A White Feather
A white feather fell slowly
down,
as light as a tear.
It brushed up against the window
and for a second was held there
by an invisible thermal, a tiny
hand that rocked it back and forth,
speaking of miracles:
invisible air resisting,
the illusion of gravity that shocks
every child, then questions
about the bird it fell from,
carbon atoms boiled up and spewed
out in an ancient supernova
long before there were birds
or human observers, the trick
of flight we have all envied,
asking what happens
to all the feathers in the world?
Then it continued to fall
down
softly, so very softly,
like we all fall - at different rates
but we all fall.
I Feel, Jazz
Second lockdown looming.
A cocktail of anxiety and wine
swirling in my soul. No one knows.
The future is just scat.
I turn to jazz again.
Miles,
you’re there for me
mimicking the universe
with the chaos that can
coalesce into occasional
meaning and melody
Then leap
apart again.
When I listen to you,
I am altered, reassured, at peace.
I dance around the empty apartment,
spilling myself in arms and heart,
accepting what chaos creates.
The Candle
Start with the flame,
that beautiful spark
of entropy proving itself,
compounds combusting,
changing solid wax to molten
rivers that mourn, cool and harden,
heaping new
forms on old,
re-creating but
reducing,
all the while less and less,
structured energy to heat loss.
As your candle burns up,
taking years, if you are lucky
enough to deny the 2nd Law,
the lengthening yellow hand waves shadows
on a white wall, while shadows that grow confident
as the night darkens, softly dim.
All that fading, dissembling
can be cheated
a while,
the brief
breathe
of
a
poem.
Matthew James Friday has had poems published in numerous international magazines and journals, including, recently: All the Sins (UK), The Blue Nib (Ireland), Acta Victoriana (Canada), and Into the Void (Canada). The mini-chapbooks All the Ways to Love, Waters of Oregon and The Words Unsaid were published by the Origami Poems Project (USA).
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An Anguished Father
Happy he was
To be the rock,
Out of which flowed
Streams of their delight.
Now that age is no more on his side,
At home, he is lavishly criticized.
His jokes are no longer funny,
His talks are considered silly and despised.
Slowly, he returns home,
With his head bent down
Pondering his own plight --
No wonder,
With thankless kids around,
He feels eternally exiled.
Perhaps what The Bard* said was right:
“How sharper than a serpent’s tooth it is
To have a thankless child!”
*The Bard: William Shakespeare. The quoted lines are from King Lear
Mr. Ashok Suri retired from Revenue Service, and is settled with his family in Mumbai. He loves to read and sometimes write. He tries to convey in simple words what he wants to say.
“That within you that draws breath is where the music is.” Elena Gillespie
One thing I had not counted on when I signed up to coach new fathers were the numerous and seemingly constant hoops one has to jump through to have a job, even a part-time one, in healthcare. This week’s Cavalcade of Whimsy was my assigned and nearly overdue Advanced Life Support recertification training. You know — what they used to call CPR (cardiopulmonary resuscitation).
I mean, come on, besides watching two children, running a small business and writing a novel, what else did I have going on?
With some difficulty (ever tried passing a timed multiple-choice test whilst keeping a four-year-old from dumping water over the head of his two-year-old brother?), I managed to complete the online portion of the training, so it was just the on-site, iPod led, mannikin thumping portion awaiting me.
Lucky for me — I hoped — the on-site, iPod led, mannikin thumping training room would be available for the said thumping twenty-four/seven/fifty-two.
(Huh? Twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, fifty-two weeks a year. I know that’s not the common way to say it, but my way involves a cleaner progression; hours/days/weeks rather than hours/days/days. Plus, the other way leaves out every-four-years February 29th completely. It’s time we changed that.)
When I woke up at 2:33 this morning and gave up trying to get back to sleep at 3:33 a.m., since everybody else was zonked out, there was nothing keeping me from slipping out of the house and driving in the freezing cold to the hospital and finding the Official Thumping Room.
Come with me on the magical mannikin journey, won’t you?
Around 4:10 A.M. I woke up the iPod at the First Mannikin Station; I watched the instructional video. I started the timed session and began compressing a plastic dummy. Took me a couple of tries to figure out the iPod screen was showing me where my compressions were going wrong, but I was a smart if exhausted cookie and I got it sorted. I need an 84 to pass the test, and I keep getting 74s and 78s and 80s.
Until my last attempt at that particular station, which I did not even bother to finish, as something had gone wrong. The 3×3 square readout that told me if I was too shallow or too deep on the up-down part and too slow or too fast on the left-right part was pegged up at the top; no matter how hard or deeply I shoved my hands into that plastic chest, it said my compression technique was off-the-charts shallow.
That’s fine. It was only 4:23 A.M. in the morning; nobody else was using the room. I would just disconnect from the station I was using and move over to the another.
Unfortunately, the adult dummy at the other station could not be connected to the iPod’s Bluetooth no matter what I tried.
That was fine. It was only 4:27 A.M. in the morning; nobody else was using the room. I would just change the station again.
