Month: May 2025

The Circle

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Excerpt

She’s a pretty lady. Talal thinks that if he didn’t have
difficulty following her Australian accent he could easily fall in love with her. He
smiles at that thought and she detects what he is thinking.
“What are you smiling about? Is it one of those delusions of yours, again?”
Helena jokes with him.
He doesn’t mind her at all because he knows she means no harm. She’s
always playful and full of fun; as a matter of fact, he enjoys her more than other
girls he has met, because this Australian girl with the beautiful contours is
someone whom Talal has gotten to know very well by exploring and touching
and getting excited and satisfying. But suddenly his mind travels to a woman
older than himself with whom he had such a great morning yesterday. Helena
recognizes something from his glowing face and his faint smile, a smile that a
woman can easily see is the smile of a man thinking of another woman. She says,
“Thinking of her again, aren’t we?”
“Thinking of who? What do you mean?” He suddenly gets defensive.
They are interrupted by Ahmed as he comes back to the table. She turns to
Talal.
“I’ll leave you boys on your own. Don’t forget to pick me up about three on
Saturday.”
“No problem, beautiful. I’ll be there.”

https://www.amazon.com/dp/0978186524

He Rode Tall

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Excerpt

Joel wasn’t sure what it was, but somehow he had connected
with the peace and tranquility of the land. He was wondering
if there wasn’t some way he could make a go of the Circle
H. Joel knew that he had lost his soul a lot of years ago, but now,
maybe just maybe, he had found his soul in the hills.
“So who is this Smith character?” inquired Joel.
“Big rancher. Moved in about ten years ago and hasn’t stopped
buying since. Must control almost the entire county. Between
what he has already put his hands on and what he has tied up in
first right of refusals he pretty well owns Sweetwater Country.
They say he runs over 5,000 head.”
Even Joel knew that 5,000 head was a lot of anything let alone
cows. Anyone who has enough land to feed that many cattle
would be just about as close to a king as you could get in this dry
country.
By now, Harry had run out of chores to do and things to tinker
with so he slowly turned to face Joel. It was then that Joel clearly
saw the withered, weather-stained face of the man he was speaking
with. Joel couldn’t help but think that Harry’s head was too
big for the size of his body. His tiny frame carried maybe 140
pounds, none of it fat. With a thirty-inch waist, this ranch hand
of fifty or sixty, or was it seventy, years appeared to be in excellent
condition. His face featured a big nose, ears the size of tea saucers,
and an abundance of thick black hair. And his hands. His
hands were those of a worker and his big head seemed out of proportion
to the size of his lithe body.
“Lives over there,” offered Harry.
“Over where?” asked Joel, almost forgetting who it was that
they were talking about.
“The Buck Smith Ranch Corporation Headquarters are just
over those hills. Maybe a mile across.”
“Then we are neighbours.”
“Might say that. A mile across the hills but must be ten miles
around on the roads. Don’t see much of them over here. Just
their cows all over the hills.”

https://www.amazon.com/dp/0980897955

Constantine Cavafy – Poems

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ARISTOVOULOS

The palace mourns, the king mourns

King Herod, inconsolable, laments,

the entire city grieves for Aristovoulos

who was drowned so unjustly, by accident,

while playing in the water with his friends.

And when they learn of it in other places,

when the news spreads as far as Syria,

many among the Greeks will be saddened;

many poets and sculptors will mourn,

for Aristovoulos was known to them,

and no vision of an ephebe in all our history

could compare to the beauty of this youth;

what statue of a God has Antioch ever deserved

as great as this young lad of Israel?

The First Princess weeps and wails,

his mother, the most eminent Jewish lady.

Alexandra weeps and laments for the calamity.

But when she finds herself alone her sorrow changes.

She groans; she rails; she curses; she reviles.

How they duped her! How they deceived her!

How their purpose was finally achieved!

They devastated the house of the Asamoneans.

How did that criminal king achieve his goal;

the deceitful, the corrupt, the dishonest.

How did he do it. With what infernal plot

so devious even Miriam didn’t suspect a thing.

If Miriam had sensed it, if she suspected it,

she would have found a way to save her brother;

she is a queen after all, she could have done something.

