I never hear raindrops slow when they thin and scatter, when the weight of each one lightens, even as they’re still falling. I never hear a jetliner moving toward the horizon, the sound of it blending with sunlight as I see it fade into the haze or hear the footsteps of cardinals scurrying across a concrete walkway— only that I tried as hard as I could, like a silent heart on that forgetful day in yet another year since everything passed on and silence silenced things, forever vacated from my ears, forever rotating in and out of consciousness, rotating thinner across the depths of air where their sounds stay barely witnessed.
PORTENTS
There are moments suddenly interrupted: an apparition appearing as an actor centred on stage and then a spotlight is switched on when the familiar lighting reveals a texture I can feel though cannot hold. But just as suddenly, it leaves. When it happens, it’s the finer aromas that still go missing.
But I see everything soon leaves, and what I recall— even if I’m not conscious of it—is all I have left. Isn’t this the entire story? I am here with random memory switched on and off in this maddening ritual I don’t control. But what I see is how brutal the lighting can be, a ceremonial illumination of a face and hands through every version of my life,
a historic river running over the washed stones of the riverbed, the sand smoothed and flattened without aged footprints, and me again waiting with my hold on it looser than ever. Not a moment leaves without my breathlessness in it, the sounds of what we knew, the only way we can be with each other—as if we share breakfast in an empty house we’ve never occupied.
THE EMPTY HOUSE
I come back to the dream: the darkened house, the empty rooms, with only an angled streetlamp bathing the walls and floors in pale light. The telephone has long gone silent.
I know I’m walking through a dream but it doesn’t reveal more other than to say: you’re on your own regardless of rain or chill in the moist air. I don’t want to disturb what rests here but couldn’t if I wanted to. I only know the proclivities this recurring dream has reinforced, stirring and blending with the others disjointedly. So I list each day, a leaning curse like a once-glorious yacht tilting on a long stretch of beach. The ocean, streaming to shore in thin, wide-waves, pulls the sand from once settled places aligning awkwardly with the proclivities I’ve come to.
I’m toiling to enjoy my remaining time the best way I know in the circle of people I’ve chosen. If only I could forever keep them on the checkerboard of my life, the seemingly-random lateral and retreating moves and reclaim the joy I’d once known—the art of adding colour to a colourless world in the white and pale-gray of another day.
The handwriting of the empty house is the tidemark in the art of another time, where doors don’t reopen— will never reopen. It sits isolated as a place lost when time too is lost along its silenced walls— once the heart of life itself—and will no longer say what I thought they always would. The language now incompatible with the one I’d spoken—but it still startles me when I hear those off-balance words and live the challenges they inflict daily.
SR (Salvatore Richard) Inciardi was born in New York City and attended Brooklyn College and New York University. SR Inciardi’s poetry has appeared in in various online and print magazines including Green Ink Poetry, Harrow House Journal, Front Porch Review, Grey-Sparrow Journal, Borderless Journal, Written Talesamong others. He was a contributor to Green Ink Poetry for their publication on Kennings: Equinox Collections: Autumn released on Amazon in October 2024. SR Inciardi currently has two books of poetry on Amazon that speak to loss and navigating grief.
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“A journey is not so much a place, but a new way of seeing.” — Pico Iyer
Travel has always been my passion. From childhood, the love for exploring new places was instilled in me by my parents. They believed travel was not just recreation, but education.
Every school vacation, my father would plan a month-long trip, taking us across cities, temples, forests, and historic landmarks.
By the time I stepped into adulthood, the entire stretch of Gujarat and Saurashtra was familiar terrain — Dwarka, Porbandar, Jamnagar, Ahmedabad, Baroda, Surat, Rajkot.
We traveled across the country too, exploring Calcutta in the east and venturing north to Kashmir, Amritsar, Agra, Delhi and Jaipur, Jodhpur and Jaisalmer in the Northwestern part.
Along the way, each place offered its own unforgettable charm — the serenity of the Golden Temple, the fragrant rose gardens of Jodhpur, the majestic palaces of Jaipur, the golden deserts of Jaisalmer, and the shimmering beauty of Dal Lake in Srinagar.
Each journey painted my childhood with stories, sights, and memories that would stay with me forever.
Perhaps that is why, when I was finally given the opportunity to travel abroad on a business trip to Singapore, my excitement was indescribable.
But beneath that excitement was a quiet nervousness — it was my first international trip, a solo journey, and I had to navigate visas, documentation, and the unfamiliarity of foreign travel.
I still remember the night before my flight — the quiet hum of anticipation, the open suitcase neatly arranged with formal wear and presentation notes, and the flutter in my heart that felt both brave and uncertain. This wasn’t just another professional assignment — it felt like a rite of passage.
Singapore was my first glimpse of a world beyond India — an island nation I had only encountered in business magazines and travel columns.
As the aircraft lifted off the runway, I felt something shift inside me. Beneath the official purpose of the trip lay something more personal: the realization that I was crossing a threshold that would reshape the way I saw work, people, and myself.
The first few days were busy with meetings and deliverables, yet my Singapore-based colleagues made sure I didn’t miss the beauty of their city.
Over weekends, they took me to Gardens by the Bay, Sentosa Island, Universal Studios, Little India, and shopping districts filled with light and energy. Their warmth made the newness less intimidating.
I experienced my first metro journey abroad — taking the MRT from Ang Mo Kio to Raffles Place — and was amazed at the punctuality, efficiency, and discipline that seemed to pulse through the city’s transport system.
Gardens by the Bay left me mesmerized; Sentosa offered calm and peace, while Universal Studios was a burst of color, joy, and laughter.
