The friend left first, the social life. No more did that exist.
The nightmares and the drinking took their place, to this day they do persist.
My family suffered most of all, my moods went bad to worse.
I went through stages where i almost gave up on everything in my life that had any worth.
I got some help in Hospital to help mend my tormented ways.
That way I can spend the rest of my life spending all my days,
In this sunburnt state of ours, at the family home
Now I only feel normal, when I am alone
I now spend all my time on the family farm raising sheep pigs chooks and cows.They can at least be trusted, I can spend hours and hours
This state is more than just a loc, a place you say you live, Queensland is the only place that has given so much, but still continues to give.
I love this state, ill never move. Till the day I die
Even if they said to me, it's easy if you try
But when I go remember that, I have been tormented, torn and broken,
but at least i lived in paradise the truest words ever spoken
Gavin H
20 May 2014

Brown maple sugar,
Cinnamon toast complexion.
Hershey chocolate chip.
Carmel Hazel brown eyes,
Red sugarcane lips.
Your curvy curvaceous thighs.
With enough melanin color blended so perfectly together, bronzing the brownish shade of your muscles.
Natural ethnic hair.
Thick, coarse or silky.
It is perfectly acceptable by me.
***** so big it needs to have its own legs to stand on.
Your blackness is ****.
And it **** sure is beatiful.

An odor has remained among the sugarcane:
a mixture of blood and body, a penetrating
petal that brings nausea.
Between the coconut palms the graves are full
of ruined bones, of speechless death-rattles.
The delicate dictator is talking
with top hats, gold braid, and collars.
The tiny palace gleams like a watch
and the rapid laughs with gloves on
cross the corridors at times
and join the dead voices
and the blue mouths freshly buried.
The weeping cannot be seen, like a plant
whose seeds fall endlessly on the earth,
whose large blind leaves grow even without light.
Hatred has grown scale on scale,
blow on blow, in the ghastly water of the swamp,
with a snout full of ooze and silence

What is so happy,
About this,
Not this feeling,
Stomach sick,
The burn of day
Moves onward
Slowly masking
From within,
Blending
Rain and sugarcane
Surrendering
To the sound,
It pours down
To the sound
Of distance
Flesh on flesh
Tangled in a net
Surrendering
To you
Inside my mind,
Do what you will do

hatasha hullah - dey
parablah nuh parrah
vey, okay, huttah, ulay
narralah, narrah, nutay

That interim between dreams and consciousness, that momentary lapse of reality
When slave children don't howl and the wild animals lay tamed in sun traps, weary

Your scattered thoughts betray reality
and you
question everything - now waking
Smiling chief, chirping loud
Your body gathered and prepared
under torchlight in dusty tents
Ingesting iboga and that old familiar numbness overpowers
You've been here for a life now, looking back on your life now
hatasha hullah - dey
vey, okay, huttah, ulay

Witch doctor, tribal medicine, fanning smoke from a wild fire
flashing imagery akin to memories of when life was decadent
you remember the taste of stray rain drops on your upper lip on muggy British summer days
and waking on a beach, bloodied as the sand at your feet is the next recollection, how powerful
the act of reflection, as you recall the mirrors of the sea and your torn body weakened and inept
The gathered village chant in unison and splinter groups fall off beat only to rejoin intermittently

Remember the Burmese boy far from home on the Gabon shoreline
and he informs you of your own death,
and asks you why do you breathe still?

hatasha hullah - dey
parablah nuh parrah
vey, okay, huttah, ulay
narralah, narrah, nutay
Oh laa, ley ley lahh ley lah
ley hatasha hullah - dey

On some beaten path lost in Angola you carried two packs, food for the world
but you fell starving and spluttered on the rock that looked like your home
Rebels run wild in jeeps black as night, your supplies strewn on rubble grounds
- hatasha hullah - dey
Taken in a flurry, twittering birds in far off trees betray your trust and fly away
in the opposite direction, and the juggernaut jeep catches air over uneven tracks
You were scared and crying under blindfolded eyes and captors jeered, captivated
- parablah nuh parrah
An orchestrated mass of military garbed children with rifles gather you abruptly
when the car stopped with a rumble
And tied to rusted rigs you're gagged and stripped, bloodied your face now
as they beat you and laugh
- vey, okay, huttah, ulay
Congolese giant man, sword in hand and grimacing through bared teeth
Making bold gestures and speaking some inscrutable language
You cannot answer and fear is now in control, you shiver in the ghastly draft
On failure to answer you must be beaten, your back is lashed, repeatedly
- narralah, narrah, nutay
You remain silent but cry in disparity, after shrieks of horror finally escape your barren lips
Through stinging eyes you assess the surroundings after hours of torture when they retire
to their leather beds of shame and innocence faltered, try and remember how to live
- Oh laa, ley ley lahh ley lah
Months must have passed, survive off insects and morning dew on the muddy floor
This African wasteland, time forgotten, child soldiers and lack of humanity is trivial
Always scheming, recollect the armament and through door-way shack trapped light
you see a clear path, and it is good
- ley hatasha hullah - dey
The pinnacle nightfall anticipated arrives, and your skinny wrists released now easily
(their faltering lack of knowledge and abundant braggadocio betray them)
AK laying in moonlight illumination, a sign of God perhaps, but experience proves otherwise
(How cruel the dreams you had of such a gift)
When they spot you leaving, the night lights up, wild crackle of gunfire, heart beats, tribal drums
(To massacre children, such proficiency, the dreams were mindful)
No lapse in concentration, you may ruminate on objective morality in due time
(Crawling through blood and bodies of children, so pure, cadavers tell lies)
The clearing ahead in giant trees, you run and don't look back, praying for no pursuit
(Another genocide committed by a white man, justified perhaps this once)
Weeks pass and you falter only to slurp rain water from Congolese sipping cups the leaves
(Blacking out somewhere in the Republic, or on a border or who cares, as you died long ago)
- vey, okay, huttah, ulay
  ley hatasha hullah - dey