And lo, dear readers, did the humble Daddy Boot Camp coach and father of three finally manage to complete the first of six certification techniques at the third station after only twenty minutes of thumping effort? Justifiably proud of myself, I started the second module, with the bag and the air into the plastic dummy’s mouth.
Except that the bag-breathing readout did not seem to be functioning. Could have been an user error; eight hours’ sleep in two days did not speak well for me — but no matter what I did, no bag breathing showed up on the readout.
That’s fine. It was only 4:35 A.M. in the morning; nobody else was using the room. I would just move over to the final station, possibly said a couple of bad things under my breath.
God be praised — this mannikin had a working respiratory system. And once I figured out all the instructions and offered the life-saving breath every 5-6 seconds instead of pumping the poor guy like I was trying to inflate a bicycle tyre, I passed the second of six modules after only thirty minutes of overall effort. Basic understanding of statistical analysis told me I would be done in another ninety minutes or so.
The third adult module put the first two together in an unholy concoction; thirty compressions that needed to go in that little green square indicating they’re not too fast, slow, hard or soft and then three breaths from the bag.
The bag, the same one from the previous successful test, mind you, from which I would sometimes get a ‘nothing happened’ reading and sometimes get a ‘you just blew this guy’s lungs apart’ reading despite applying, I swear to you, exactly the same amount of pressure every single time.
I needed an 84 to pass. I had been in this room for what felt like hours. I got a 78. I adjusted my technique and tried again. 74. I watch the instructional video again. I didn’t even finish the next attempt after two ‘lung bursting’ mistakes. I took a couple of deep breaths and tried again. 80. I stepped away from the station, did a couple of laps around the tiny room, and tried again.
And…I…lost it. I cursed that lifeless ALS Certification dummy, I cursed the factory that made him and for good measure I cursed the Red Cross founder, Clara Barton.
After I got it all out of my system, I did arguably the only smart thing I could claim in the past couple of hours; I abandoned that particular module and turned over to the infant tests. Passed the compression test on Junior in my second try; had similar ‘not enough’ vs ‘kid’s head just exploded’ bag squeezing problems but managed to overcome them, and the little baby dummy lived to see another plastic day.
It was after 5 A.M. in the morning. Just that one test remained. I don’t mind saying I prayed for grace and (the appropriate amount of) strength. I only sort-of mind admitting that I actually asked the plastic ALS Certification dummy out-loud to be nice to me; promising that if he would just give me a break on this once, I would go away and leave him in peace.
And I started the blessed Compression/Ventilation Certification test once more time.
First person to tell me that B stands for ‘Barely Passing’ will get a free sample of my recertified Chest Compression skills.
I turned off the equipment and grabbed my jacket. It was only as I was leaving the Mannikin Thumping room that I realised.
The room is located in the Birthing Recovery wing with beds sporting recently delivered mothers and fathers and newborns on either side.
It wouldn’t have kept me from my angry fit, knowing that — I would’ve tried to lower the volume.
Nobody banged on the wall or called the nurses’ station at least.
Meanwhile, it was 6:38 A.M.; I would really try and get some sleep.
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Will Nuessle is a primary caregiver (two male homo-sapiens), a small business owner, and novelist who claims he can recite the alphabet backwards in less than ten second. He blogs at thestorysofar650777992.wordpress.com or search Will Nuessle on Amazon.com; print, digital and read-by-the-author audiobooks available in a variety of flavors)
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Companions
Composing the flock I thought I heard
When wonder drew me out the door,
A solitary mockingbird,
Busily being more,
Absorbed in his little crowd of sounds,
A parody of me,
Was gathering in his singleness
Some songs for company.
First published in The HyperTexts
Poems by Tom Merrill have recently appeared in two novels as epigraphs. He is Poet in Residuum at The HyperTexts and Advisory Editor at Better Than Starbucks.
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Suzanne Kamata is different. She is a mother writing for her children, who are uniquely placed in Japan – products of syncretic lore, an American mother and Japanese father. Recipient of a number of prestigious awards, Kamata represents the best in the mingling of the East and the West. Her writing flows well and is compelling — exploring areas that are often left untouched by more conventional writers.
Kamata has lived in Tokushima Prefecture, Japan, for more than half of her life. She is the author or editor of 14 published books including, most recently, The Spy (Gemma Open Door, 2020), a novella for emerging readers; the middle grade novel Pop Flies, Robo-pets and Other Disasters (One Elm Books, 2020) which won an American Fiction Award and was recently released as an audiobook; and Indigo Girl (GemmaMedia, 2019), winner of an SCBWI Crystal Kite Award and named a Freeman Book Awards Honor Book, as well as one of the Best Children’s Books of 2019 by Bank Street College. Her work also appears in The Best Asian Travel Writing 2020 (Kitaab, 2020), The APWT Drunken Boat Anthology of New Writing, What We Didn’t Expect: Personal Stories About Premature Birth ( Melville House Publishing, 2020), Inaka: Portraits of Life in Rural Japan(Camphor Press, 2020), and The Phantom Games (Excalibur Press, 2020). Her adult novel The Baseball Widow is forthcoming in October 2021 from Wyatt-Mackenzie Publishing.
