Month: November 2025

The Circle

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excerpt

it’s best for their morale, for their belief in the rationality of what they do every
day, and for their steadfastness in moving ahead. He has been around these
people and this agency for a long time since leaving Baghdad, since the days he
thought he had a good future with the CIA. Time has passed along with his belief
in a good future. What went wrong? He has wondered many a time; Ibrahim is
right. Bevan knows deep in his heart that Ibrahim is right. The problem is what
the agency does and what his department does is often questionable. This has
troubled him for a while. He has a hard time understanding the reasoning
behind decisions taken that are based on a mounting fear in the psyche of the
American people. He has been abroad for many years in which he has come
across people of many different nationalities; Muslims and others and they are
seldom the way they have been portrayed by the administration and by the
Ameerican media at the best of times. Following the end of the term of the “war
president” the people elected a different party and the stand of the country
abroad softened a bit, but after a couple of terms they were back at the same old
doctrine of pre-emptive strikes whenever it felt right, and Bevan knows that’s
not the best approach. Sometimes it’s better to sit and talk to a person instead of
unleashing the power of the killing machine and later trying to find answers to
questions you never asked to begin with.
He knows something has to be done about all this. Yet there are times when
he doubts even himself, even the comments from Ibrahim, his good friend. Does
he doubt his friend? A number of times he has thought about that, as well. After a
while his mind gets stuck on the idea that something has to be done with this
department, something has to change; it cannot keep on going like this for ever,
it cannot keep on going on with the killings and the atrocities. Yes, he knows,
something has to change.
He has tried over the past five or six years to change the mentality of a
number of people whom he has talked to; but has found it difficult to convince
most of the people in higher positions that what they do and how they approach
things is wrong. Some seem to thrive on other peoples’ misery and cannot
suddenly change direction because Bevan Longhorn wants it. He knows the only
way something will ever change is when something dramatic happens. Bevan has
been thinking about that for quite a while.
Ibrahim is right; substantial change takes place only when dramatic events
precede, like the attack in New York in 2001. He takes a copy of the memo he has
issued to his personnel and puts it in his wallet. He closes the file and calls his
secretary to pick it up. Then he finishes eating his sandwich and asks Dorothy to
remove his cold coffee.

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

The Unquiet Land

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excerpt

“In one way they were right,” Michael interrupted.
“Yes, that’s true enough,” Caitlin agreed. “The doctor tried to tell the people it was epilepsy, but they said that epilepsy was just a doctor’s big word for seizure by the Devil. Then a fishing boat went down in a storm with the loss of all hands. The people in the fishing village blamed Padraig. They dragged him from the doctor’s house, but on the way to the harbour, where they might have drowned him, he suffered another seizure. He was writhing on the ground and foaming at the mouth when my father rescued him. The doctor agreed with my father that the best thing for his own safety was to let Padraig go.”
“What a terrible life that poor man has had,” Michael observed.
“Only the first dozen years,” Caitlin said. “He was twelve when he came here.”
“So he lived with the doctor and his wife for three years?”
“About that, yes. But he was mostly confined to their house. Children stoned him one day when he went outside.”
“Imagine being stuck in a house for three years.”
“It was a lot better than the house he came from. The doctor continued his education.”
“Padraig’s education?”
“Yes.”
“What do you mean, ‘continued’ it?”
“His mother, the school-teacher, educated him herself as best she could under the circumstances in her brother’s house. She did a good job of it too. Padraig is a clever man. A very quick learner.”
“You should know, shouldn’t you?” Michael said. “You spent a lot of time over his books too, as I’ve heard.”
“I learned as much from Padraig as he did from me,” Caitlin said modestly, but honestly. “Old Shaughnessy, the schoolmaster, didn’t know what to make of Padraig. I did. I taught him what I could. Except for theology.”
“Theology?” This was a new word for Michael.
“The study of religion.”
“I see.”
“Padraig was quite well versed in that. The doctor or his wife must have known a lot about it. Padraig actually taught himself, Michael, in between the odd jobs he did for my father. He did well enough to get to university. After that there was no stopping him.”