To awake from hallucinogen dreams, and cruel memories linger, it's painful you agree
Witch doctor still sings, lonesome now as the tribe apply ointments and silently pray
The fire still dances to some incredible song and your scars redacted, physical and other
How incredible the mind feeling fuzzy and that insane dream is just that - a dream
You black out again, a common occurrence but upon waking you're free, no tribe exists
With a sheepskin rucksack full of cassava, plantains and sugarcane and cocoa beans
Months pass and you make it to the North, when you leave Africa your body is new
and your mind is stable, no lingering cognizance or frightful thoughts of a forgotten ordeal

You arrive in Turkey, to partake in ***** with nimble girls
and I see you floundering on silken sheets,
My memories were fresh as the nymph on your lap
I write to you a note, and you turn alabaster, moon faced being
I was there always and saw every moment
Your ideals on morality are hazy at best, and to your behest I detest all that you stand for
Is your afterlife so pure, now that bodies litter the forest floor
and do you believe that I am not (a) God
and is this mere poetry, or an indictment of your folly and a warning to all whom engage
but do you not also see that every reaction was an action taken to your original action
and when all is said and done, do you no realise that from the day you were born
you were born a God and that God was born dead
and this is just that interim between expiration and consciousness, that momentary lapse of reality
when slave children don't howl and the wild animals lay tamed in sun traps, weary

hatasha hullah - dey
parablah nuh parrah
vey, okay, huttah, ulay
narralah, narrah, nutay
hatasha hullah - dey
parablah nuh parrah
vey, okay, huttah, ulay
narralah, narrah, nutay
hatasha hullah - dey
parablah nuh parrah
vey, okay, huttah, ulay
narralah, narrah, nutay
Oh laa, ley ley lahh ley lah
ley hatasha hullah - dey

Summer was
******* on sugarcane and cinnamon peels
handed from your grandparents, occasionally mine
when our roller-skates made love to cracks in
                             the sidewalk
          our knees were drunk on its feathers
so many specks of moss get caught in there, too

    you taught me not to cry
or have that formaldehyde-chugging look
until I hit the bunkbed; your sheets made my sweat
look so much worse
                          we got anything we could want.

I wanted to kiss you when your wore your
Popsicle lipstick, a freeze cracking the crib of your
       mouth and circling buzzards around.

But how does a girl say
   she would rather have someone than a cigarette  
      stick of candy from the ice cream man –
the ones she would twirl like cherry stems
    and feign middle school maturity?

  We would whisper about things at night
with the lamp off, our pants down
                                                   but never ever love:
love is for adults. Love is Mardi Gras in the city
           not powdered sugar from beignets
   or the kind of beads you settle around your neck.

I wanted to be the bayou you swam in,
cast your fishing pole at the underbelly of and
  counted how many seconds it took to lift back up.
I wanted to be a chest you put
         your personal belongings in, a treasure box.
Most of all, I wanted
                          to be your personal belonging
              the treasure you immediately thought of –
        but that is not what Summer was.

Shouldn't we all be studying?

dedicated to M M Jones from Montana,
where I guess big skies make people think
about big questions and young poets thrive.


the butterflies of child-awakening
to the certainty
that school and
shame and embarrassment
were only minutes away,
once again,
is as fresh as
the flowers my love
buys every Friday,
fifty plus year later.

I would awake,
climb into bed with my mother,
telling her I did not feel well,
that my
stomach felt gray.  

I could not tell her that
the mocking I received by
my richer classmates at the
multiple lines in the fabric
of my corduroy pants
where she let my pants down
made me cannon fodder
for what we call now
bullying.

I could not tell her
of the heartbreak
when somehow the parents
of my supposed suburban friends
forgot to
pick me up for the weekly swim,
leaving me to watch
the sunset fall as I sat
on the stoop of our old house,
tucked away in an out of the way,
unfashionable street,
the shame still wet.

I could not tell her
of how two bothers tortured me
as I sat in the back seat
of their station wagon,
spitting seeds
on me like curses.  

Their older brother died of cancer
when that was still unusual,
and the mother wrote
a beautiful book
about his life.

I still hate them, those two,
fifty years later and it gives me
unusually great pleasure to
announce it to the world.

So I studied.  

Not my schoolbooks,
but lovely and ***** literature.
Friday afternoons, three children,
me the baby brother,
(anonymous, for they nicknamed me
brother as if  I was nothing but
checked off category)
to the library went.

Five, five was the max
they the austere librarians
and their coda of holy silence,
would let me withdraw.
(god I can see my library card still).  

By Friday night,
I had finished one or two,
ruining my eyes in
the lousy lamp light
in the living room,
falling asleep on the couch.  

this, reading addiction,
which afflicted the entire family,
I did well into my teens.

I have stopped reading
which amazes the very few
who know and care.

do let us re-pose,
let us repose,
the question:

Shouldn't we all be studying?

the answer of course is
yes and no.

my studying blue period
is long since ended.
now, my biographer,
will call this my red period.

for red are the memories that my remembrances
come back to me.
crystal is the clarity
of the indignities
I recall, though red,
is the anger
at the shame and
abuse I took.

now I can write what I have always held in my heart.  

those two awful brothers,
who loved to torture me,
I was glad their
wonderful brother died.

so this is my red writing period,
when the studying of a kind,
has long since ended
but the smell,
the memory of
fresh textbooks still can
make me nauseous.