How they will celebrate now and secretly gloat,

those wicked sluts, Kypros and Salome;

those vulgar women Kypros and Salome.—

And she is powerless,

has to pretend that she believes their lies;

unable to go before the people

to go out and shout to the Hebrews,

to tell, to tell how the murder took place.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1723961833

Jazz with Ella

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Excerpt

The day’s itinerary included lessons, a visit to the Kremlin and Lenin’s tomb, followed by a trip to the Lenin Museum. Evening was reserved for the ballet.
“I’m thrilled about the Kremlin,” whispered Paul, “but frankly I don’t want to see the Lenin Museum.”
“It’s early days yet,” Jennifer whispered back. “Don’t start an international incident.” She speared a wedge of sausage that sat in a grease slick beside a rubbery poached egg. “The bus is leaving at 9. Let’s eat this delightful repast and get going.”
★
Yawning and groaning, the group boarded the bus under Natasha’s watchful eye, then waited while Paul was dispatched to round up the twins who had already found the hotel’s souvenir shop. “Just ask if they’ve seen two copies of Liza Minnelli wandering about,” Hank called after him. The twins certainly resembled the movie star although with an extra twenty pounds of weight per twin.
They waited again while Professor Chopyk delivered a brief but pompous speech of welcome. Aaargh! Why does he do things like that? Jennifer thought. It’s so irritating.
The bus took them across Red Square and parked two minutes later at one of the Kremlin gates.
“That was hardly worth the ride,” grumbled Marty.
“Arriving by bus marks us as foreign visitors,” said David, who was laden with camera equipment, “and we get privileged treatment on the tours.” It was true. Natasha marched them behind the Kremlin walls, past the many line-ups, ignoring the passive stares of the crowds, and ushered them into each historic location. They visited the quiet, simple Church of the Assumption, examined the Tsar’s Bell that had never been rung and the Tsar’s Cannon that had never been fired, and they gazed across a closely guarded, cobblestoned courtyard at the imposing edifice of the Supreme Soviet.
The Kremlin’s armoury museum was not a house of weapons as Jennifer had expected. Instead, it was a dazzling display of fine crafts, jewellery, ornate costumes, royal regalia and richly decorated carriages.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1926763246

Arrows

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Excerpt

I gripped the lifelines, my habit soaked and
pasted to my body. He shook his head and curled his mouth as he
placed his bare feet on the steps.
Bartolomé glared when I came up to the quarterdeck. He and the
helmsman were fighting with the long tiller to steer the Isabella who
was surfing a wave downwind with increasing speed. He was too
busy to pay me attention.
I could see he was thinking hard, for he had seen men break their
bones when propelled by the long tiller as the waves jerked the
rudder.
The pilot concentrated on the movements of the needle in the
compass set in a wooden box fixed onto the binnacle. A sailor tried
to record the time and course while another minded the sandglass.
Every man there had a duty to perform; all others were tucked away
in the relative safety of the ship’s innards. Bartolomé chewed his
inner cheek, as he always did when considering his options.
The visibility was nil, no other ships were in sight. Every vessel
was on its own now, each full of men fighting for their lives and
praying, the galleons surely better off than the Isabella. They didn’t
have the wretched high castles fore and aft, taking all the wind and
making the vessel ungovernable.
Bartolomé growled, covering his eyes with one hand and
lowering his head without releasing his grip on the tiller. I saw his
lips move silently amid the roar of wind and sea. He could attune his
senses to the mood of the wind, feeling it on his nape, sniffing it out
of the air, hearing it on the sails and rigging.
Bartolomé knew I was adamant about staying on deck; nothing
short of an angel or God’s thunderous voice would send me down.
He aimed a sullen glare in my direction and yelled to the sailor
minding the sandglass to pass me a coil of line. I caught it in the air
and fumbled, keeping an eye out for waves until I found the end of
it. Bartolomé motioned me to bring it around my waist. I managed a
knot above my Franciscan cord and tied myself to the rail as the
others were to the binnacle, but he sighed, nodded to the pilot, let go
of the tiller and came to tie the knot to his liking.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/0981073522

Neo-Hellene Poets, an Anthology of Modern Greek Poetry

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I

The angel,

We had waited for him for three years, concentrated

       closely examining

the pines, the seashore, the stars.

Joining the blade of the plough or the ship’s keel

once again, we searched to discover the first sperm

so that the ancient drama might recommence.

We went back to our homes broken-hearted

with incapable limbs, with mouths ravaged

         by the taste of rust and salinity.

When we woke, we travelled to the north, strangers

driven into the mist by the perfect wings

of swans that wounded us.

During winter nights, the strong eastern wind

         maddened us

in the summers, we got lost in the agony of day

         that couldn’t die.

