Hindu
Things of the world I have seen
yet my eyes remain clean
your silence fills my ears
the sun shines and you tell me go to sleep
Hours of the Stars
In the Quiet After Slaughter
excerpt
Memory Sandwich
The Monroes migrated from nobody-knows-where just as the
swallows were turning up famished at our backyard feeder. A
van with lilting shocks and unfamiliar licence plates deposited their
belongings on the lawn of a neglected two-bedroom. By the time the
leaves on the poplars in Falaise Park had begun to coil, just as the
wings of the leatherjackets started to sag, the family up and moved
away, a memory.
Afterwards a succession of temporary tenants occupied the bungalow.
There were couples with children and couples without.
There were lessees, owners, renters and loners, none of whom were
able to do anything about the air of despondency permeating that
sullen cedar structure.
Fresh paint, a garden — nothing worked. For years it sat empty,
victim to vandals, rodents and mould, roof shingles scattered, windows
lost to target practice. The day it was bulldozed that house
looked much as it did the day the Monroes moved in: unloved.
Besides the adults, Nelson and Connie, there were three kids:
Gus, the eldest at 16, had a purple birthmark splashed across one
eye; Lana, a year younger, was a quiet girl whose attempts to conceal
sprouting mammary glands were unsuccessful.
Shortly after their arrival the youngest crossed the street to where
I was fanning my collection of baseball cards. I had been aware of
Freddy observing me from a bedroom window. He introduced himself
with the assurance of someone accustomed to the role of
stranger. There seemed a precocious savvy in those squinting eyes.
– Wanna be friends? he asked.
To facilitate camaraderie Freddy faked an interest in baseball. He
misused terms like line drives and pop fouls, cannily eschewing…
Wheat Ears
Unobserved
The unobserved specks blow by
stay anonymous
while drinking coffee in the morning
not fathom its meaning like
some innocence in
your kiss remains unnoticed
like hand touching pencil shaft
while you write reverently
but when you idle mesmerized
by a moonlight, distraught
sensation arousing
stops you on your tracks
or refreshes delight
of crafting poem
Redemption
excerpt
. . . Stathis, Stathis, however did you manage it? Everything is
going superbly, just as your fine lad said. It is almost as if all
this never . . .
A bolt of energy struck through him. Exercise. But at this intersection
of hour and mood? To him, morning and exercise are related.
Exercise collided with now. The commitment of discipline must not
loosen, derange, or unfasten him. As if on command, he rose and
stood at attention. His body commanded his mind to command it: a
few knee-bends, jumping jacks, and he extended his hands almost
to the walls. Inhaled deep, exhaled slow, his breath became cuprous,
tarnished, an obese air; but he continued, and his lungs butterflied
and collapsed, perhaps in rehearsal for a ritual in which he might
never take part.
There has been no extraordinary exertion, yet the burden of
boredom diminished him to the figure of a junkman’s nag tolling
uphill before the overload of relic erudition. Half of a man knew it
was war; half of a man insisted it wasn’t. In the confusion, it was
difficult to discern which entered the theatre of war with a plowshare.
The blunder into the hunt, to discover oneself, was a quarry
that dogs followed in all directions of the cosmos, dogs which ran
and followed his steps as if ready to bite, to dig deep in his flesh
with their teeth.
He stopped as abruptly as he started and sat on his bed. His
mind flew back to the island.
Jazz with Ella
excerpt
A sad story, Lona thought. She wondered how many other homes had buried treasure—perhaps the owners didn’t even know it. Back in New York the buyers would be interested in stories like this one.
When she got home should she find a buyer for the icon, too? No, she wanted the icon for herself. She would not be turning it over to the businessmen on her return, but somehow, she would have to account for the cash—it had cost $50 U.S. dollars—that she had been given to purchase these items. She would cross that bridge when she came to it. She considered its size, weighing it in her hand like tomatoes at the grocery store. She checked once more that the door was locked, then she carefully unwrapped the distinctive Beryozka wrapping paper from a newly purchased balalaika, a musical instrument with a long narrow neck and a triangular body. There was no mistaking its shape even in wrapping paper. Once the paper was removed from the balalaika she wrapped the icon in her kerchief, then squeezed it into the space between the strings and the body of the instrument. It just fit. She re-wrapped the Beryozka paper around the balalaika, being careful to tape it in exactly the same spots as before, then held it up for inspection. You could hardly tell a thing—just the merest suspicion of something rectangular. She placed the wrapped balalaika into a mesh shopping bag such as the Soviets seemed to carry everywhere. This one she would be taking on the plane with her and stowing in the overhead baggage compartment. That done, she pulled out a kit from her suitcase that contained some acrylic paint such as children use and bottles of powder and Vaseline.