Yet, I still study life around me,
as I clean countertops,
walk deserted beach isles
in early September...
this studying,
is the product of years
of studying the inside out
of me, and turning that study
fruitful into poetry.

why?
why am I writing this at 2:00 am on a Sunday morning?

I did not pose the question.

but it posed me,
and the dialogue in my mind came
sugarcane fresh and tumbling out
and will be both
recorded and recoded
("in the truth will out eventually" file)
after a fashion.

these days I sometimes study
my older poems,
whose titles I recognize,
but whose content
I cannot recall.  

so double digit delight
when I
meet again old words,
wondrous and trite,
that make believe
that all my studying
somehow paid off after all.

Monkey and goose
Snake and bull
And their friend Tiger Lou
Met at hummingbird's garden
For an afternoon's tea for two

In hummingbird's garden
Raised the most  precious flowers
Be they red or blue , pink or white
To all that viewed
It was a dazzling sight

Somewhere between succulent sips
The question of God's existence
Became more than a quip
Where is it that God can be found ?
Is he here upon Earth or some holiest ground ?

Then goose said , "I will fly across this land .
My wings are strong and
When it comes to tiring , I have no end .
From high away I can see . So please ,
For certain , I am the one to send ."

Monkey said ,"I can swing from
Tree to tree all day long .
So high that I can see
Every aspect of the land .
So if anyone goes , let it be me ."

Snake said ,"I will slither , I will crawl
Across the swamp , across the bog .
If this God exists , surely
I will be the one
To bring back a certainty ."

Bull steps in as to be not excluded
"I will cross the plains from end to end .
I will search from dawn to dawn .
If there be such a place
It will be found by me on Earth's green lawn ."

Tiger Lou steps up with a growl
"I will go searching in the fields of rice .
I will go where the sugarcane grows .
I will not stop , so cast my lot .
When I come back , it will be told ."

Then they left , each in a separate way
And they would be gone for many a day
But then there came the day to pass Goose and Monkey , snake and bull and Tiger Lou
Met at hummingbird's with finished task

Goose said "I have found God !
And I know the only way ."
"Say Hey !" said the monkey,"For you are all wrong !
Through the woods have I found God !
It's through the woods all day long ."

"Nay !" snake had to say ,"I found God
And only I know the way .
Across the swamp , I'm here to state
Is the only way to him .
Anything else is tempting fate ."

Bull bellows most loudly of all
"You fools , I have searched for days and days . It's across the fields of grass
That you must go to God . And by the way ,
All of your remarks are so crass ."

Tiger Lou darkened his eyes
"Idiots ! The devil has fooled you all .
If you seek God  , I and only I know the way .
To show you let me say .
So apologize or step back away ."

Then there was a vicious roar
Monkey strangled goose , snake bit monkey's knee
Tiger bit snake in half , then bull flung Tiger
High into the sky , breaking his back with a Crack
Bull burst his heart with such strength , and didn't linger

Hummingbird in her garden was saddened
Began humming and humming a song
The song turned into a chant that flew to heaven
Where God was and is today
Waiting for searching souls that he will never abandon

Monkey , goose , bull , snake , and Lou
Before God stood , looking blue
"Have you fools anything to say ?"
But only silence crossed their lips
"Listen closely to what I have to say."

"Only I know the way .
Only I , for I am the way .
Only through me can there be a way .
And only by my gift of salvation
Can you stay ."

Welcome my Princess! Oh Heavens,
For the queen of my heart
Is about to offer to nature
Her complete beauty of Africa,

Give her the Kente cloth
In its rich, natural and splendid array,
And offer her newborn feet with
The golden sandals and diamond beads,

Behold! There she descends from the
Unapproachable eternal flames of the sun,
With the divine firmament
Fizzling at her flammable tune,

See how the precious fragrant branches
Of the clouds covers her lovely feet,
For the clouds have gathered and there is
Nothing more to expect but the storm,

Oh yes, I have found a ****** woman,
The beauty among the daughters of great men,
Whose eyes are as brilliant as the star

And as delightful as a sugarcane;
Behold, her face is as bright as palm wine;
Her hair sleeps like a slender thread,
And her stature is as that of a pawpaw tree,

She is called Obaahemaa Kabutuwaa
And truly she is Rasses Kabutuwaa
Whose eyes are those of the faithful dove,

Truly, Kabutuwaa whose
Gods is like that of bees,
Slim, black and full of sweetness,

Truly, Kabutuwaa is obedient and wise,
Truly, Kabutuwaa for whom
All men felt love in their hearts!

Come! Oh my unveiled one,
And expose thy soft and loamy face,
For the nations shall seek and
Behold thy enviable eternal beauty,

Ah, the proud effeminate shadow of Africa,
Please show the angelic face of
Thy love to my perturbed soul,
For thou art an African ****** indeed.


© PRINCE NANA ANIN-AGYEI
Email: nanaspeaks@gmail.com

on my right leg,
under my knee
lives a cinnamon colored stain
that looks a bit like africa
the same way i look a bit like africa
in the shape of my nose
and the waves of my curls
waves like the water that carried my
ancestors in boats
all the way to this island
of salt and sugarcane

Upon the stale wind, her body flails again
I came walking through the field
to learn about compassion
She was blonde and the last heart in town
The moon bathed her from within
What a loveless dream from that tree
touching God's skin.