When and why did you move to Japan? What made you start writing? At what age did you start writing?
I came to Japan to work as an assistant English teacher on the JET Program in 1988, shortly after I graduated from college. I’d wanted to experience living abroad for a year or two before I began my “real job,” which was not yet determined. I partly wanted to accumulate material for writing future stories and novels. I started writing as a child and never quit. I think my love for writing developed from my early love for reading.
What was your first book and how did it come about?
The first book that I published was actually The Broken Bridge: Fiction by Expatriates in Literary Japan (Stone Bridge Press, 1997) an anthology of short stories by foreigners who lived or were living in Japan. I’d read an article about editing anthologies, and I read several short stories by expatriates in Japan which I felt deserved a wider audience, so I wrote a letter to a publisher that specialised in books about Japan with the idea of a collection. Little did I know, I wasn’t the first person to come up with such an idea, but I was perhaps the most persistent, so even though I was only in my twenties and had only published a couple of short stories in obscure journals, the publisher was willing to give me a shot at it.
What influenced your writing? Books, authors, music? And how?
My writing style is probably most influenced by reading. Early on, I was strongly attracted to the minimalist style of Ann Beattie and I tried to imitate that. Some other influences would be Marguerite Duras, particularly the collage aspect of The Lover, and Lorrie Moore’s dark humor. As far as subject matter goes, I am influenced by confluences of culture, by travel, by motherhood, by my daily life, and sometimes by quirky facts that I come upon.
You have a book called Losing Kei, in which a child born of a mixed marriage is torn by cultural differences and the parent’s inability to adjust to each other’s heritage. It has been compared to Kramer vs Kramer. Why the comparison and do you think it is justified?
Kramer vs. Kramer is about a custody battle, so I can see why my publisher used that comparison. I don’t know of any other novels about in-court custody battles over children of international marriages published at that time, so I think it’s more or less apt. In Losing Kei, the father is granted full custody of the couple’s son, against the mother’s wishes, but the child, Kei, is mostly taken care of by his grandmother. In the movie, the Kramer father is taking care of his son by himself because his wife has deserted them, but then she tries to get her son back.
Having grown up in America, do you actually think of the Japanese culture as ‘repressive’ or ‘xenophobic’ as says author Ellis Avery, author of The Teahouse fire, while commenting on Losing Kei?
Hmm. Things are changing, a bit, but I think that there is still a lot of resistance to foreigners in Japan. During the pandemic, which is on-going as I write, for a time only Japanese nationals were allowed to leave and re-enter the country. If a permanent resident – even someone with a home, job, and family – were to leave Japan during the early part of the pandemic, they weren’t allowed back into the country. Many foreign residents have seen this as discriminatory. Laws have changed, since I first arrived, allowing more foreign workers to come to Japan, but I think a lot of people worry that an influx of people from other countries will change Japan, and not in a good way.
You often write on or for children. Is there a reason for it?
I started writing for children when my own children were small. Being biracial/bicultural and living in Japan – and disabled, in the case of my daughter — their experiences were quite unique and rarely represented in books, so I tried to write a few stories to help fill that gap.
Squeaky Wheels, your immensely moving novel that won the inaugural Half the Globe Literati award (Best novel) in 2016, explores a mother’s travels with a child on a wheelchair. Can you tell us how this book came about?
Thank you so much for your kind words! Although the book won the award for “novel,’ it is actually a memoir of traveling with my daughter. When she was around twelve, she declared that she wanted to go to Paris. At the time, I was working as an adjunct, and we didn’t have a lot of money. So, I came up with the brilliant (ha ha) idea of writing a proposal for a book on traveling with my daughter, who is deaf and uses a wheelchair. It would be, I proposed, like Elizabeth Gilbert’s Eat, Pray, Love, but in different countries – France, not Italy; Japan, not Indonesia – and it would explore issues of accessibility in each country. I knew that Gilbert had gotten a huge advance to write her book. I also knew of a father of a child with autism who had gotten a million dollars to write a book about taking his son to visit a shaman in Tibet to be cured or whatever. So, I thought that I had a shot. No publisher, however, was willing to give me a contract and an advance to fund our trip, but I had a pretty decent book proposal by then, which I used to apply for a grant. I was extremely fortunate to be awarded a generous grant by the Sustainable Arts Foundation. We went to Paris, and I wrote the book.
Your last novel was Indigo Girl. The Kirkus Review said it was “a lovely sequel that focuses on finding strength in one’s self and maintaining hope when all seems lost.” It was a sequel to Gadget Girl. Tell us a bit about the two books.