Singapore’s friendliness, cleanliness, and multicultural harmony made a deep impression on me.
It was a place where professionalism coexisted effortlessly with warmth, where discipline didn’t suppress diversity but strengthened it.
When I returned home, friends and colleagues asked about the presentations, the meetings, and the outcomes.
But what stayed with me long after the trip was not just the work accomplished — it was the inner shift.
Singapore taught me that stepping outside our comfort zone widens our world in ways we never expect.
That first flight did more than carry me across countries — it carried me into a broader way of thinking, observing, and belonging.
It showed me that growth often begins at the edge of comfort, and that the world is much larger and more welcoming than our fears allow us to believe.
“Certainly, travel is more than the seeing of sights; it is a change that goes on, deep and permanent, in the ideas of living.” — Miriam Beard
What Singapore Taught Me
Every first step into the unknown teaches us something essential about ourselves.
Singapore showed me that courage doesn’t always roar; often, it’s the quiet decision to board a plane alone and trust that you will find your way.
In every MRT ride, every unfamiliar street, and every new conversation, I discovered the subtle power of openness — the willingness to learn, adapt, and embrace difference.
When we travel with curiosity instead of fear, the world responds with generosity.
And sometimes, one journey becomes the beginning of a much larger unfolding — a reminder that confidence grows one step, one city, and one experience at a time.
Reflection: The First Flight Within
We often believe that courage lies in grand actions — but sometimes, it lies in handing your passport to an immigration officer with shaky hands.
My first flight taught me that courage is a journey too.
That every time we step out into the unknown, we return home a little braver.
A little wiser.
A little more ourselves.
About the Book:
When the Road Becomes the Teacher: A Reflective Memoir of Wisdom Gained Around the World is a memoir about how travel can transform the way we see the world and ourselves. Drawing on four decades of journeys across India and beyond, Shubha Apte reflects on the experiences, encounters, cultures, and unexpected moments that shaped her understanding of resilience, confidence, leadership, cultural intelligence, and personal growth. From her first international business trip to Singapore to later journeys across Japan, Norway, Malaysia, Europe, and the United States, each destination became more than a place to visit—it became an opportunity to learn. Part travel memoir and part reflection on personal transformation, the book invites readers to look beyond destinations and discover the lessons that every journey can offer.
About the Author:
Shubha Apte is an author, executive coach, and leadership consultant with over 35 years of corporate experience. She is the author of multiple books including the Amazon Bestseller, When the Road Becomes the Teacher. Her writing blends real-life insight with storytelling, exploring themes of resilience, purpose and human connections.
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From the porch, I could see a string of crows on a high branch. Then, as night came in, with my half-blind eyes, it seemed as if the very trees were crows, deep black with wings fluttering in the chilly west wind. And the hills were crows, And the road, The fence, The yard. Yet the caw came only from where I had first seen those silken ebony birds. Even in darkness, the tree crows put on hold the crows of my imagination.
SNAKE ENCOUNTER
The snake lifts its head slightly. Its bead eyes fasten on me. So where is that ancient fear of man instinctive to every serpent? Why doesn’t it slither away? But it would rather hiss softly as it takes my measure. Maybe it senses something vulnerable in me, a phobia it can play like a well-tuned harp.
I say something dumb and human, like "Shoo." But it doesn’t retreat. It doesn’t even blink. I am not prey but I am an interloper. My breath is an uneasy truce between two beings. We spend this unplanned armistice trying to read each other.
A DYING BLACKSMITH
I'm fading - not like sunset, no - like the cooling of iron left too long on a sideboard.
Sleep is near death, my bed’s a coffin with a forge for a crematorium.
Dreams speak the tools of my trade but twist them in ways that make my brows knot.
I wear that rutted road, not proud, just unsure how to smooth it out. And the flame is not my friend. My handle burns. My hammer’s head is about to shatter.
John Grey is an Australian poet, US resident, recently published in Shift, Trampoline and Flights. His latest books — Bittersweet, Subject Matters and Between Two Fires — are available through Amazon. He has work upcoming in Levitate, White Wall Review and Willow Review.
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Lily West in front of Mount FujiPhotographs provided by Suzanne Kamata
In Lily West’s travel memoir West goes East she recounts venturing from her native England overland toward India in the early 1970s with an impulsive American named Ed, a pro-Palestine fellow hippie whom she meets en route, on a shoestring budget. With the brazenness that comes with youth, they become entwined with all sorts of shady characters, finding themselves the guest of a charming conman in Amman, and being mistakenly deposited in a brothel in Cairo. Among other adventures, they rescue a polar bear from heat stroke in a zoo in Khartoum, are arrested twice in Egypt (and not for climbing to the top of a pyramid, which they do), and find themselves spectators at a public hanging in Iraq.
Many of the places they visited, such as the West Bank, Sudan and Afghanistan, are even less accessible now. West, by the way, is one of the few people who have traveled to every country on earth recognised by the UN. Although she made these travels as a man, she now lives in Japan as a woman. This award-winning book is a wild ride into the treacherous terrain of a bygone era. Lily generously agreed to answer a few questions.
Suzanne Kamata: First of all, congratulations on launching this book into the world! It has had a very positive reception, including an award for NomadMania Best Travel Book 2024. In the introduction you write that you hadn’t intended to write a book about traveling with your friend Ed, and that the idea came to you decades later. Can you tell us about the writing process? Also, how did you manage to recreate the scenes so vividly?