The jewellery, a pendant of solid gold and very old, was easy to doctor up; it was not of religious significance, although Krov had tried to tell her otherwise. It would find a buyer who was simply looking for something pretty and special. She considered if she had time to invent a provenance for it—a story about some czar giving it to his mistress, perhaps? The consortium had rapped her knuckles once before for inventing but she couldn’t resist. Who’s to say that it was not true? What Russian peasant before the revolution would own such a rich thing?
She removed the elaborate gold chain and put it with her own modern jewellery, then re-hung the locket on a leather strip. She put the locket into a tiny, leather, filigreed sack. She would wear it around her neck.
The prayer scrolls were also easy. They would be placed among the pencil sketches of St. Isaac’s Cathedral that she had completed…
He Rode Tall
excerpt
The Day Before
The Circle H Ranch
Willow Springs, Montana
It was Saturday. The day before the sale at the Circle H. Joel
had toyed with the idea of driving over to the Ramage place,
but a part of him was saying that wasn’t right. He knew from his
conversations with Roy that the Ramages saw him as competition.
This had been the weekend of their production sale for
years. For Joel, he had set up a competitive situation by
piggybacking on the Ramages’ clients. Joel didn’t like that at all.
He had run into Jack Ramage once in town only a week or so
earlier and had tried to make pleasant conversation with him.
He could tell that Jack was carrying a lot of anger and resentment
toward him. At first, he thought that it was all about how
Ramage felt about him, but later in the day when he was telling
Cindy about the chance meeting, she added another angle to the
conversation: the Ramages were advertising that their sale was
also a herd reduction sale as a result of the drought. The
Ramages had traditionally sold their horse crop as saddle-broke
two-year-olds, but this year, in addition to the fifty
two-year-olds for sale, they were also selling thirty mares and
thirty yearlings. They were really cutting back.
The good news for Joel was that the sale of the quality mares
and younger horses should draw even more folks into the country
for the sale. The bad news was that, with that kind of horseflesh
available on the day before his sale, he wondered how many people
would have any money left on the Sunday to invest in any…
Tasos Livaditis – Poems, Volume II
Long-listed for the 2023 Griffin Poetry Awards
https://griffinpoetryprize.com/press/2023-longlist-announcement/
There are, truly, thousands of ways for one to regain
his life
and only one to waste it. The tenants complained
for my oily hair that had covered half of the roof,
they didn’t know how many forgotten people still
existed yet, to be truthful, they weren’t shooting;
what’s the purpose of getting involved with death
trances,
better sit by the window and knit a sock. This often
happened to unfortunate Rachel as she’d step up
on the chair to dust the window she’d suddenly see
her true life; then she’d step down a bit cold on
her shoulders and she’d put her overcoat which
still seemed as empty. The villagers finished hastily
as if in fear and they discovered a choked person
there between the potatoes where they were
digging.
Thus, after we lost everything, mother used to
leave the door open and
Hagia Anna got pregnant although very old,
until at the end you could find most of the dead
among the survivors, old stories to narrate
sitting by the fireplace
after a good supper
and the trap of certainty under the carpet.
The Incidentals
Inebriation
He too fought side by side with Thanatos
he too longed for peace and prosperity
for a wife and two kids, he longed for
values his parents taught him, he longed
for the little life of the citizen who spends
his days at the factory, cursing for no reason
shouting just to be heard over the endless
buzz of the machines.
He too had a good time at home, he raised
two kids one became a policeman,
with a steady job, wages, a pension,
the other took up studies to be a teacher,
he said he wanted to mould the new generation
of pacifists, anarchists, and disobedient
citizens, reactionaries, the ones who always
complain about anything and everything
like those who think they know everything
though unable to play with their penises properly
and the old legionnaire sitting alone in
the dimmed lights of their Legion sips
his beer, all problems solved, he thinks.
The rest of the details are for the thinkers
of this country, let them untie the Gordian
Knot, the rope he was tied to was only
five meters long and like a donkey tied with
a rope to a stick in the ground, the poor
legionnaire had only this far to reach,
enough, enough of this philosophy,
he too adhered to set rules, he too
begged for his share of the Heavenly Prize
and grabbing his beer once more
he dissolves himself in his inebriation
after all he too fought for the motherland’s
freedom, for their values, for peace
one achieves by fighting a war, and which
the legionnaire realized is but a euphemism,
an idea once held, a pipe dream
for which he fought only to be left
alone and miserable drinking his beer
and waiting for Thanatos to come and make
his day by taking him away for good.