A lot of people think that Gadget Girl, the story of the fourteen-year-old daughter of an American mother and Japanese father who has cerebral palsy, is based on my daughter’s actual experiences, but that’s not really true. I started writing the book when my daughter was quite small. I wanted to write a book that she might be able to enjoy as a teen. The main character, Aiko, is an aspiring manga artist, who has grown up as her sculptor mother’s muse. I wrote frequently about my children when they were small, so I imagined what my children might feel about those stories once they hit adolescence. In the first book, Gadget Girl, Aiko travels to Paris with her single mother. In the follow-up, Indigo Girl, which is a stand-alone sequel, Aiko visits rural Japan in the aftermath of the March 11, 2011 triple disaster (earthquake, tsunami, and nuclear meltdown) to finally connect with her biological father, who is an indigo farmer.
How many books have you authored? Are they all centred around young adults or children? Which one did you enjoy writing the most and why?
I have authored 12 including a picture book, a couple of titles for emergent readers, a short story collection, a memoir, three novels for adults (one forthcoming) and four novels for younger readers, the most recent of which is Pop Flies, Robo-pets and Other Disasters (One Elm Books, 2020). The first two novels that I wrote (but not the first two that I published) were The Mermaids of Lake Michigan (Wyatt-Mackenzie Publishing, 2017) and Screaming Divas (Simon Pulse, 2014), which were both initially intended to be adult novels, but which concern young adults. When I wrote those books, I was in my late twenties/early thirties, when I felt that I didn’t have enough distance or perspective to write about my adult experiences. And then later, I intentionally wrote for children and young adults. It’s really hard to say which one I enjoyed writing the most, but Squeaky Wheels was fun for me. I loved traveling with my daughter, and I loved reliving those experiences when I was writing and revising the book. And writing nonfiction is a lot easier than writing fiction.
You teach at Naruto University of Education. What is it like to teach students who have been brought up in an entirely different culture from you? How does this experience translate to your own writing?
Japanese students tend to be a bit conservative, so I am always striving to open their minds, and to help them see that being receptive to other cultures and travel can be mind-blowing as it has been for me. I also learn a lot from them, because their upbringing has been so different from mine. One very concrete way in which teaching has affected my writing is that I have started to write stories for emergent readers. I realise that a lot of my books are too difficult for the average Japanese reader of English, but many students are interested in reading my writing. So far, I have written two hi/lo books for the Gemma Open Door series. These books are short, and the level of language is a bit easier.
How has the pandemic affected Japan, you and your work?
Japan hasn’t suffered as greatly as many other nations, perhaps because it is a mask-wearing culture, and also because as soon as news of a break-out aboard the cruise ship the Diamond Princess appeared, people started being cautions. In Tokushima, where I live, there have been fewer than 400 documented cases since the start of the pandemic. Since I haven’t had to travel for conferences, and I have been teaching online, things have been pretty calm and peaceful. Surprisingly, I have written quite a bit. I actually started a new novel!
What are your future plans? Do you have a new novel/books in the offing?
I hope to continue writing and publishing! I have a couple of adult novels – a historical novel, and one set slightly in the future – in progress, as well as a few picture book manuscripts that I have been tinkering with. In October of this year, my adult novel The Baseball Widow, will be published by Wyatt-Mackenzie. I started writing it shortly after I finished Losing Kei, but I abandoned it a few times. Anyway, I am happy to announce that it will finally make it into print! It’s a family drama about an international/interracial marriage in crisis told from multiple points of view. I hope you will enjoy it!
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This has been an online interview conducted by Mitali Chakravarty.
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Once there lived a king who ruled a certain land. He had a son, whose mother passed away during his childhood. The prince was so handsome that no boy or girl in the land surpassed him in good looks. Time passed and the prince became a young man. The king looked forward to his wedding with wedding songs, drumbeats and dance. He gave a picture of the prince to one of his most trusted slaves and assigned him the task of finding an equally beautiful girl for his son in the neighbouring kingdoms.
The slave took the picture and set out on his mission. After travelling for several days and nights, he finally reached another land and spent the night at the hut of an old woman. Next morning, he resumed his journey and went from door to door till at last he found a beautiful girl in the house of a poor man. The beauty of the girl stunned the slave. When he regained his senses, he pulled out the picture of the prince and compared the two — once gazing at the girl and then at the picture. He believed the girl was worthy of being the prince’s bride.
At last, he turned to the owner of the house and addressed him: “I’m the slave of the king so-and-so. He has given me the task of finding a bride for the prince. I have been wandering from city to city and house to house looking for a beautiful girl. The beauty of your daughter surpassed that of all other girls I’ve seen so far.”
He presented the prince’s photograph to the girl’s father who after looking at the picture said: “How can a poor man like me dare to compare himself to a rich prince? I think you are making fun of me.”
The slave turned to him and said: “I swear by the honour of your chaste daughter that whatever I told you is true. I believe your daughter is worthy of being my master’s bride.” He then asked him for a picture of his daughter and urged him to accept the proposal.