Lily West: I had often been urged to write a book, but never found the time or energy to do so. Then a friend introduced me to a publishing agent from English Agency Japan, who on hearing some of my travel stories, begged me to write a sample chapter which I eventually did. Then he demanded another and another until somehow after a year the book was finished. I guess the scenes in “West goes East” had remained vivid in my memory, because I had had some fifty years to remember them.
SK: Could you tell us a bit about the road to publication?
LW: The road to actual publication was a long one. My agent took six years only to come up with two concrete offers from publishers. Lots of offers that turned out to be pie in the sky though! I rejected both, the one because they wanted to edit the book down to half its size, the other because they wanted the chapter about Israel and all mention of Palestine removed. No! So, the manuscript continued to sit in my computer. Then Harry Mitsidis, the founder of the NomadMania extreme travel group, and arguably the world’s most travelled man, came over to Japan to verify that I really had been to the 193 UN member countries and thus was qualified to join the group. He was amazed that I was so easy to verify. Luckily, I had sent a postcard to my parents from every country I had been to. And my parents had kept them all! So, we became friends; I mentioned to him that I had written a book, and he asked me to send him a couple of chapters. He was so impressed that he said he would write a foreword and get the book published on Amazon. (This was technically beyond my ability!)
But he made it a condition that I include an epilogue about Lily’s much harder and longer journey, the journey to be accepted as the woman I knew I was. To be honest, I wasn’t very keen on this, because nowhere in the travel book do I mention or hint that I am a “transgender” woman. In fact, in 1972, the year the events in the book happened, it was still my Big Secret, something which could never be divulged to anyone, so I can understand its absence. However, as requested, I wrote the epilogue, which I have heard has caused some readers to cry. Naturally, Harry also wanted Lily West to be credited on the cover as the author, which was fair, because Lily had written the book!
SK:What was the first foreign country you ever visited? What activated your wanderlust?
LW: Well, I was brought up in England, but my mother was German, so we went there most summers. But I think you mean the first country visited by myself. I’ll give you two. I HATED the cruelty of school so much that at 17, I ran away and hitchhiked to Madrid which improved my Spanish enormously. Then that summer the local Education Committee paid for me to spend three months in the Soviet Union studying Russian. My German grandfather collected stamps, interesting enough, but what fascinated me were the names of the countries. Not just looking at the exotic names, I knew I wanted to go and actually see them! So, after I graduated, I said goodbye to England and set off on my second overland trip to India, as described in West goes East, but this time with no intention of returning.
SK:Early on in the book it becomes clear that Ed has the potential to get into trouble. You write that you were unlikely traveling companions, with very different personalities, and yet you stuck together. Was there any point in your travels that you at least considered going your own way?
LW: Yes, in Baghdad over the Donkey Boy incident! I was so angry with him! But we had gone through so much together that it would have been difficult to split up. Of course, I knew we would part in Delhi, and I would be going off on my own, which eventually landed me in Japan. (After I had been there just under a year, Ed arrived with his wife and son.)
SK: What does it mean to you to be a UN master (one who has visited all 193 countries recognised by the United Nations)?
LW: The end of one lifelong journey! This April, I took part in the largest gathering of UN Masters ever. 64 of us in Azerbaijan! Some had taken considerably less time than the 49 years I had taken, but Harry Mitsidis explained that many more people had been in space or climbed Everest than had visited every country in the world, so we had achieved something very special. Now I do appreciate meeting people from every country and know I can chat about their homeland. 2016 was a significant year for me, as that was when I finally visited No.193, Equatorial Guinea. I was very happy that I had managed this, but to put things into context, something more meaningful for me happened two months later when I was invited to join a 500-strong group of foreign women in Japan. Actually, that was more important for me!
SK:You’ve visited every country in the world recognised by the United Nations, but some have changed greatly since you first visited them. Are there any such countries that you would like to return to? And why/why not?
LW: There are some countries I don’t want to return to, because war has changed them almost irreparably. It would be too sad to see Syria, Iraq, Palestine, or Afghanistan. Or for that matter my two visits to Israel sufficed for me to see what this country was like. Whereas others such as Vietnam, Cambodia, Uzbekistan or Peru have become too touristed and I would rather remember them as they were. I visited Africa 30 times, but on my final visit in 2017, I survived a bad car accident in the Comoro Islands, in which my head broke the windscreen. Surely the Gods were telling me that’s enough!
SK:What is Ed up to now? Has he read the book? If so, what was his response?
LW: Sorry to say that Ed passed away suddenly in 2022. Yes, he had read the book at the insistence of my agent. I knew he would not be happy, even though his full name and where he came from are never mentioned. He wanted all reference and memories of his hippie past erased. For instance, he destroyed all the photos he had taken as well as his diaries. He never told his wife about my book; in fact, she only learned of it from me after his death. She bought the book, read it and then paid me the biggest compliment anyone ever has regarding West goes East: “Thank you so much, Lily. You brought Ed back to life!”
SK: You mention in your epilogue that female Japanese students responded to you differently as a woman; “less daunting,” you wrote. Have you noticed any difference in how you are treated when traveling as a woman versus traveling as a man?
LW: Yes and no. Generally, I find people, especially women, are kinder and more friendly to Lily. Of course, it’s always easier to talk to someone of your own gender. Also, I’m more outgoing and confident in myself as a fellow woman in the company of other women.
But like any other woman, I find myself much more on my guard, while not being paranoid about men, just more watchful in their presence. Luckily, Japan is safer for women than let’s say the UK or the US, but as a woman, I can’t take that personal safety for granted as I would if I were a man.