Her feet above my head, painted in mud and above the sugarcane
And if I didn't love her so, I'd be able to walk from this pain
But I recall her warm breath the last time we kissed
The air tasted of a broken soul that I failed to fix

Blood under her nails, scratching freedom too slow
If she was yelling for my name, then I'd rather not know
It might as well been me who hung her above the stars
I did not give her enough of me and it will haunt me for years

He craved a father like a burnout
licking his sugarcane eyes &
slapping them on
any surface they'd stick &

he called night The Kingdom
would wander off for ages
said I don't need to know
where I'm goin'

said Someday I'll have already
found it & maybe he's right
All people die a little
more in daylight

he was 16
a dry firecracker
one spark away
from infinite eruption

I am
corn-fed girl of
middle land
glaciers rested here
then chose to stay
melted into the ground
from which stalks sprouted
I am
daughter of floods
on the plains
pioneer of the elementary school prairie
conqueror of the long highways
that stretch from flat horizon
to flat horizon
I am
speaker of tongues
imperfectly
I am
curious
seeking the limbo where
East meets West
I am
austriangermanhungarianslovenianpolishscottishwelshirishspanis­hcomancheiowan
I am

He is
sugarcane sweet boy of
Partition’s land
born on the right side
border still bathed in the blood
of those born in the wrong
He is
son of monsoons
and spider-web trees
longing for his land
visitor of Swat
disparaging long lost tranquility
uprooted, exiled
frequenter of south asian sweets houses
He is
a bad dancer
He is
guiltless in this battle between
East and West
He is
pakistanimultanisiraikidesipunjabi
He is

R.J Calzonetti


Screaming cross the skyscraper’s windbreaker tapering

Aether vapour- trailblazing ****-sapien wafers

Of machinations psychotropic doppelgängers

Aristotle throttling menagerie’s philosophically hypnotic obelisks

Mind-boggling astronomical chronological esophagus

Antioxidants phosphorus catastrophic mitochondria

Beyond anaconda onomatopoeia

Of hallucinogenic Armageddon biblical umbilical cords

Swarming northern lights of aurora borealis

The chalice a battleground of Evangelion belladonna

Metalica candelabra swallowing the monochrome Hanukkah

Of a cold winter’s eldritch disintegration photosynthesis

Of innocent infinity stretching wretched beckoning requiem

The words that fall upon my page, are really just a shallow grave

Of the dawn of nighttime in my eyes, calm upon the twilight sun

Wrong is done draped on the blood moon wraiths

Skyscraped fields dusk a hollow thud below the dunes

That thumps the consumption of our fate, fumes to glow in darkness loom

Left blind in light of day you cannot see, the little pieces silver sheen

For blinding light may fade to grey, and I will never have my way

Nightfalls on another daybreak, dawning darkness, sundown on another day

Twilight plays with sparkling haze, the sky a wildfire made ablaze in patchwork scarecrows

Who etch rainbows black as a heart of coal, sold flatlining railroads

Gold wraithlike halos of stained-glass cathedrals unreal in the fever-dream of human beings

Bleeding Elysium from the seabed of dead worlds, gourds of incorporeal cornucopias

Born orchestra morsels of sorrowful oracles predicting crucifixion of ellipsis’ antithesis


(MC) Aurora


Absonant  as my pen writes the twilight, the red swallowed on horizon and bright

As through a sea of blood under my feet and shrinking mast of my mighty ship

A shadow I make on that red snow and peep into my heart’s hollow

It’s deep as much as my pen spake of grief.

I blinded in that last light and hurled like a beast dreading the songs of holy lies

That have just pained in bright and made me grieve.

They dragged me on my wings and deplumate  me as so fallen humans

They wrenched my limbs and rive my heart out and flinger me in air and I laid forever

On the stones that dank my blood.

I wait for the troth  of  demise but betrayed as it didn’t come to detract,

I laid when the horizon grinned red on my face and poured the last ale

And brutally drank the last sip of me.



R.J Calzonetti


People are sleeping under the blankets of a tranquil streetlamp

A sunflower in the damp bed of concrete

Soon they’ll be pushing up daisies

Underneath the foundation of what I stand for

Nip the bud of the flower pedalling the root of all evil like fallen leaves

Breeding paraplegic freedom from the pollen melancholic

Anarchistic polycrystalline shapeshifters drifting vilified

Buried alive like asphalt constellations crowning metallic gallows alcoholic in my solitude

See the clouds bury the ground in half a heaven’s heartbeat

Limbo’s limitless abyss the photosynthesis of the sepulchral diablo

Revenants of redemption dancing with death

Evanescent in its bioluminescent crescent moon spooning illuminated illustrations

Of Himalayan mayhem cremated avarice of ethereal onomatopoeia unravelling catacombs in God’s palindromes

Homeopathic saplings decapitated in the dismembered September wastelands defibrillator

Invigorating the nightshade white wraiths plane-walkers of Apocrypha documenting entropy

Pent up sentience avenging the endless demigods of discombobulated proclamations nocturne graceless, octaves eldritch, evangelic

Elegant elevators to flights of staircases where the air is fragrant with the fragments of stagnant stained glass asterisks

Written gospels to masquerade hostage to the faith the man misplaced the sacred hate, the passageways of apathy apostrophe