The man took the prince’s picture from the slave and gave him one of his daughter in return. Early in the morning, the slave took leave of him and set out for his own home. After having travelled for half-a-day, he reached a small hamlet and went into a house to rest. It was the house of a maidservant. She welcomed him. After exchanging greetings with him, she inquired: “Where have you been and where are you heading?”
The slave confided the details and the purpose of his journey. In the middle of the conversation the maid expressed her desire to see the photograph of the prince’s would-be-fiancé. Actually, the maid was the paramour of the prince. But the slave did not know that. The moment her eyes fell on the photograph she went almost numb with trepidation. She had never seen such a beautiful girl in her entire life. She feared the prince would discontinue his attentions to her after he tied the knot with the pretty girl. The prince would most likely not spare her a single glance.
A myriad of thoughts flooded her mind. Hideously envious of the girl, she gave the photograph back to the slave and excused herself and strolled out of the door. Sometimes later, when she returned, she found the slave fast asleep. She surreptitiously took out the photograph from his pocket and cunningly left a scratch mark on the picture – on one of the eyes of the beauty — and slipped it back into his pocket. When the slave woke up, he took leave of the woman and resumed his journey.
Late in the evening he finally reached his destination and gave an account of his journey before the king, presenting him the photograph of the girl as well.
When the prince returned from a hunting trip the king told him that they had found for him a beautiful girl and within a few days he would be married to her. The prince happily returned to his bedroom. Dreams and desires blossomed in his heart. But the moment he took out the picture from his pocket, his glowing face almost turned pale. The girl was exceedingly gorgeous but alas she looked blind in one eye. Anyhow, the prince submitted himself to his father’s will. Soon drum beats, the sounds of shehnais and wedding songs reverberated in all corners of the land. Amidst music and dancing, the prince was conducted to the nuptial chamber. However, he was not happy with the marriage and thought it to be a burden unleashed by his father on him. On the very first night he ordered the maidservants thus: “Lay my bed away from that of the bride’s and put out all the lamps and lights.”
The lamps were blown out and the prince and the bride slept separately in the dark house. It became the routine with the prince. He spent the day outside hunting and, at night, he slept away from his wife in the darkness.
The girl was worried about the strange behaviour of her husband. She was desperate to please, but she couldn’t ask him anything. She was worried. She thought something might be ailing the prince and he didn’t want to disclose his illness. And that was the reason for his sleeping separately and blowing out the lamps. She also wondered if she had made a mistake or the slave had told him something against her.
People began to whisper and gossip about the king’s daughter-in-law for not giving the prince an offspring. Sick of people’s gossip, the young girl began to devise a plan. Secretly, she wove winnowing baskets and sold them door to door. One day she happened to go to the house of the maidservant who was responsible for the agony she was going through. She was shocked to see her husband sitting with the maidservant. The maidservant was almost stunned. The prince had his eyes fixed on the beautiful lady. He took pity on her as he thought poverty had forced her to sell straw-baskets. He couldn’t help but call out to her: “O basket-seller! Come here.” She strolled forward.
He asked her: “Do you live in this city?” The girl replied in affirmative.
The prince asked her again: “Where do you live by the way”?
“I live in a dark house somewhere in this city,” replied the girl.
“Dark house?” The prince slipped into deep thought. A moment later he turned to the girl and said: “Anyhow, I’ve to discuss something with you. Where shall you meet me?”
“I shall wait for you by the riverbank tomorrow,” the girl responded.
Next day, she asked her maidservant to accompany her to the river to wash her hair. She picked up the mirror, hair oil and soap, and, together with her maidservant, went to the river bank. Through the strands of her open hair covering her face, she saw the prince ride up on his horse. She turned to the maidservant and said, “Give me the bottle of hair-oil.”
The next moment, she broke the bottle and pierced her hand with a shard. She began to cry. In the meantime, the prince went to her. When he saw blood dripping from girl’s hand, without any hesitation he tore his chador and dressed her wound with the strip of cloth.
The girl turned to the prince and regretted, “Today our meeting was spoiled by this unexpected incident”.
The prince said, “We shall meet sometimes in the future.” The prince rode back to the palace. The girl and her maidservant took a different route back.
At night, as usual the prince blew out the lamps and slept on his bed. When his wife was sure he was fast asleep, she dragged her bed near to her husband’s. The prince turned on his bed and his hand touched his wife’s wounded hand. The girl cried out aloud:
“O God! Ah! My wounded hand. You touched my wounded hand.”
He asked him what happened to her hand. The girl replied: “Didn’t the shard pierce it on the riverside?”
“A shard?” The prince was taken aback.
“Yes, it did,” replied the girl.
The flabbergasted prince got up. He was surprised to see his wife’s bed placed by his own. He asked his wife: “How do you know a girl’s hand was pierced by a shard on the riverside? She was someone else”.
The girl said, “She was none but me.”
The prince could not believe his ears and said, “You are telling a lie.”
The girl said, “If you don’t believe, turn on the lights and look for yourself.”
