Savages and Beasts

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excerpt

encounter in life are shared by all only to a different perhaps
level of intensity from one to the other ultimately to be left with
that Pandora’s gift to the universe: hope. And upon this hope
one commences all over, like a new Sisyphus pushing his rock
towards the hilltop.”
“You speak of very wise things, Dylan, and I don’t hesitate
to say that I enjoy your philosophical views,” Anton smiled at the
old Irish man.
Anton’s side view caught Migizi with a young girl coming
towards them. When they neared Anton and Dylan the youth
introduced his sister Miigwan to Anton.
“My sister,” the boy said proudly and his cheeks turned
red as much as his sister who lowered her eyes and didn’t say any
word.
“Good to meet you Miigwan,” Anton said to the girl who
whispered something, which only her brother Migizi heard.
Anton realized that it wasn’t meant to hear what the young
girl said and who continued to look at the ground and kept silent.
Her brother smiled at Anton and Dylan, pulled his sister
by the hand and walked away. Soon they were among all the other
children who walked around the grounds in bunches of two or
three, until the school bell was herd and Father Nicolas who was
on duty with Mary gathered them. They were put in rows of three
and slowly walked into the school for their morning porridge.
“Another day in Paradise,” Anton thought and smiled. Yes
another day to work in the laundry with the old Irish man.
The skunk was buried today while the sun played hide
and seek with the ones who looked up high and noticed, those
few who had perceptional vision of that kind. The skunk died
and took along with him the stench of those days, bad days as
Dylan named them; yet were today’s days different and if so in

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1926763602

He Rode Tall

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Excerpt

help but think that he should have done a better job of shaving that
morning and, yes,maybe it was time for a haircut. But this was the
way he was for now so he just had to run with it.
As he entered the office, Joel walked up to the counter and was
met by the smiles of five ladies of various sizes and ages working
at their desks on the far side of the counter. The one thing that
they all have in common, Joel realized, was that they must love
working at the auction yard. Joel could not remember ever seeing
an office where everyone was wearing such big grins. That Roy
fellow who ran the yard did seem to be a nice guy, but boy oh boy,
he must be doing something special to create this kind of happiness.
One of the ladies, an older woman with blue hair and
black-framed glasses, volunteered in a light, almost giggly, voice
that “Cindy will be out in just a minute.” Funny thing is that Joel
couldn’t even remember asking for Cindy.

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

Water in the Wilderness

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Excerpt

Auntie Tyne had brushed her long blonde hair and pulled it into a cute pony tail before they set off for the Harrisons’ house. Rachael had felt like a princess. She hadn’t wanted to take her skirt and blouse and sweater off, so had kept them on for the rest of the day, and at bedtime she’d looked for a place to hang them. Her cousins had peeled off their own clothes and dropped them into a heap on the floor.
When Rachael couldn’t find a spare wire hanger in the small clothes cupboard, she had laid her new garments carefully over the back of the one chair in the room. But Lyssa had immediately swept them off onto the floor, and as much as Rachael wanted to pick them up, she resisted when she saw the ‘I dare you’ look on the nine-year-old’s face.
Rachael’s stomach growled. In the stillness it sounded to her ears like the rumble of the freight trains that passed through Emblem several times throughout the day and night. It growled a second time, and Rachael clutched her abdomen with both hands in an effort to keep it quiet. She didn’t want to wake Lyssa and Lark – they would start pushing her again. She wished she could have slept on a cot like Bobby was allowed to do in the boys’ bedroom. But the girls’ had a bigger bed, so she had been told to sleep with them.
Her stomach would not stop grumbling, and now the hunger pangs made her wince. Rachael was no stranger to hunger. Sometimes, at home, Mommy had not had money to buy enough food for them. It wasn’t their mom’s fault, though. Rachael had seen her go without a meal so that she and Bobby could eat what little there was.
At the farm she and Bobby were never hungry. There had been lots of food on the table, and Auntie Tyne and Uncle Morley had made sure to fill up both her plate and Bobby’s at every meal. The food was good, too, always with generous helpings of the vegetables that Uncle Morley brought in fresh from his garden every day. Just thinking about it made her hunger pangs worse. She’d better think of something else.
But Rachael could not keep her mind off her empty stomach, and she thought about the big breakfast Auntie Tyne had cooked for them before they left for the Harrisons’ house that morning.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/192676319X