SK:I realise that this is a book about your travels with Ed, but you drop tantalizing hints about other episodes in your travels. For example, in the epilogue, you write that you and your Japanese partner were taken hostage on a trip to the Central African Republic. What???? Could you share a bit about that?
LW: Very long story from 1996. Fifteen of us were on an overland truck going from East Africa to West Africa. We had budgeted 10 days to go through Congo, but the “roads” were that awful, little but bog holes and mud, that it took us 56 days. During which time three passengers died: snakebite, malaria and cut to pieces by our own tyre chains. However, we felt lucky it had not been more!
Within two weeks, there were no more shops and as cook, I had to go into the villages and exchange stuff for food. Luckily, I found they wanted empty bottles in which to store the poison they used for hunting. I was the cook, but I wouldn’t use meat because I am a vegetarian. One evening, the two Australians who did most of the digging came back from a village with some meat, which they barbecued. A couple of days later, we ran into the first Westerner we had seen, a Belgian in the lumber business. He invited us to eat with him. One of the Australians started to tell him about the meat they had had. The Belgian asked where the village was, then he raised his and asked “Did it have fur?” No. “Did it have a hoof?” No. “I think you ate a baby!” One Australian just vomited, but the other said: “Tasted OK!”
And so, in such a dilapidated state, we finally reached the ferry over the Congo River to Bangui in the Central African Republic. By this time, we were down to 9 or 10 functioning members, for this didn’t really include a French Canadian, our only native French speaker. But he had lost his mind, and would never speak to anyone again during the rest of the trip. So that left me as the only actual French speaker. Anyway, we were at last on the ferry, chattering away about which hotel in Bangui we were going to stay in and really excited about having a shower as opposed to bathing in rivers with crocodiles and snakes.
We parked our truck on some waste ground by the river and I went exploring. The town of Bangui seemed eerily quiet as I found my way to the Novotel. Entering the hotel, I knew all was far from well when I saw a cloud of flies buzzing around the dead man at the check-in desk. Back at the truck, I told the others about the hotel and that we had better leave Bangui first thing in the morning. Everyone agreed, but at about 4 o’clock in the morning, soldiers arrived and started to knock down our tents and force us on to our truck. Those who argued or were too slow were jabbed with their rifles.
So off we went with two armed soldiers on the truck to guard us, but where were they taking us? Back to Congo or somewhere to shoot us?
We hastily formed an escape plan. At a given signal, the two hefty Australian diggers knocked the soldiers to the floor and stood on their guns, while the driver drove like mad overtaking the accompanying jeeps. I had found where the US Embassy was and it was there we headed. All other embassies were closed. We had one American in our group, so we figured that was our best chance. At five o’clock in the morning, our English driver smashed into the gates of the US Embassy at full speed. But the gates were so sturdily made that they did not give way!
In the shock, the soldiers recovered their guns and were screaming “Tirez-le!”, (Shoot him!). The driver got out of his cab window, flung himself into the embassy grounds and hid behind a wall. The soldiers opened fire and lights came on the embassy. They forced the co-driver to turn round and we were taken to a large building where we were all herded into an underground cell at gunpoint. To make matters worse, we could hear the screams of someone being tortured.
At noon, our driver arrived accompanied by personnel from the US Embassy and the Central African Republic Army as well as government officials. Slowly I pieced things together.
The soldiers who had captured us had taken part in a failed coup d’etat and now needed us as human shields to get past the checkpoints and out of Bangui. A deal was struck. They would take us 700km to the Cameroon border where they would set us free. Everyone shook hands and we set off. It took several days to drive, for we had to stop along the way many times as the soldiers constantly tried to intimidate us. Once they lined us up firing-squad style, but shot over our heads. Their idea of a joke, I guess.
However, after 500km, we reached the town of Bouar, which was rebel-held territory, so they felt safe and saw no reason to release us. They kept us in the camp, under guard with no indication as to what might be our fate. After ten days or so, I determined to try to find a way to get out of this camp. Most of the others seemed to sunk into despondency or were just too sick to move.
There were 30 soldiers holding us and I tried reaching out to those who seemed a bit more friendly. I persuaded two of them that we were running out of food, so they took me into the market. The next day, I asked them to take me in again, this time with Takako, my partner. Then while they were drinking beer in a bar, she and I ran for it to another bar which I had spotted the day before.
Were there any foreigners in Bouar, I asked. Yes, there were two and someone offered to take us to their house. The two foreigners turned out to be French Jehovah’s Witness missionaries! By this time, I would have joined! And as I hoped, they had a radio. It was hidden under the floorboards and they let me use it to contact the US Embassy. “You still there”, was the surprised response. “We’ll get you out in the morning,” they promised.
Very early in the morning, a helicopter landed and after more bargaining, the rebels finally let us drive to the Cameroon border. We crossed the border and those of us who could still walk were in the very first bar on the Cameroon side celebrating. Suddenly, in walked the rebel soldiers still with their guns! Oh, no, surely not, I almost exclaimed! Then, the two I had befriended came up to me and asked me to translate. “Don’t worry! We’re so glad we didn’t have to shoot you and would like to buy a beer for you all.” I answered: “We’re also very glad you didn’t shoot us!” To general laughter, everyone raised their beer bottles: “Salut!”
Three days later we arrived in Yaounde, the capital of Cameroon. With our driver, I went to the British Embassy to report the three deaths, all Commonwealth citizens. The Ambassador listened as we told our story.
Then he stood up and shook our hands: “Jolly good show, chaps! Let me get you a drink!” The brandy was welcome.