He asked all her maidservants to go away that very instant. He turned on the lights. The moment he saw his beautiful wife he was mesmerised. He cursed himself in his heart. He pulled her into his embrace and apologised, “Forgive me my beloved! I was mistaken. Rather I’ve been betrayed. I… when I saw your photograph, I noticed a blemish in your eye… I didn’t know…”
In the morning, the slave was summoned to the court. He told his entire story. The maidservant with whom the slave had stayed that night was summoned to court. The king warned her with dire consequence if she did not tell the truth. Finally, she was forced to admit her wrongdoing. And the king ordered the maidservant to be hanged and adjourned his court.
(This folktale retold by Rahman Murad, originally appeared in Quarterly Drad Gwadar, Dec 2001-Jan 2002).
Fazal Baloch is a Balochi writer and translator. He has translated several Balochi poems and short stories into English. His translations have been featured in Pakistani Literature published by Pakistan Academy of Letters in 2017 and in India.
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The Pedlar on the Roof
On the roof
across the way
a man is perched
like a hawk
hawking his wares
without any care
for his safety.
Where does he think
his customers
will come from?
He is selling bicycles
high up there
and daring those
below to try them out
with a shout
that is like the squeal
of rusty brakes.
“These bikes are real,
not fakes!”
He has won me over
with his words
and over I cross
from my roof to his
on the tightrope
of the washing line.
The loss of
coins jangling
in my pocket
and notes folded
in my wallet
is no big deal
when in exchange
I receive
a sturdy frame
on two wheels
that I can ride.
The transaction is made
and back along
the perilous line
I now promenade
with the bicycle
on my shoulder.
If I was bolder I might
trundle across
like a circus acrobat
but the risk is too great.
Back on my roof
I mount the saddle
and set off on a journey
entirely in tight
circles: how divine!
I ring my bell
to express my delight
to the man
who sells these things.
He is a pedlar on his roof.
I am a pedaller on mine.
Robotson Crusoe
There was a robot named Crusoe
who belonged to the crew of a cruise ship.
He scrubbed down the decks
and cleaned all the cabins
until he was unfortunately shipwrecked.
A dreadful storm bashed a hole
in the hull and into the sea he was hurled
but because he mostly had air
in his head he floated quite well for several
days until he washed up on an island.
A totally deserted island.
Robotson Crusoe was lonely and sad
but decided to do the best that he could
like a dutiful mechanical lad.
He made some trousers and also a shirt
from the biggest leaves on the trees
and though for his dinner
he usually ate bolts (rusty bolts)
he made do with nuts (coconuts)
and grew somewhat thinner,
and though he liked hotels he lived in a hut.
He was onto a winner but…
One morning he found a footprint
in the sand that belonged not to himself.
Had someone else been stranded?
He searched the island and found an android
who called himself Diode Defoe.
The stranger explained, “I fell from a plane
while I was cleaning the wings.
I fumbled and tumbled and plunged through
the clouds and after landing I shouted
aloud but no one came to my aid
but I feel fine because I’m very well made.”
Robotson Crusoe bade him welcome
and they soon became best friends,
two cybernetic maroons mentally
in tune, for there was plenty of room
on the island, that totally and utterly
and not very subtly remote and pristine
island. And boom! the waves crashed
down on the beach and they surfed
the breakers though it might seem rash
for metal beings to sport in the brine,
and in the evenings they drank coconut
oil, which to robots is just like wine.
The things they did were jolly good fun,
they slid down the dunes and basked
in the sun and played bongo drums on
driftwood logs and blew mellow tunes
on seashell flutes. How cute they looked
in banana leaf suits but the point is moot.
They went to the cinema arm in arm
to watch the manatees play in the sea
and that was their Saturday matinee.
Beach cricket too and oh! what a view
was had when they climbed the trees.
“Let’s build a canoe,” suggested Crusoe
on a day when the sea was all smooth,
“and paddle away and pray that we may
arrive on an inhabited shore.” But Diode
Defoe shook his head and roared, “No!
I beg you, dear Robo, to forget that idea.
I love it here and wish to remain. Don’t
you feel the same? I hope you will agree
to stay. Finally free and very happy, our
troubles all in the past, never again will
we slave on behalf of human depravity.”
Oh, his words rang true and old Crusoe
thought so too, after a little pondering.
“Then all our wandering is at an end
and this is our home,” he said at last.
They embraced, danced and pranced,
as you might do too (if they were you)
and to celebrate the momentous decision
they thought it better to take a siesta.
Robotson Crusoe and Diode Defoe are
dozing now, swinging not fast but slow
on a hammock with nowhere to go…
Rhys Hughes has lived in many countries. He graduated as an engineer but currently works as a tutor of mathematics. Since his first book was published in 1995 he has had fifty other books published and his work has been translated into ten languages.
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PLEASE NOTE: ARTICLES CAN ONLY BE REPRODUCED IN OTHER SITES WITH DUE ACKNOWLEDGEMENT TO BORDERLESS JOURNAL.