Apartheid of serpentine survivors carving smiles on the sidewalks

Farming diamonds and their detox

Arming giants like a phoenix

Carnal nihilists with their secrets

Stardust quiet as the bleachers

Start defiant still a reject

Art discipled to our freedom

Shattered hearts pick up the pieces

Jigsaw puzzles, smothered treasons

Sow the seeds and **** the reaper

Even legions rhyme and reason

Tattered flags without a penance

Good men do not go to heaven

Buy your burden at 7-11

Your exit is the only the next entrance

Resurrection prepubescent

Asymmetric biomechanics

Anguish to be reprimanded

Megalomaniac in our sabbath

Living life is just a sentence

Psalms of seance death’s senescence

Baptize vengeance lest it ventures into heaven

Ventriloquist omniscience of rhythmic equilibrium

Earthly hurricanes reemerging insurgent as the sugarcane purgatory

Primordials metamorphosis contorting rigour Mortis oracles horoscope cloaked in cloaca hallucinations

Induced irradiated amalgamated retaliatory incorporeal chlorophyll

Born from the sorcerers' spell, the cathedral of doubt

The only darkness is within oneself, light shed within a holy shell

Isolation is a lonely hell, scythes of moonlight blight of bells

Nightingales fail to halo word of mouth

Enveloped in the clouds cast shadows hex

But resurrection cannot hide from the eyes of death

Fresh as babies breath

Rank as the body festers effigies

Bless the Nephilim the questions beck

And call for some god to collect the rest

Is there any answer?

Even growth can be a cancer

Lifeless corpses once were dancers

Devils waltz on top of canopies

Heaven’s hands have touched serenity

****** brands that crushed His enemies

Stained glass sanguine dismantled entropy

Calamity ran dry insanity dabbling in humanity

Unravelling the candy wrapper saplings of happiness

Pitch black irradiant dull edges sharpening archangels, darkness reincarnating

Blinding bioluminescent glistening abyssal rakshasa sarcophagus parting monarchies

Metamorphosis coruscating fornication immortalization Tartarean

Reverberating ****-sapien scintillating hurricanes palpitation circulating ricocheting oblivion

Shining crepuscular homunculus dully illustrious

Sunless avatars, mannequins of Abaddon stygian as fallen leaves on the breeze of Avalon Evangelion

Incarceration breeding Elysium’s jailors in the cathedral of double helixes

Bethlehem's’ new genesis of Lucifer’s crucifixion

Brighter than a fallen star

Mourning in the dark

Doppelganger apostles night stalkers of phosphorous

Pockmarked arcanum bloodstained in gravestone Salem

Where the braves’ halos dined on maelstroms alone

Heirs succeeding failures of the empty throne

Filled with nothings’ own

Brimming bound by Babylonian poems

Deus ex Machina's apocalypse coughing prophets of Samsara blossoming diabolic

Life is but a Holocaust

Death the moment God forgot

Breath the only psalm we sought

Kept within a hollow box

Shedding devils, angelic, lost

Finding metamorphosis


(MC) Aurora


A world often synonymous with beauty on the horizon,

Meet my eyes you mourned demon load the strength on thee.

Crestfallen light on your wrist burns down your girth

And you can plead, just plead your twilight sun.

Watch the dead sea swallow you in the salts of agony

And drown in the anguish, hundreds of angelic bloodsheds,

Press hold of the thumbprints on your throat, you can't roar.

Sore lugubrious melancholy aired atmosphere,

And downhearted souls dispirited dragons dragged along.

The sob grim hiding in a blue funk rusty smog choking wind,

The nyctophilliac animals howl long the cold-blooded love song

In your lungs and burn.

It's the twilight sun,

Just that twilight sun.

Sometimes I wish love was just an option,
that feelings materialized by chance
and the many rooms of the heart were filled with cotton.

That we could choose to see what's behind the door,
that it was an A, B or C answers on a game show.

That it was a myth, the most ridiculous fantasy novel,
that it could easily be buried on a night with alcohol and a shovel.

I wish love was just an option,
that it came with the ability to fly,
because us mortals are not equipped to fall from such heights,
but yet, we do.

I wish love was just an option,
that our tears were made of sugarcane bliss
and the taste on our lips didn't belong to a kiss
but yet, they do.

Because love it's not an option,
it’s not a text message filled with X’s & O’s
it’s not Hollywood happy ending
it’s not a Kardashian wedding
it’s not a facebook ‘Relationship Status’
it's not iPhone App
it’s not what’s perceived on the outside
it's the parade of emotions running rampant in your insides.

Because love is not an option, my love,
alas, it's the only one.

How does it feel,
to know the secrets
of an entire city?

I mean, you can see
everything.

The handshake
for a sold deal,
a new cooperation,
a million jobs created,
another million destroyed.

How does it feel,
to see a ***** street rat,
a plastic bag of sugarcane,
vermin taking their pick
of Chinatown’s lovely leftovers?

How does it feel,
to see children
turning into fathers?

To have them grow,
hoping, praying,
that one day they’ll
be as tall as you?

That the children
will fly among the stars,
angels cursed to play tag,
for just a little bit longer.

How does it feel,
to know that one day,
your favorite will slam
his apartment door
closed for the last time,
bags packed into boxes,
driving into a tunnel,
your line of sight gone,
never to return?

How does it feel,
to know that he might
love the ocean more?

Friends, Part Two will get posted after a break. I have added short notes at the end, for appreciation of all Jazz lovers. To know how the word 'Jass' became 'Jazz', - kindly read the Foot Notes below. Best wishes, - Raj, New Delhi.

    THE STORY OF JAZZ MUSIC IN VERSE:
                         PART- ONE

                      INTRODUCTION
Before writing about this true Jazz Story,
I had delved into its long checkered history!
I had plowed through many articles and
books,
Making personal notes to make Jazz better
understood.
My love for this music flows in my veins,
From writing this true story myself I could
hardly restrain !