Takako and I were able to contact our families for the first time and reassure them that we were not dead as they feared. We flew to Europe from Cameroon and then on to Japan, arriving three months late. Astonishingly, I was able to keep my job. While I know I went to Africa for adventure, sometimes you can get more adventure than you bargained for!
SK:Wow! What a harrowing experience! Thanks for sharing that! Are there any other travel memoirs or travel writers that you admire and would recommend?
LW:The Roads To Sata by Alan Booth, In Patagonia by Bruce Chatwin, An African in Greenland by Tete-Michel Kpomassie.
SK:What’s next? Will there be another book?
LW: I could write another book, yes, but I doubt that I am able to write another book that would be as good as this one. I feel that this is my masterpiece. Every time I look through it, I think, wow, I wrote this! Many travel books nowadays have the author writing about doing many different trips over the years, one chapter per country. I certainly could do one of those too, but I, and others, think that a major strength of West goes East is that it is a story of one continuous journey rather than many short ones. It describes eight months of travelling overland from Syria to India via Afghanistan in 1972, in a world that no sadly longer exists and the people we met along the way, both locals from those countries and other Westerners.
SK:Thank you so much! I, for one, am glad you got this book out into the world.
Lily West and her Japanese students. Photo provided by Suzanne Kamata.
Suzanne Kamatawas born and raised in Grand Haven, Michigan. She now lives in Japan with her husband and two children. Her short stories, essays, articles and book reviews have appeared in over 100 publications. Her work has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize five times, and received a Special Mention in 2006. She is also a two-time winner of the All Nippon Airways/Wingspan Fiction Contest, winner of the Paris Book Festival, and winner of a SCBWI Magazine Merit Award.
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Why do they evaporate when they were just there, those moments before I woke when I can sense I was just with you, when time held no relevance, but now I can’t remember a thing?
Why can’t I remember the sounds we just shared and why do I sense they’re still waiting as if behind some thin door when in the morning darkness, I can still hear the sound of steady rain and its slowed dripping when stopping?
I lie here listening, but wonder: is this forgetfulness a kind of hardened armour—a line blocked from crossing, a mental habit keeping me from further harm?
And in these empty moments, am I to accept that real-life is all I’ll know—that dreams will forever end in nothing? Or is the lost recall not a protective shield, but safe-place built-in: a dream not really a dream, just a limit to what goes on living?
SR (Salvatore Richard) Inciardi was born in New York City and attended Brooklyn College and New York University. SR Inciardi’s poetry has appeared in in various online and print magazines including Green Ink Poetry, Harrow House Journal, Front Porch Review, Grey-Sparrow Journal, Borderless Journal, Written Tales among others. He was a contributor to Green Ink Poetry for their publication on Kennings: Equinox Collections: Autumn released on Amazon in October 2024. SR Inciardi currently has two books of poetry on Amazon that speak to loss and navigating grief.
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PLEASE NOTE: ARTICLES CAN ONLY BE REPRODUCED IN OTHER SITES WITH DUE ACKNOWLEDGEMENT TO BORDERLESS JOURNAL
The pages are dotted by camouflaged confessions in black ink like blackened darkness, past the reaches of quieted streetlamps and the empty calls from birds in the moment, yet oddly settling the mind, flipped through with snippets of light caught in each instant— past tense becoming present language combining with softer music, air exhaled with each turned page, and when each page settles, it’s as if a leaf floating to rest, its jagged edges smoothed to finish a dream or relive a past— as if reading what’s written could now speak to the rest of my life. But once a certain word count is passed, there’s so little it can do, reading about who I was then and in a second, gone-on to now often with empty hands: moments I’d take back, the light I thought I saw yet remains unseen, the whitened pages of nothing left, the aches in the lost print, the fear of what will be replayed or come next isolated exhausted but curiously jumping ahead in the light in another early morning.
From Public Domain
SR (Salvatore Richard) Inciardi was born in New York City and attended Brooklyn College and New York University. SR Inciardi’s poetry has appeared in in various online and print magazines including Green Ink Poetry, Harrow House Journal, Front Porch Review, Grey-Sparrow Journal, Borderless Journal, Written Tales among others. He was a contributor to Green Ink Poetry for their publication on Kennings: Equinox Collections: Autumn released on Amazon in October 2024. SR Inciardi currently has two books of poetry on Amazon that speak to loss and navigating grief.
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PLEASE NOTE: ARTICLES CAN ONLY BE REPRODUCED IN OTHER SITES WITH DUE ACKNOWLEDGEMENT TO BORDERLESS JOURNAL
An introduction to Leonie’s Leap (published by Atmosphere Press) by Marzia Pasini and a conversation with the author
Maria Pasini
Leonie’s Leap by Marzia Pasini is a novella that explores the inner recesses of a teenager’s mind till he finds clarity, perhaps a kind of bildungsroman, if realisations can happen in thirteen days! Leonie technically leaps to self-realisation as he tries to run away from an exploitative orphanage somewhere in Hungary.
It’s an unusual story, with a commentary by an inner voice which addresses the fifteen-year-old Leonie as “dearheart” and leads the teenager towards self-realisation. With a background in Philosophy and a Master’s in Comparative Politics from the London School of Economics, Pasini began her career in international development and has moved on to become writer and life coach. This is her second book which she has dedicated to her two children, William and Maria.
The narrative travels through Leonie’s subconsciousness to his coming to realisation about his life’s choices. Colours are woven into the tapestry of his subconscious experiences with a Buddhist monk called Hridaya, Leonie’s own mysterious Indian mother who might have an interesting backdrop, colourful circus characters — Isabelle who plays violin to her elephant named Grace, Astrid, the chief of the circus’s daughter who wants to be a ballerina, clowns, a lady that wrestles with a tiger, a Russian oligarch and more. Young Leonie meanders through an adventure of his own making, a bit like Pinocchio’s experiences in the circus except the teenager soul searches where the puppet was just mischievous.