Nabanita Sengupta explores taboos around teenage values in a compelling read
Mrs. D’Souza taught at the school. A thorough city bred woman, she had come to this place with her husband, who was in charge of the fire safety and security department of the factory at Ghumi.
The tiny township fascinated her. The greenery all around, the British style bungalow with sloping roof and high ceiling, the small garden patch in front and a bigger courtyard — all these mellowed her heart. She was drawn to the quietness of the place that stirred itself to make some noise only during certain times of the day — such as at the beginning and the end of school time, the afternoons when children came out to play and at the start of the various shifts of the factory, the main lifeline of the little town, when people filed on the single straight road connecting their estate to their workplace.
Contrarily, all her life she had lived among various noises born out of movement. The windows of their apartment in Kolkata opened into one of the busiest streets of the city — the street that did not sleep at any point of the day. Honks, whistles, shouts, sounds of passing vehicles — her ears had forgotten the music of quietude. Now, surrounded by silence, she felt rejuvenated; and was seized by a sudden desire for action. Perhaps, the energy that an urban existence had sucked out of her, now remained untouched within her body, and that in turn, stirred in her a desire to do something; to find an outlet for the unused life force that had accumulated within her.
She loved to teach, a passion from her younger days, which till then had only found sporadic manifestations in her career as a wife of an engineer with a risk management specialisation. It was inevitable that within this small township, she and the school would find a symbiotic requirement for each other. Her husband was either in office or buried nose deep in files at home for most part of the day, The children were grown up and out of the nest. Mrs. D’Souza had time on her hands.
School kids, especially those at the threshold of teens fascinated her. She was intrigued by the hormone induced unruliness and iconoclasm that characterised this difficult to handle age-group. Adolescence, for her was both intriguing and challenging. And now, well settled into the post-middle-aged complacency of a woman who has led a more or less satisfying life, she thought she could explore this particularly interesting period of growth towards adulthood.
She often remembered her own children at this stage — the daughter and the son — both suddenly turned into you-don’t-tell-me-what-to-do types! The memories of their tantrums and obstinacy at any sign of authority still made her smile. Now, both of them were in their late twenties. Separated by a couple of years, the siblings had regained their composure. It was as if with the shedding of the teens another new personalities emerged from their being — personalities that made them more understanding, patient and caring and with the swoosh of a magic wand that impetuous, querulous nature had vanished!
But she had enjoyed their teens — their energetic righteousness, the desire to change the world, the longing for some kind of positive action — all these would fill her with a sense of happiness and pride. She understood those as the blooming of that courage and integrity which would remain lifelong with her children, safeguarding them from turning towards evil. Their itchiness and impatience that often bordered on rudeness, were the birth pangs of something positive within their soul — the birth pangs of the consciousness that made them recognise that this world was not the rose tinted one they had experienced in their childhood. It was a recognition of the world’s true colours, the colours of love mixed with that of hatred, peace with war, kindness with cruelty and all the greys between the binaries. She was eager to enjoy those doldrums of that age once again
Students of ninth grade knew that they were going to be assigned a new English teacher. Anticipation ran high in the class. And speculations too. When Mrs D’Souza stepped into the class, she could feel the eager eyes taking in every bit of her handloom cotton sari clad, no-makeup, no-accessories getup. She felt as though the class had been wound up by some invisible key on a high alert position which would require a gradual attempt to move towards a more relaxed and open mindset.
Raya still remembered the day when Madam D’Souza entered their class for the first time. Initially, she did not seem impressive. In fact, the commonplaceness had put her and her friends off quite a bit. When anticipating something new, we often colour our expectations with the exceptional, forgetting that the new person or object might, in all probabilities, resemble the old or the common. But before the class ended, almost all of her classmates, including herself, had fallen for the unassuming charm and openness of Mrs. D’Souza.
Very easily the class was all admiration for their new teacher. They enjoyed her classes which were different from just textbook explorations. Drama, music, recitation, storytelling — her tools made the class animated and eager to learn. The students accepted her with an openness not very common among this age group. So, it was quite obvious that Raya would turn to her when adolescent issues of a co-educational institution started making their presence felt.
Returning from a lunch break, one day Raya reached her seat to find a small piece of paper surreptitiously kept under her pencil box on her desk. Three innocuous words — ‘I love you’ written on it.
Raya’s adolescent sense of propriety was considerably outraged, more so because the discovery was made in presence of two of her friends. All determined to act the ‘good’ girl, Raya decided that the correct course of action would be to complain to the teacher, who could then establish the identity of the offender by examining the handwriting and punishing him. Of course, it must be one of the boys in her class, who else would have such impunity! She was reminded of a similar incident that had taken place in another class quite some time back. There too was a similar declaration of the unruly teenage heart and it was punished with a call to the parents. It was the age when disgrace hurt more than physical pain. Raya wished for a similar retribution here too.