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1926763203

Nikos Engonopoulos – Poems

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Double Checking the Signals
on the corners of the shadow
the eyes got burned
in the most unbelievable ferocity
of the walls of the zodiac Roxane
lust that charges
as if the result was
never mentioned
hope, curse and flesh
put together the awe
of sleep
they hold the lips
tightly shut
they forget of trickery
in lustful mysteries
the dual salvation
commands
to the dusk the winds raise
the spinning wheel hides us
attracts us
wants the stranger’s passion from us
the pain of the material world
in the honeycombs
of yesterday
the rose, like a true styptic
the secret serenity of the day
the fast symbolic tissue
band of light,
of silence
they feel nostalgic
for the escapee who
will be released
and steal and hide
among the leaves
the body
that was truly loved

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

Medusa

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Cyclamen
With the first sliver of sunlight, cyclamen unfolds petals in the rock’s schism, the breeze chants a hymn before the virgin light, and the bluish window, like the verse of a faint poem, observes the dawn as I courageously try to balance life after your death
—Get up to gather the leaves of the big oak. They won’t go into the recycling bag on their own
Rose in the vase leans like a star on the right crest of the sky, the lock of the door remembers of all the little songs it has locked outside, and I pray to His majesty to bring you back to me
—If you need three recycling bags, I have more in the storage room
Closer to my retina, I discover a tear that will flow like a ripened fruit, rebellious molecules dancing in a frenetic mode as if to redefine Terpsichore’s flow, the brownish finch discovers our birdfeeder and takes control of his hunger
— Tell me what is on your mind, and you ignore me today?
The colourful dawn paints idols and symbols onto my retinas, and I can almost hear your footsteps, my beloved, echoing on the gleaming floor of the terrace, reminding me of the need to have you
— You don’t care whether I talk to you or not, do you?

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1926763769

Small Change

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excerpt

a sweet humming whisper and my fingers closed around the aluminium body shutting off the little air holes that made it sing. I stuffed it into my shirt pocket and my fingers brushed against the last Spud menthol I’d forgotten to smoke that afternoon after baseball. I pulled it out and straightened it carefully into a limp tube that dribbled dry tobacco from its open end. Scary stuff, lighting up in front of your own house, but what the hell. My scalp came alive with little electric maggots, wriggling. I found some matches in my pants. The end of the Spud flared and settled into a hot core that let sparks off in the breeze when I sucked on the cork tip. I put one foot up behind me against the fence, and the movie came on in my head. My eyes narrowed; my ears sifted the sounds of the city for clues.
Then suddenly they were there, the big boys.
Joey comes up to me, all excited and talking like he wants everybody on the block to hear.
“’ey, Georgie, Pasquale wants you to go to D’Amato’s an get im four cansa Ballantine ale.”
He presses a damp, crumpled bill into my palm and says it again.
“Your nonno, ‘ey, he wants you to get ‘im four Ballantine’s.”
He winks at me, and gives me an elbow. He laughs. His eyes are heavy lidded and his face is damp with sweat. He’s been talking loudly at me so the neighbours can hear, and now he makes a face that says to his buddies, it’s cool, don’t sweat it. I remember that look from dozens of Saturday matinees. I feel the damp currency in my hand. I know there’s something wrong with all this, but I can’t figure it out. Then he bends close to my ear and tells me to meet them in the park.
Sometimes Nonno Pasquale would come and stay with us. On a shelf in the pantry he kept this little tin pail with a lid he’d give me to go and get beer in. The guy behind the bar at D’Amato’s, Gioffo, an old guy, but not as old as Pasquale, always thought I was worth a smile, this little kid with a beer pail, and he knew my nonno from years ago, so he’d wink at me and fill it up and give me a Sarsparilla on the house, and I’d run back home so the foamy draft wouldn’t get warm in the sun, and my grandfather would laugh and give me a nickel, and pinch my cheek and tell my mother what a prize she had for a son.
But I never saw him drink from a beer can, ever. Or even a bottle. Still, it was tonight, and they were having a party in there, and what did I know. So I marched importantly into D’Amato’s Bar & Grill.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1926763157