THE ATLANTIC SLAVE TRADE
The story begins some four hundred years
ago in History,
Drenched in the blood and sweat of the black
slaves which was no mystery,
Painting a sorrowful background to our Jazz
Story !
It was a time when the English , Spanish , French ,
Portuguese and the Dutch became frantic , -
To gain control of the slave trade across the vast
Atlantic !
Slave trade those days was a very profitable
business proposition;
The funds generated had also financed Britain’s
Industrial Revolution!

In 1619  a Dutch sailing ship had carried the first
lot of fifty slaves from West Africa, -
To work in the cotton, tobacco, and sugarcane
plantations of English Colony of Virginia !
Only twenty slaves had survived that hazardous
Atlantic journey;
And here my friends lies the roots of my Jazz
Story !
While it is true that in New Orleans Jazz got
cradled and also nourished;
But it had taken birth in the regions of Western
Africa where slave traders had once flourished!
Later, many more slaves were transported across
to work in the plantations of the Southern States
of America,*  (see notes below)
And in their hearts one could hear the tom–tom
and drum beats of native Africa ! * (notes below)

HOLLERS AND WORK SONGS
Those slaves took no musical instruments with
them,
And worked under the whip lash of their white
Overseers bound in chains !
But they had cherished their ancient music which
fed their hope and the will to survive;
And from the depth of their sorrow and suffering, -
sprung the rhythm and beat of their life !
While at work they were forbidden to talk to each
other,
So they sang in a rich sing-song voice and called
out to one another;
Which was not understood by their whip-wielding
Overseers.
They also called out and communicated to other
working gangs in the distant fields,
Who also replied back in a similar fashion to
make their communication network complete.
The ‘hollers’ and ‘work songs’ also did help,
To lighten the burden of their treacherous fate.
This ‘call and response’ later formed one of Jazz
Music’s basic elements,
As ‘improvised music’ got composed with Jazz
providing a proper vent.
From their tormented soul they sang to wipe away
their blues,
Giving birth to ‘blue notes’ later , for WC Handy
to pay his many handsome tributes !
The slaves longed for freedom and emancipation,
Singing their ‘spirituals’ with faith and devotion !
While singing they often got into a trance,
And felt like the Israelites in ******* in Egypt,
ordained by fate and chance !
The Mississippi was like the River Jordan across
which they hoped to see, -
A band of Angels coming in their chariots to set
them free,  @
From their suffering, drudgery, and captivity !
Thus ‘improvisation’ becomes a vital ingredient of
Jazz Music;  $
For ‘freedom of expression’ is its distinguishing  
feature, which Jazz music forever seeks.

CONCLUDING  MY PART ONE
‘Jazz’ had come to America in chains, buried
deep inside the black man’s soul.
With a longing for freedom from torture and pain,
Which was then beyond their control!
The tom-tom beats, work songs, Spirituals and the
Blues, -
Were all precursor to Jazz, and here I pause to
pay my homage and heart-felt dues,
To those valiant predecessors who had come in
chains ,
Giving a painful birth to ‘jass’, - from which Jazz
gets its name ! # (notes below)

FOOT NOTES:-
Slaves were sold at 15 dollars per head. Early 1700s saw 75,000 slaves auctioned! By1800s there were one million slaves in US alone! Slaves came from Senegal, Ashantis, Gold Coast, Niger Delta, Dahomey, & the Congo; with a variety of beats and music buried in their minds and hearts !
** The Drums were an essential form of communication in Africa. They believed their Gods communicated through their beats . Those drums provided the basic beats of Jazz Music.
+ 'Blue Music' = became a part of cultural landscape of Southern US by early 1900s, but had remained unnoticed till W.C.Handy published his song –‘Memphis Blues’ in1914.
@ I refer here to the famous ***** Spiritual song -‘Swing Low Sweet Chariot’ ! I use to sing this song in my Missionary School in Calcutta in the 50s !  Slaves had sung them in plantation ‘Praise Houses’ during their weekly prayer meetings.
# "JASS" = originally an Africa-American slang meaning ‘***’! Born in the brothels of Storyville (New Orleans)  & the Jasmine perfumes used by the girls there; one visiting them was  said to be 'jassed-up' ! Mischievous boys rubbed out the letter ‘J’ from posters outside announcing -"Live Jass Shows'', making it to read as ‘'Live *** Shows'’! So finally ‘ss’ of ‘jass’ got replaced by 'zz' of JAZZ !
$ “Improvisation” = is the process of spontaneously creation of fresh melodies over the continuously repeating cycle of chord changes of a tune, which distinguishes Jazz from all other musical forms - raising it to its own great Individualistic Heights !
….ALL COPY RIGHTS ARE RESERVED BY RAJ NANDY OF NEW DELHI---
E-Mail : rajnandy21@yahoo.in

there is a reason
woman is shaped
with the curves of an hourglass

the shouldered top
in which rests the weight
of threadbare words
covered in the crimson paste on chapped lips

the ever-slimming waist
the hips that hold our hands
with fingers that slip between
our cracked ribs
and pull. tightly. inwards.
to make it harder for that ****** sand
to waterfall through

and the wide feet
with train-track paths behind them
that lead through middles of mountains
fly over valleys of sugarcane and wildflower
and beneath trenches woven deep in the ocean

there is a reason
woman is shaped
with the curves of an hourglass

that pale, fine time
that slips from
the tip of a rough tongue
and through gritted teeth
falls into the hollow bones
of the hips, legs and ankles

at the moment time leaves her
the sand is now full
of chipped mountain rock
sweetened with sugarcane
colored with specks of yellow wildflowers
and salted with kisses from the Atlantic.