She rushed out of her class and ran towards the teacher’s room. The next class was with Mrs. D’Souza and Raya wanted to meet her before she entered their class so that she could complain to her in detail. Mrs. D’Souza listened to her with full attention but did not say anything. Raya had thought that her sense of outraged modesty would sufficiently work up Mrs D’Souza and was a bit disheartened by her composure. They entered the class together and Mrs D’Souza took the class attendance with a completely unperturbed attitude and then proceeded with their studies.
Raya, that day, could hardly keep her mind on the lesson. Conflicting emotions ran high. On one hand, she was excited about the pending talk, which she was sure would take place after the class, on the other hand she was starting to harbour misgivings about Madam D’Souza’s attitude towards the issue.
For Mrs. D’Souza too, it was a crucial battle. She knew that co-ed set up had its own challenges, yet she felt it to be the best microcosmic representation of the outside world. Still new to the school, she knew it was her one wild card chance to reach out to them. And matters of hearts were always the trickiest. She did not want to attach undue significance to the episode, yet she needed to treat it with consideration, she knew how prickly these new teens were in such matters.
The best course, she thought, would be to speak to them in their own language. One of her personal and lifelong crusades was, in her own words “against the inadvertent insensitive behaviour of anxious parents to their teenage children for the cause of moral and social uprightness”. She had seen two generations of teens — her own and her children’s; and, blessed with a keen perception, she remembered how the mildest of reprimands often resulted in the most volatile reactions.
It was towards the end of the period that Mrs D’Souza put down the book from which she was teaching, looked at the entire class, smiled slightly and said: “I want you all to concentrate on my words. As you are growing up, you will develop feelings that you will find are quite unprecedented and overwhelming. But those are natural, nothing to be afraid or ashamed of. It requires a lot of courage to let a person know that he or she is appreciated. If you like someone, please do not send nameless chits, rather have the courage to strike up a positive friendship with the person. If friendship succeeds, there will be time for more, else the liking is not worth anything.”
She paused, allowing her words to sink in.
Then, in a very casual, nonchalant way, looking directly at Raya, she added, “By the way, I personally, would not have minded having a secret admirer. After all we all want to be appreciated, isn’t it?”
Raya saw her teacher’s twinkling, mischievous eyes look in her direction.
The whole class gasped before they could grasp her meaning. No one had told them before that matters pertaining to the teenage heart could have some kind of legitimacy or acceptability. They had been taught just the contrary — that such things are unspoken, hushed matters, and to declare it was sinful. For the first time in their lives, they found an adult acknowledge their heart burns and even take it seriously. These words showed them that feelings need not always be tabooed and repressed, that one need not be outraged by every trivial issue. The most important lesson was that friendship should be the stepping stone towards other relationships.
With these few words, Mrs D’Souza had won all their hearts.
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Nabanita Sengupta is an Assistant Professor of English by profession and creative writer by passion. Translation remains one of her chief areas of work and interest. Her works can be read in various journals, anthologies and e-zines.
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PLEASE NOTE: ARTICLES CAN ONLY BE REPRODUCED IN OTHER SITES WITH DUE ACKNOWLEDGEMENT TO BORDERLESS JOURNAL
The clouds grey and pregnant
With condensed water,
Bend down and
Kiss the parched earth,
In a gossamer embrace:
And,
At the same time,
Sweep past,
Caressing your oval face
With their light fluffy cotton hands,
Leaving your beautiful face wet
with the spray of the passing shower
Thrilled to the core
Of your sacred being,
Your long eyes closed,
Thin curved lips, pouting a bit,
Revealing a white set of gleaming teeth,
like the swaying silver birches,
Singing a melody not heard so far
By any mortal on this earth.
The distended large clouds
Are
Now --
Spread out like an unfurled black giant umbrella,
Dripping water divine,
On the people huddled in leaky corners
on this Mumbai street,
And, other creatures of God,
Reviving the inner child
who loved the racing monsoons,
From his tiny barred windows of a
Deserted, dim, shabby home
Of a tenant farmer,
In a green rich meadow
Of a now- forgotten ancestral land
Left behind;
Shrinking -- receding fast--
Like the old river weighed down,
Breathless, under the debris
Of a city, of late,
Indifferent to a dying river God.
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Sunil Sharma is the editor of SETU. He is a senior academic, critic, literary editor and author with 21 published books, seven collections of poetry, three of short fiction, one novel, a critical study of the novel, and, eight joint anthologies on prose, poetry and criticism, and, one joint poetry collection.
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PLEASE NOTE: ARTICLES CAN ONLY BE REPRODUCED IN OTHER SITES WITH DUE ACKNOWLEDGEMENT TO BORDERLESS JOURNAL
Rakhi Dalal says it all through this quotation of Martin Luther King Jr. Click here to read.
Interview
Santosh Bakaya, an academic and writer who has written a book on Gandhi in verse, speaks of Gandhi and Gandhian beliefs. Click here to read.
Review
Gandhi & Aesthetics: Edited by Tridip Suhrud, the nine essays are a fitting tribute to the inventive beauty of Gandhiji and its wide-ranging applicability in present-day society… says reviewer Bhaskar Parichha. Click here to read.
Borderless 