Constantine Cavafy – Poems

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Dangerous Things
Said Myrtias (a Syrian student
in Alexandria, during the reign
of Augustus Constans and Augustus Constantios,
partly pagan, partly Christian);
“Strengthened by theory and by study
I shall not fear my passions like a coward.
I shall give my body to carnal delights,
to the pleasures we dream about,
to the most daring erotic desires,
to the lascivious urges of my blood, without
any fear, because, whenever I choose,
and have the will, strengthened
as I shall be by theory and by study—
at the critical moment I shall find
my spirit, as it was before, ascetic.”

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

Opera Bufa

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Eighteenth Hour
I halt my straddle before yellow
emotion opposite a well-preserved
church echoing with blessings
and phony wishes for everlasting peace
and lifting the veil of opulent
kisses blowing like dynamite
Eros is transformed to stigma
degraded by arrogance of
critics stalled in error time
literate fanatics the dream bled to
phlegmatic negligence
puffy cloud none looks at
below masses graced by folly
endless self-love in spite of solid advice
from erudite Death who
has seen the evidence
yet the belligerent mind
guides its faithful to the steps
of immortality as all others
just die pointless deaths
observing an opera bufa
as every breath drawn hangs
like a half-open eyelid observing benevolent acts
exulting bigotry promoting
the sin-turned-blessing scaffold dropping
noosed heretics through the hole
like monotonous drips
from the gutter after rain
every virulent thought done up
to splendorous diction
and meditating olive branches
ask ‘why?’ as the percuss of breaking spines
spits emphatically:
who cares?

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1926763092

Ken Kirkby, A Painter’s Quest for Canada

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excerpt

When they immigrated to Canada, and settled in Toronto, they founded
a tile company and then became real estate developers. Their flagship
building was First Canadian Place, the tallest building in the Commonwealth.
Ken talked about them and gnawed on the information he had
like a dog on a marrow bone.
“Forget about them and come into business with me,” Henri said.
“Why try to sell paintings to people who don’t buy paintings?”
Ken finally looked at the books, which revealed that the frame factory
was struggling to stay alive.
“You can buy half,” Henri offered.
“Why would I buy half of a sinking ship?” Ken asked. But, he agreed
to become a partner. Perhaps, it would be a good idea to be seen as a
businessman instead of an artist. He might be viewed with more respect
and given more credibility. He would buy his half with orders for frames.
Henri agreed to build Ken a studio across the top of the factory.
Within six months, Ken had paid off the fifteen thousand dollars he
owed and moved into his new studio where he began work on two large
Arctic paintings – one for First Canadian Place, measuring sixteen by
sixteen feet, and one measuring slightly less, for the new international
airport planned for Yellowknife.
Marsha said, “You have no money and you’re going to create two giant
paintings that no one wants to buy. It makes no sense!”
It made sense to him, even though he had no explanation to give. He had
learned to listen to his inner voice, and it was telling him to paint the canvases.
Nobody’s doubts could stop him. He was going to show the world!
The new studio was too small for the massive paintings and so were all
the conventional canvases. He joined four lengthened panels with invisible
seams by bevelling the wood, squeezing the stretchers together with
clamps and creating knife-edges that melded together. Through painstaking
experimentation with a torque wrench, Vise-Grips and a canvas
stretcher he created a unique design that produced perfect tension on
every square inch of canvas. When the tension was perfect, he hosed the
canvas down to shrink it. One of his first canvases exploded, and one flew
off spinning like a propeller, but he finally got it right and made a sixteen
by sixteen and a twelve by fourteen foot canvas.
He was still mystified by his inability to sell paintings of the Arctic.
One day, while he was driving on Steeles Road near the Allen Expressway
a question leapt into his mind. “If you were limited to one image – one
object from all your experiences in the Arctic, and that was all you were
allowed to portray, what would it be?”
Inukshuk!
Ken was stopped at a red light. The light turned green…