It’s a place where an enticing bay sways,
Music dancing on the misty breezes,
Humdrums of level heads mingle effortlessly,
The constant waves lap up on indigo stacks,
The sun sits bejeweled in the sky,
Sandy stalks of sugarcane sweeten the air,
Drink and pleasure abound,
Vagabonds and harlequins twirl and chant,
The dusk and the dawn live together,
Creamy silver and golden haze weather,
The aesthetic is O so grand,
Celebrations of life here in the sand.

Mad trolleys take them to the city,
The hustle and bustle reduced to saunter,
Adornments of every shape and design,
Line the alleys and canals,
Flora and fauna engrained in the DNA,
Every bit of the city breathes, sighs and laughs,
Back at the bay they all rest together,
Making love by driftwood fires,
They sing like mad poets and howl to one another,
Everyone becomes an instrument,
Everything becomes equal.

The ugly poetess
Over the housetops,
Above the dry blades of the sugar cane husks
I have known fear, I have known hunger
I felt the pain of a nail wound deep in my foot
I belted out the blues like Nina Simone
An era of reform: the moments of truth,

On top of the hill, lies a village in Barbados
Acid rain, rooftop leaks on to my bed
It was a rough year:
only food sources were rice and breadfruits
We lived through it all:

It was my destiny:
To love and to hate them:
those old fruit loops

Through the eyes of a uprising poet
The curving of his pen,
Somehow, he made amends, he purge
the smoky air,
the disgusting sight of the pig pens
out of his mind

lack of personal dental hygiene,
the elders lost their teeth
Grinding down on sugarcane, while they
awaits the big meal of the day
Supper!

With innocent eyes and achy feet
I read so many books for inner peace

My stomach was empty,
but my mind was at ease
To dream big while aiming high

Marlene, Delores, and Linda
Known as the vanishing three
Migrated to North America
Where a Barefooted child
like me wasn’t supposed to be
Eventually, I know I would have followed

I have woven my feathers,
while looking upwards,
In my little corner under the old rusty galvanizes
.
At the old country shop the vanishing three mothers
told me that I wasn’t pretty enough to leave the island
Words of hatred, mere words of discomfort
I felt my wings tighten against my rib cage,
My tongue, glued against my jaws

From that day forward the poet smile against stupidity
And spitefulness, she too had come to
Eat her words, the old shopkeeper

The poetess enter another line from that era
Uncaring beauty without brains
Where are they now?

I walked with confident down that street
The misty air moist my skin
The poetess return to the Island of Barbados
Without the sugar in her blood..
.

We began with doubts in the dark night-
Everything that came under the sky of night-
The noiseless stars -that were just flickers
In the crisp air of a deep night and crickets
That creaked from dark and thorny bushes.
We thought of sultry bears that came down
From the hills for ripe sugarcane in fields
On windy nights when we were sleeping
On the river bank, with a long stick safely
Sleeping beside us on a springy string cot.
The dogs sculpted their own long protests
At the howling wind and  bush rat’s scrawl .
There in the sketchy bushes of darkness
The lizards slept fitfully wary of night snakes.
Outside, the fireflies tantalized the country.
Our doubts persisted through the night ,
Going on unabated in sleep and dreams.
At the ****'s crow they dissolved in sleep.

here lies, too, his lover still
doting from the daffodils
shrieking, hot and virile; shrill
caressing flesh she's soon to ****

so goes, whence?, the evening train
as she, longing to love again
lust as deep as sugarcane
howl at me between the rain

enter, now, the corpse of faun
carved from wet, unsightly lawn
lithe and nubile as a swan
murky eyes look further on

at last, rise from the netherworld
'round her fearsome finger curled
soul diffused and newly pearl
kissing the form you call a girl

His naked hands, so cold
I become lavender

sticks poking from lace sheaths, wanting to
be a wedding dress
or just a piece of someone in love

the powder, aroma of a man
who forsook his lover last spring.

Her tomb is just a box filled with earth
that opens to the pearly
gate of heaven

and each of her legs have grown
stiff because god so desperately needed to

shape a marble mold of the most
perfect being he
ever created and killed way, way too soon.

(the road has ended as
many stories as it has begun)

Hot concrete pried her mouth open
and I will be the one to
sing through it until she gets her voice back

like using sugarcane
to lure clouds into leaving the sky.

-----------I weave my grand                     mother's spirit to life--------
             when I paint with my             words what she dreamed
             in her life.  My grandmother's kimono sat in the dark never
            worn; so needs a     dusting--I lift it up      into this light to be
           seen, to be heard,      to be felt, fabric of          loving  heart
          dreams to be.  It's     not perfectly shaped   or tattered or torn,
         rather fermented       beyond her time  to      take form.  My
       Grandma loved  to        eat her white rice          she ate thirty
      seven million grains      of rice by the time         she reached her
      104-- Born on a             sugarcane plant'tion         on the coast of
     Oahu, a child in               the tropics then a       teen in Japan. Her
    family returned to          their roots to learn,    & grow, reenter the
   cultural force. She                discovered her              new talent as
                                            ------------------------------
                                  ­              K  I   M   O  N  O          
                                               ­     A R T I S T
                                            --------------------­----------
                                       Kikuyo  Yamamoto became
                                     liberated as an artist and then
                                     her life changed as her family
                                    demanded she leave her position
                                   and marry away to a Japanese man
                                    who lives in California (my Grand
                                    father).  The matchmaker said it
                                     would work really well....She
                                   endured life as an American farm
                                     wife, then life in Japanese intern-
                                    ment camps. Five  children, nine
                                    grandchildren...Dear Grandmother
                                     I know you had lots to surrender-
                                           I honor your life as mother,
                                           grandmother, and artist --I
                                          wove this poem in the form
                                       of  a kimono for you  May your
                                         spirit rest in peace. I love you.