We brought back

these petroglyphs of a humble art.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1926763513

Still Waters

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excerpt

Chapter Three
The ambience of the nurses’ residence at the Holy Cross Hospital
in Calgary did not fill Tyne with enthusiasm on the day of her return.
The air that met her as she opened the front door felt hot and stuffy,
and more depressing than the atmosphere of the bus on the three
hour ride from Emblem. She responded to the house mother’s greeting,
signed the ‘In’ register, then carried her bags down the corridor
to her first-floor room.
The tins of cookies and fruit cake, which her mother had packed
that morning, weighed her down more than her suitcase of clothes
and personal items that she carried in her other hand. But the enjoyment
the goodies would afford was worth the effort, not only to her
but to her roommates as well. They would provide a welcome supplement
to the hospital food which was seldom appetizing.
Tyne opened the door to the room she shared with two of her
classmates. The smell of paint, although more than three months
old, assailed her nostrils as it always did when she had been away for
any length of time. But it was a clean, homey smell and Tyne recalled
with amusement their efforts to decorate the unpainted walls, and to
hang curtains at the bare windows. After two years in the stark dormitory,
Maureen had declared she could not spend another twelve
months living like a nun. Tyne and their other roomie, Carol Ann,
had readily agreed. Afterwards, they wondered why they had waited
so long.
Tyne dropped her suitcase on the bed nearest to the door, and
deposited the box of her mother’s baked goods on the desk across
the room. Only then did she catch sight of the note…

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1926763068

Nikos Engonopoulos – Poems

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Eleanor
for hands, she hath non, nor
eyes, or feet, or golden
treasure of hair
(front view)
her hair is of carton
and like a fish
her two eyes are
like a dove
her mouth
is like a civil war
(in Spain)
her neck is a red
horse
her hands
are
like the voice
of thick forest
her two breasts are
like my paintings
her belly is
the history
of Velthandros and Chrysantza
the story
of Tobias
the story
of a donkey
of the wolf and fox
her gender
is
sharp whistles
in the quietness
of noon
her thighs are
the last
gleams
of timid joy
of the road rollers
her two knees
Agamemnon
her two reverent
small
feet
are the green
telephone
with the red eyes
(rear view)
her hair
is
the oil lamp
that burns
in the morning
her shoulders
are
the hammer
of my lust
her back is
the binoculars
of the sea
the plough
of the foolish
inscriptions
whistles
sadly
on her waist
her buttocks
are
fishbones
saddened
her thighs
are
like
a thunderbolt
her small heals
light
the bad dreams
in the mornings
and finally
she is
a woman
half hippocampus
and half
necklace
perhaps even
part cypress
and partly
an elevator

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1926763734

Swamped

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Excerpt

“Let’s go Susan, I’m hungry,” he said, taking her by the hand. They
walked past Logan and Helena into the hallway. Alone with Susan in
the elevator, he rewarded her expectations with a kiss, to which she
responded as eagerly as he had hoped. They said nothing until they
reached the ground floor and crossed the street to Da Carlo’s, an Italian
eatery and one of the best spots for lunch in downtown Vancouver.
The place was already packed, but he was known to the manager,
who escorted them straight to a table. When they had settled down,
he gazed wordlessly at Susan. Her brown eyes were brighter now than
earlier, even in the dim light of the restaurant.
“You look beautiful today, Susan,” he said, taking her hand in his.
“Thank you.” Her answer echoed so loudly in his ears.
He called the server, and they each ordered a pasta dish with
chicken. He suggested half a litre of red wine to go with the pasta and
tomato sauce. Susan agreed and added with a smile, “You plan to get
me drunk?”
“You want me to, sweet Susan?” he answered with a question.
She enjoyed being with this man. Since they had met and gone
out a few times, she had gotten used to drinking wine. Canadian born
and raised, Susan had grown up with beer and pubs rather than
restaurants and wine, but he had had an effect on her in that department
and Susan now appreciated the European ways he had kept
after all his years in Canada. He still spoke with an accent, and Susan
sometimes had trouble following everything he said. But other than
that, she loved his ways and in particular his romantic touch, often
expressed unexpectedly on the spur of the moment. She felt very attracted
to him and didn’t shy away from showing her affection. He
felt the same way. She had sensed this as soon as they started dating.
His only concern was what other people in the company might say.
He extended his arm to the middle of their table, where a few
seasonal flowers were placed in a small vase. He took a rosebud and
gave it to her.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B08WP3LMPX

Marginal

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Eyes
questioning, wondering eyes
smiling lips, shy laughter
on the screen, momentarily
uncomfortable reaction
to my comment
visceral need for touch,
dermal and internal which
I dream of experiencing,
emotional fast heartbeats,
body warm, willing, expecting
you in the sweetness
of the moment
eternal image in my mind

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1771715987