The plot is simple you realise at the end of the book, but as you meander onwards, you pause to wonder if it’s child labour, underage marriage or unsafe working conditions you’re grappling with. The conclusion is clear cut. You realise you have been led along a maze. All the action was in Leonie’s subconscious.
For all those, who like to discuss spiritual development and growth, this book could well be like Antoine de Saint-Exupéry’s The Little Prince (1943), though in that the author reached out to not just within an individual but to pertinent social issues. Leonie’s Leap is more about personal growth — about the teen taking a leap towards adulthood — perhaps because Pasini has opted for a career as a Life Coach who has travelled many countries to make a home in India. Let’s ask her to tell us more:
What led you to write this book?
For many years, I felt called to explore the journey back to the heart—not as an idea, but as something lived. The kind of return that happens when roles fall away and you are left with your body, your breath, and a reality you can no longer sidestep.
The book took shape after a life-altering health crisis that brought me close to death. Writing was no longer optional. It became a responsibility to the life still moving through me and to the vow I made: if I am still here, I will not delay what is mine to live.
You started out as a master’s from London School of Economics in comparative politics, worked for the royal family of Jordan, and then became a life coach. Tell us a bit about why you made these choices and what stirred your muse towards becoming a writer.
I’ve always wanted to be of service. Studying comparative politics at LSE came from a desire to understand how power moves and decisions shape lives. Working for the Jordanian royal family and the UN was a natural extension of that impulse.
In my late twenties, my health redirected that trajectory. It pulled me into myself with no escape. Though I had always been drawn inward, I could no longer outrun what I was being asked to face.
Over time, it became clear that all real possibility begins within. The shifts I later supported in others were first ones I had to move through myself. Writing became the place where I let the truth hold me.
What made you leave Italy? Why did you opt to live in India? What has your journey through six countries done for you and your writing?
I’ve always been adventurous. I left Italy at fifteen to attend boarding school in the UK, driven by a curiosity to discover something larger than the life I knew. Looking back, I see I was chasing aliveness, perhaps even a kind of magic I believed lived somewhere else.
Life later carried me across six more countries. My husband’s work with the United Nations placed us in the Middle East, South America, and eventually India. Each relocation reshaped me, dismantling the illusion that identity is fixed.
India, in particular, asked for radical honesty. There was little room to hide. In that rawness, I began to see where I wasn’t fully inhabiting myself.
That changed my writing. The listening deepened. Stories became less about what happens and more about what is revealed beneath the surface. Today, I carry many worlds inside me. Home is no longer a place.
Has your own life impacted the diverse colours of humanity in this book? Please Elaborate.
I write about the human journey—the longing to belong, the fear of stepping into the unknown, the courage it takes to choose oneself. These are not experiences confined to one story.
My life shaped the book because I have known those edges, too. Uncertainty. Illness. Loss. Love. Each deepened my understanding of what it means to be human, and that depth gives my characters their colour.
The story could have taken place anywhere in the world. Why did you choose Hungary as the locale for your story over all other places?
Hungary sits at a crossroads between East and West, carrying beauty alongside a sober melancholy. When I walked around Budapest, I sensed an emotional gravity that resonated with Leonie’s sense of in-betweenness.
There is also a long tradition of Hungarian acrobatics. The circus in the novel isn’t just spectacle; it represents the inner balancing required to hold contradiction, leap without certainty, and trust oneself first.
Is this book impacted by your choice of career — being a life coach? Please explain.
My work as a life coach has given me a deep respect for the inner process. Leonie’s Leap invites readers into wonder, inquiry, and direct seeing. It isn’t a self-help book in the traditional sense, but it engages questions that draw the reader back to their own heart.
The “dearheart” letters woven into the narrative are not instructions. They are a voice that sits beside you and says, stay. It is tender here. You are not alone.
Did you imagine all the characters in Leonie’s journey towards self-hood or were they based on some experiences? Please elaborate.
I don’t believe we ever write from a neutral place. Even when characters are fictional, we create through our perception—our wounds, our longings, our questions. The characters in Leonie’s Leap are imagined, yet carry the landscapes I have traversed. They hold the mess of being human and the possibility of grace.
Leonie’s mother would have had a back story—a lonely Indian woman. Is she an illegal immigrant? Where’s his father then? What would be her story? Is Leonie an immigrant?
I left her backstory intentionally open because some spaces don’t need to be filled. Leonie’s mother is a woman who lived a complicated life, marked by abandonment, illness, and loss. What matters most is the imprint she leaves on Leonie—a gentleness and fierceness that fuel his longing for freedom.
Your book has a discussion on fear in chapter one. Your first book, Satya and the Sun, also dealt with fear. Does overcoming fear become a theme in both your books? Is the first one also a psychological adventure? Why is overcoming fear so important to you?
Fear has been central to my life. I have been in more surgeries and hospital beds than I can count. In those moments, fear became breath. Today, I no longer see it as an obstacle to overcome, but as a catalyst for deeper embodiment.
Satya and the Sun is also a psychological adventure, though written for children. It follows a girl afraid of the dark who sets out to find a place where the sun never sets. Inspired by my own fear of going blind, it explores what happens when we turn toward what terrifies us and discover that light exists even there.
Are you on the way to writing more books? What are your plans going forward?