This is what I remember:
the rasp of your callouses against my hips,
and the way your eyelashes would settle
like snowflakes on my cheekbones
if you brought your face close enough.
This is what I remember:
the whir of the air conditioner
struggling against the afternoon heat.
Too short shorts.
Vinyl diner seats sticking to my thighs,
pulling uncomfortably at the skin.
Blueberry cobbler and coffee left too long in the ***.
I don't know if it was me
or you
or me with you-
the way I would bruise pretty and quick
beneath your fingertips,
like a summer peach just shy of overripe.
This is what I remember:
filling myself with you and dime-book poetry,
both worn by time and the carelessness of others.
My wet hair on your pillowcase.
Your eyes.
Your eyes.
Your eyes;
irreverent and devoted.
There was religion in you-
divine words written in the spaces between your ribs.
You took whiskey like holy communion.
And me too.
Your bedroom faced the East.
Mornings were molasses and sugarcane and dragging feet.
This is what I remember:
ruined shoes and over-stretched T-shirts.  
The smell of lake water.
Mud between my toes.
Changing leaves floating down around me.
Cold doesn't come here like other places.
Snow gathers on trees and in hair and melts easy.
This is what I remember:
warming my hands in your coat pockets,
then with cups of tea-
Earl Grey brewed so strong it made my head ache.
I am more used to night terrors than I ever was to you.
This is what I remember:
feeling.
The flu in September,
then again in December.
You felt more like a fever dream than anything else-
blurry;
fantastical;
difficult to recall.
You left me sixteen voice mails;
sixteen unheard messages;
sixteen times I pressed nine to delete.
This is what I remember:
me,
stronger.

When designer and model Mari Giudicelli stepped foot inside the Rio Market in Astoria, Queens, she was like a kid in a candy store. “I looove it!” she exclaimed at the sight of a jar of goiabada—a guava paste you can eat with cheese. Her eye catches something else on the shelf: “These are delicious! Everybody had these bite-size cake desserts made with condensed milk and chocolate powder (called brigadeiros) at their birthday parties when we were little. They’re a staple, like hot dogs are here in the U.S.”

With the Olympic Games in their second week, the Rio-born beauty was on a quest to find little pieces of home in sprawling New York. Guidicelli has lived here for six years, leaving her hometown in Brazil to attend Parsons School of Design and later FIT in hopes of becoming a fashion designer. Now she has her own shoe label that is on the up-and-up, comprised of incredibly chic, Brazilian-made loafers, slides, and mules in leather and exotic skins. And while her business and modeling gigs presently have her travel schedule at an all-time high, she relishes the moments she can go home to the Botanical Gardens neighborhood where she grew up to see family and friends about once a year.

Currently, Giudicelli is living and working in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, and missing that trip back to her grandmother’s house for moqueca (fish stew) and beach visits highlighted by acai bowls and sugarcane juice drinks. “When I was in Rio, I used to go to the beach on my lunch break,” she explains. “It’s much chiller there; I had time to really hang out during the day, but when I moved to New York, I quickly realized that I needed to get moving or I’d get left behind.” One day recently, though, Giudicelli did slow down to enjoy a day in New York inspired by Rio. She visited the market in Astoria, and said hello to a good friend, also Brazilian, who started a sweet shop on Porter Avenue in Brooklyn called My Sweet Brigadeiro. Guidicelli hung out at Beco restaurant, dining on traditional post-beach snacks like chicken croquettes and grilled sausage with onions, and had a beer. To end her Rio tour of NYC, she stopped by Miss Favela in Williamsburg to have feijoada, of which she says, “Whenever I crave it, I go to Miss Favela to get it.”

While sipping a caipirinha at the bar at Miss Favela she noticed the Olympics on the TV. She’s proud of her country for hosting the games this year. “I have some friends back home who are stubborn about Rio hosting and they think it’s bad for the country, but overall, a lot of the locals are enjoying it and partying in celebration,” she explains. “It’s not putting Rio on the map, because Rio already was on the map, but overall, I think it’s a positive thing. I think it’s really awesome.” For Giudicelli, home is where the heart—and really great food—is.

Above, Giudicelli finds a taste of Rio in the streets of New York.Read more at:http://www.marieaustralia.com/formal-dresses-brisbane | www.marieaustralia.com/****-formal-dresses

Born of a country I barely remember
I did not spend a childhood
sprinting across fields of sugarcane as I maybe could,
but my legs are that sweet brown anyway, of the earth
of a land of Always-June and Never-December.
I wonder if the rainforests remember my name
or how, when I was born, they wove into my hair
that deep-dark jaguar-black I’ll always wear,
which millions of miles away, is still the same.
Maybe had I stayed a few years more
I might remember the smell of midnight rain showers
Of golden afternoons and those Caribbean flowers,

that in this house, only my mother longs for.
But instead I know only what came in suitcases
that relatives brought, of achar, casrip, curry powders,
pepper-sauce to make your stew a little louder.
Foreign things finding homes in faraway places.
This land I left behind;
is it still mine?