https://www.amazon.com/dp/0981073573

Blood, Feathers and Holy Men

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excerpt

Brother Rordan looked around for Svend or Ul, whichever his name was. Determined
he’d find him, he only wished to apologize for his earlier blunder and perhaps
be his friend. Maybe Ul was being ‘used’ by the captain and felt ashamed of his position.
The crew, apart from the captain, seemed to give him a wide berth. Perhaps
already on board, the Irish thrall was nowhere to be found.
When the feast wound down, the late summer sun had moved along the far horizon.
Songs and games became more boisterous. The Norsemen wrestled, stripped
to a narrow loincloth, their bodies glistening with lamb fat. Bjorn, strongest of them
all, won every bout. Bjorn was aptly and fondly named the Blonde Bear for his massive
bushy beard and hairy chest. No Norseman ever refused his challenge. Each
preferred to be thrown by the mighty Bear than be seen as any less than a brave son
of Odinn, god of war. Spectators circled the wrestlers, cheering on each challenger
in his turn. Sometimes, Bjorn allowed a man to hold him for a while, but never long
enough to claim a victory. As each challenger lay defeated, the great champion lifted
him up with the love of a Nordic brother. In all his show of strength, Bjorn was
almost gentle.
When the wrestling was done, other games of skill took place. Some competed in
feats of archery and knife throwing with targets set at greater and greater distances.
Prizes of bone-handled knives and silver jewellery were awarded to winners in each
category. Several men began a game with a leather ball. They used sticks to hit the
ball and one another’s legs. Competition grew loud and fierce. The ball, the size of a
man’s fist, flew hard and fast.
At last, the casks of beer were drained. One by one, the players left the game to
sit in small groups and talk about home and women and their dreams. Each man
speculated on his share of the profits, when they’d sell their catch of sheep and slaves
at the marketplace in Thulé.
By the dying embers of the fire, the captain filled his men’s cups with sweet mead.
He and his crew toasted further adventures and Valhöll, where all slain warriors
would live for all time, happily feasting with Odinn. All grew serious for a while.
Then Bjorn tossed the ball to Kyrri, the Quiet One. Kyrri tossed the ball to Captain
Hjálmar. This was a different game, played with a twist of humour. While Bjorn and
Kyrri covered their eyes, the other men began a song.
“Treasure hidden in the night, so safely out of view,
will not be gained without a fight. The search is up to you.”
Hjálmar tiptoed off to hide the ball. Much to the amusement of the onlookers,
he slipped it up the loudly snoring Finten’s tunic, then stood apart chuckling. On a
signal from the singing crew, Bjorn and Kyrri began the search from man to man, accompanied
by cheers and sighs of “koer, varmr, heitr, kaldr” and the Brothers joined
in with their own shouts of “close, warm, hot, cold.”
Finally, with whispered hints from various members, Bjorn snuck up on the apparently
sleeping monk. But as Bjorn reached under the priest’s tunic in search of
the hidden ball, Finten grabbed his wrist and bellowed, “Do you take me while I am
sleeping? You are desperate, my poor fellow, but I have a vow, and my vow applies to
women and to men. I cannot satisfy you asleep or awake. For shame.”

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1926763106

Wheat Ears

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Hades
Under the watchful eye of Hades
I used my strong hand to spread
the brown to the right
and the bloody red to the left
hills and paths that led
downward to the sea
where sweat and salt mixed.
Then for a moment I stopped
to listen to the owl’s call
requiem for my dead comrades
hour of wisdom incarnated
lines of people I pulled from
the earth’s bottom
chthonian climax
unorthodox couplings
the expert analyser that I was
and I counted
the fingers and phalli of men
eloquent contours of women
sea caves where future
generations were destined to dwell
labyrinthine quotations
asymmetrical widths
elliptical lengths of shadows
during the saddened August
I searched the fiery seashores for naked
bodies peacefully lying on the sand

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0BKHW4B4S