I recently completed a poetry collection centred on devotion and heartbreak—an exploration of love when it strips you to your essence. I have also begun a new novel set in the Amazon—a story of initiation, surrender, and what survives when identity falls apart.
(This review and online interview by email is by Mitali Chakravarty)
The ocean breeze swipes the water page after page turned in waves of succession,
one after another sweeping the air and stirring it in the sounds of coming and going.
The waves move as the wind dictates: some taller, some more shallow, still others less certain.
These are the waves of times, when Fall just begins and the air knows nothing of Summer—
in days blessed by what came but were cursed when they left, with just the newest day now with me,
where only what left is what I wanted— where only waves of its time came and are now over.
Water comes then recedes motion upon motion, each one pulled from the edge of the sea,
each one returned to where it once came. I do not see its subtle direction-change
except its withdrawal, except to see them extracted in distant sentiments of their own.
Can it be that this is what was always meant to be, and did I miss more than I could have remembered?
Did I not notice them when they were there one after another in chances I hadn’t realised were given?
But now I see I was wrong: each day the shore doesn’t forget each wave’s sentiment,
each wave holds its own where there is no end to them, where I’m offered a memory wrapped by the pain
of their leaving, but stays bound to every one where I hold on to the gift each one carried. DESIGNS
so much of what consumes me is mired in redundancy mental gymnastics wound ‘round and ‘round like an old watch spring and even when encased as permanent and making promises of permanence revolve with the earth in an air of inconsistency— both tensioning and reverting
maybe sorrow was designed this way maybe it was honed from some common metal where fissures stayed hidden but are the cause of its denigration over and over daylight comes deepens then fades mired in a cycle where change speaks only to change ‘round and ‘round in steps that hold its own brightness
A STEP AT A TIME
I can’t walk far once sunlight begins leaving, once the sweet music of unnamed birds begins to end, after rain fell again in the morning and clouds regrouped in early evening, the day without a before or after, only itself with two hands giving all I come to breathe— the two of us here in waning sunlight remembering: another day only mine to take, only the day to give— whether I cherished it or had choices when it ended, a day in the light that remains with an intensity of its own.
SR (Salvatore Richard) Inciardi was born in New York City and attended Brooklyn College and New York University. SR Inciardi’s poetry has appeared in the USA and in Europe in various online and print magazines including Green Ink Poetry, Harrow House Journal, Grey-Sparrow Journal, Borderless Journal, Written Tales,among others. He was a contributor to Green Ink Poetry for their publication on Kennings: Equinox Collections: Autumn released on Amazon in October, 2024.
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PLEASE NOTE: ARTICLES CAN ONLY BE REPRODUCED IN OTHER SITES WITH DUE ACKNOWLEDGEMENT TO BORDERLESS JOURNAL
Every day at three o’clock, as the afternoon sun fought through the dusty windows and escaped the obstruction caused by the high school down the street, a teenage girl would slip quietly into a boutique. She never spoke, never bought anything, just wandered to the same rack and lingered over a particular black dress. Minerva watched her, recognising the weight of grief in the girl’s eyes she knew too well.
The girl would lift the simple black satin dress off the rack and wrap it around her as if embracing somebody very special.
After a few moments with the dress, the girl returned it to the rack and quickly left the store without a word spoken with tears streaming down her face.
*
Minerva used her late husband’s life insurance money to buy a little boutique she’d admired for years. The shop sold consignment women’s clothing and served as a sanctuary for Minerva to pour her sorrow into something tangible, to help women and girls find joy in clothing and accessories. The shop was a fragile haven built from a life including love, loss, and longing. Every shelf, every dress, every faded photograph tucked behind the register was a thread in the tapestry of her survival, but a lump found during a breast self-examination ignited anxiety which weighed heavily upon her.
Each morning, Minerva opened the shop, she was certain the lump was a “call” to “fold her hand” as the world felt like it was determined to break her.
*
One afternoon, as the bell tinkled above the door announcing a customer, Minerva looked up from her ledger. The girl was there again; her gaze fixed on the black dress. This time, she hesitated, then approached the counter, clutching the black dress including a second, almost identical dress but in a different size.
“Could I try these on?”
“Of course, dear.
“The fitting rooms behind me.”
A few minutes later, the girl emerged, the black satin dress draping heavy over her small frame. She looked at her reflection in the mirror, then turned to Minerva, uncertainty clouding her face.
“How does it look?”
Minerva stepped closer.
“May I ask, why this one?
“It doesn’t seem to fit you properly.
“I believe the black cotton dress will fit you perfectly.”
The girl hesitated, her fingers twisting the hem of the satin dress.
“My friend and I… we wanted to dress up and go to the prom together. She was killed in a hit-and-run accident. I can’t stop thinking about her. This black satin dress… it’s the only thing she tried on here. It’s all I have left of her.”
Minerva’s heart clenched. She spoke as if embracing the girl, her voice soft.
“I’m so sorry, sweetheart. Loss is a heavy thing to carry.”
The girl’s eyes shimmered with tears.
“I just… I wanted to feel close to her again. I thought maybe, if I wore the black satin dress, I could remember what it felt like to laugh with her.”
Minerva nodded, her own memories surfacing including her daughter’s laughter, a husband’s steady presence, and the ache of their absence.
“I can only imagine the emotional trauma you’re suffering, but please, allow me to share my sorrow with you, and together, we might lessen our heartache and move forward, stronger. I lost both my daughter and husband. Once, my world included a loving husband, Paul. He was a hard as nails career Marine whose stern exterior hid a heart that beat for his family. Marrying Paul provided me an opportunity to escape the role of only daughter to dysfunctional parents rooted inside a small town offering no prospects for self-fulfillment or escape.