Ken Kirkby, A Painter’s Quest for Canada
excerpt
“I mean no disrespect, whatsoever,” Ken said. “I know the symbol well.
But that is the wall.”
Albert exchanged a few words with Leon and then nodded. The painting
would go on that wall. Then Ken and Leon tackled the problem of
hanging the massive painting on a marble wall. The maintenance staff
concluded they would have to drill into the ceiling beams and suspend
the painting from thin stainless steel wires.
They hung the painting after business hours. Ken invited the media.
He had the panels delivered to the lobby where he bolted them together.
Salvador and his staff came along to help. Many members of the young
professionals group also arrived on the scene. The media asked how much
the painting had sold for. “No comment,” Ken said.
“Was it a lot of money?”
“No comment.”
“How did you contact Mr. Reichmann?”
“No comment.”
“You’re an artist,” one of them said. “How do you know how to do
all these other things? Artists don’t know how to be entrepreneurs. Who
helps you?”
“That’s a big question,” Ken said. “It’s a spiritual matter. I don’t wish
to discuss it.”
“What do you mean it’s a spiritual matter?”
“Just that. I get my knowledge, inspiration, and advice from a higher
authority and beyond that, I don’t want to discuss it. But, I will say one
thing – my advisor is Mr. Albert Reichmann.”
“Yes,” Albert said, when a reporter asked. “I am honoured to be Mr.
Kirkby’s advisor. He is doing wonderful work.”
Those few words gave Ken the credibility he’d been looking for. He had
achieved what his father had always had – the power to command respect
and attention wherever he went.
Later that night, when he was one of the last to leave, he paused to look
at the painting that he had envisioned hanging in that space so many
times. It looked exactly as he had imagined. It was in perfect proportion
to the immense lobby. It wasn’t until one walked closer to it that one felt
the full impact of its size.
His greatest debt was to Salvador, who had arranged the meeting, but
when he told him that he wanted to give him several paintings, he refused.
Ken painted several canvases regardless and delivered them to his home.
Before getting back to the task of Isumataq, Ken returned to the Arctic.
Keith Sharp, the burly Englishman, had moved to a parcel of land near
Rankin Inlet and extended an invitation. Ken included Michael as well as
Avril the photographer, and Roberto and Egidio, the filmmakers, in his
entourage; in mid-July, the somewhat motley crew – loaded down with…
In Turbulent Times
excerpt
‘You’re too smart for them, Joe.’ Michael gulped a mouthful of tea that was still quite warm. ‘Your mother says you’ve been in America.’
‘Yes. I did a bit of travelling there.’
‘Must be a great country.’
‘Yes, it is. I loved what I saw of it. I told Nora that I was going to live in the States when the war was over.’
‘That’ll prepare her,’ Caitlin said in a heavy voice.
‘So you’re going to become a Yank, Joe?’ Michael said.
‘I think so.
‘Good for you. That’s where the future is, I’d say.’
‘Yes,’ Joe agreed. ‘That’s where the future is. In fact I’d say the future was already there.’
‘Grab your share of it, Joe. And good luck to you, son.’
҂
Nora waited anxiously as the days passed. She hoped heart and soul, more fervently than she had ever hoped for anything, that Joe had made her pregnant. She even prayed for it in church, pleading with God, who had robbed her of so much, to grant her this one compensating favour. And then she remembered that God did not reward sin but punished it. Would He punish her? Could He, who had already punished her so cruelly, continue to show only heartless vindictive ness towards her? The time of the month, as Nora reckoned it, had been most propitious for conception. The occasion itself, so beautiful, so transcendental, so highly infused with the passion of pure and overpowering love, could not have been other than providential. If she never had another possession in her life, Nora wanted Joe’s child with a ferocity that almost choked her.
‘If I can’t have him,’ she prayed, ‘allow me to have his son or his daughter, to love and care for as I would have loved and cared for Joe himself. Oh God Almighty, harden not Your heart this time. Wipe from Your mind all memory of the wrong we did to attain this end and give to our undying love, so true that only You could have inspired it, the divine consummation it deserves.’
Nora was tense, anxious, irritable and easily upset. She had a violent row with her mother that began with a purely innocent and casual remark from Caitlin about Owen Joe’s being too warmly dressed.
‘You’re one to be giving advice about looking after babies,’ Nora shouted heartlessly. ‘I’m surprised your incompetence as a mother didn’t kill me.’
Manolis Aligizakis 