“Marriage to Paul included a patchwork of military bases and hurried goodbyes, of late-night phone calls and the constant ache of uncertainty whether he’d be called to war. I learned to be strong; to pack up our life at a moment’s notice, but I also learned to find beauty even inside environments built for war. I found work inside clothing stores wherever we landed because I was drawn to the way fabric could transform a person, and how a simple dress could make a woman feel alive, special, or different even for one occasion.
“I apologise for tearing, but you remind me of our daughter, Emily, the light of my life. Emily’s spirit was wild and restless, her laughter echoing through the cramped military apartments and purring inside my heart. Emily drifted away to somewhere unknown inside her mind as if being pulled by currents I couldn’t fight including Paul’s ’tough love’ and frequent physical admonishments also inflicted upon me.
“The phone call came on a cold November morning: Emily was gone, lost to a Fentanyl overdose on a bed inside a stranger’s home. The grief rolled over me like a tidal wave, relentless and suffocating. Paul tried to be strong, but the loss hollowed him out like no weapons he’d ever known.
“Less than a year later, his heart stopped forever, leaving me with nothing but memories and the silence of an empty house we purchased after Paul retired. Some days, the memories are all that keep me going.”
The girl looked up, surprised.
“Does it ever get easier?”
“Not easier, but you learn to live with the pain of loss. I’ve learned kindness helps stitch the pieces back together.”
The girl glanced at the price tag, her face disappointed.
“I can’t afford both dresses.”
“You don’t have to. These are my gift for you.”
“But… why?”
“Because I know what it’s like to need something to hold onto. Giving is the only way I can heal.”
Tears spilled down the girl’s cheeks.
“I don’t know what to say.”
“You don’t have to say anything,”
Minerva carefully folded the dresses and placed them inside a gift box including a pink ribbon adorned with small hearts around the box.
“Promise me you’ll remember the good times and let yourself laugh again, when you’re ready.”
The girl nodded, clutching the box to her chest.
“I will.
Thank you.”
Minerva watched the girl slowly leave the shop and turn towards her before exiting. She mouthed the words,
“I love you.”
The girl left and the slight spring in her step signaled to Minerva signs of hope flickering in the ashes of her sorrow, and although Minerva didn’t get her name, she instinctively knew it was a brief encounter with her beloved Emily which gave her the final contact she desperately needed.
*
The doctor diagnosed Minerva with metastatic breast cancer. Minerva remembered staring at the ceiling in the doctor’s office, feeling as if her body was telling her the fight against grief was soon to be completed and she could join Emily and Paul in the afterlife.
The hardest blow came when the doctor informed her,
“The treatments will include a double mastectomy surgery, chemo, and radiation. If you want a chance of beating the cancer, it will require your complete devotion to rest and recovery. You won’t be able to keep up with the demands of operating the business.”
*
The words echoed in her mind as she stared at the racks of dresses, the sunlight struggling to pour through the fabrics mirroring the tears behind the black veil Minerva wore at two funerals and today, a struggle for her own life. Closing the shop felt like losing another piece of herself.
She lingered by the window, watching the sun dip below the horizon. She thought of her daughter, husband, all the moments lost, and the memories that remained. In giving the girl those two black dresses, Minerva was reminded that even in the depths of loss, kindness could stitch together the torn fabric of a broken heart. She had hoped to hear the familiar chime above the door open one final time and reveal the lovely girl. Minerva knew she was off chasing her own life which would reveal twists and turns. Minerva prayed the girl would be guided by kindness and knowing loss and misery is universal.
Recalling the happiness in the girl’s face carrying both dresses helped Minerva find the resolve to survive. She turned the sign on the door to “Closed,” knowing she would never open it again. But as Minerva locked up, she felt, for the first time in a long while, that she was not alone and would confront her illness head on with a newfound resolve to live.
From Public Domain
Jonathan B. Ferrini is the published author of over seventy fiction stories and poems. A partial collection of his short stories may be found in Within Hearts Without Sleeves. Twenty-Three Stories at Amazon. Jonathan also writes and produces a weekly podcast about film, television, and movies named, “The Razor’s Ink Podcast with Jonathan Ferrini.” Jonathan received his MFA in motion picture and television production from UCLA. He resides in San Diego.
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PLEASE NOTE: ARTICLES CAN ONLY BE REPRODUCED IN OTHER SITES WITH DUE ACKNOWLEDGEMENT TO BORDERLESS JOURNAL
It’s those words in the smaller pairings that offer imagined depth but inexact dimension with eyes that cannot see newness in weakened light absent colour words that can be read from the ashes of what never was in a time escaping into the dimming sunset: if only I could see my choices replayed if only I could hold them when the air was younger when they floated on a gentle breeze and were touched by an earlier sunlight when I knew what it was to be in the moment and I was captured by words still to come. If only they were here if only the words I heard then continued to speak now.
SR (Salvatore Richard) Inciardi was born in New York City and attended Brooklyn College and New York University. SR Inciardi’s poetry has appeared in the USA and in Europe in various online and print magazines including Green Ink Poetry, Harrow House Journal, Grey-Sparrow Journal, Borderless Journal, Written Tales,among others. He was a contributor to Green Ink Poetry for their publication on Kennings: Equinox Collections: Autumn released on Amazon in October, 2024.
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PLEASE NOTE: ARTICLES CAN ONLY BE REPRODUCED IN OTHER SITES WITH DUE ACKNOWLEDGEMENT TO BORDERLESS JOURNAL