The Circle

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Excerpt

Their flight is a five-hour affair. They have first-class seats and are served a
light lunch once the plane is in the air. Hakim is hungry and enjoys the food,
although Ibrahim eats only a bit of his. They each enjoy a glass of red wine.
Hakim asks the same question as on the previous day.
“My uncle, you promised to tell me more about the work Matthew Roberts and
the Admiral do for the CIA, do you remember?”
Ibrahim takes a deep breath, smiles, and says,
“It is a long story, my dear boy; however, in a nutshell, this is it. They both
work for a department that goes by the code name the ‘Circle’. They are located
in Washington D.C., not in Langley. In their department 130 people analyze
intelligence, data, and information, and make recommendations to the
Executive Branch. This is where decisions about war take place. Based on the
recommendations of the Admiral, who bases his decisions on the analyses of
Matthew’s people, the war room as some call it, takes its stand against any enemy
as circumstances dictate.”
He stops and takes a deep breath. Ibrahim does that a lot more often, Hakim
notices. The old man looks at his nephew, wondering how far he can still go with
this.
“They are the basis of a detailed system that undermines the governments of
various countries, based on what their goals are and serving their interests the
best way possible. They formed the basis for the decision to go against Saddam
Hussein in the war of 2003. That department of the CIA is the one which sexed
up the propaganda before the war.”
“In other words, they are the reason the war started?”
“Well, I wouldn’t put it that way exactly; however, they had a lot to do with it.
You see, they are not the final decision makers of the government, but they make
recommendations based on data. They have a plan of action for any foreseeable
event, which could turn the outcome of their strategy one way or another. They
plan with various options always before them, and even then they prove to be
wrong on many occasions. There’s always a variable that cannot be predicted
ahead of time, and when it comes to play, it alters the results time and time again.
This is the same reason they are wrong so many times—the unpredictability of
the reactions of people to certain events and to intelligence. Every time you think
how or why a decision has to be made, it’s like being in a maze, and you can only
hope for the outcome you have predicted.”
He stops for a while, calls the flight attendant and orders two glasses of wine.
Hakim takes a sip of his wine, looks at his watch, and estimates they are halfway
to New York. His uncle looks tired. Yet Hakim wants to know more.
“What else do you know, my uncle?”

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

Nikos Engonopoulos – Poems

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They Passed the Forest


paper doves
flew inside
the dark colonnade
of the palace
and each flutter
of their wings
the deep glance
of the Kore was too
like the fall
of a stone
in the sea
or
the promise
of a distant
joy
lower
the thin dresses
with the colourful flowers
that the wind caressed
and were worn
by wooden
statues
with still wooden eyes
and clay
hair
wooden statues
named
Maria
named
bottle
tallow
bicycle
named
spark

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

Liquid Labyrinth

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behind words on posters

buttoning up my desires of a phoenix
with a spared woman’s eye
where I am vigilance on your eyelids
where morning tears a star
my little bloom doesn’t deserve a word

  • shame burns my masquerade
    satisfaction lasts only until dawn
    and my outspoken blood mutates
    my rampage gets worse half way through
  • God stops me for a few days to retire
    I block myself all my silence too
    let me be warmed up by your dawning fire
    I wish I knew what my voice was hiding
    fresh mercy tears my soul’s depth
    your voice stops me crying
    because I was just your tyrant-breath
    I make way for my narrow desires’ path
    to raise the tiny voice up
  • daybreak wakes you up at midnight
    as the universes were put in orbit unstuck
    I tried to live according to your wishful vision
    where nights and days are siblings
    your body is an unseen prison
    just behind words on posters’ printing

Jazz with Ella

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Excerpt

“We didn’t order…oh what the hell,” said David. Jennifer reached for the refreshing water eagerly.
Paul chimed in. “A country that puts a man in space, yet you look at the filthy exhaust those busses are pushing out. That’s no rocket fuel. It coats everything, gets into your lungs.”
She agreed. “At least this city seems light and bright and modern”—everyone nodded—“whereas Moscow was so drab.”
“Boy, was it ugly.” David shook his head. “Though I have to say everything looks a tad more cheerful after a bottle of the local brew.” He helped himself to another glass.
The waiter finally showed up with some sickly sweet plum syrup. It didn’t cut the vodka, but by that time they were almost past caring. The lounge filled up with British and Americans, some of them in baseball caps, a few individuals who spoke Russian with a German accent and a party of serious, silent Asians.
“I think they’re North Vietnamese,” David whispered.
The Asians were seated at the table with the centrepiece, Jennifer noted. So the Soviets were not above spying on their Communist cousins. It fit with the current paranoia. Suspicion of Asian aggression was running high in the country and tension marked the border with China.
“We’re going to need another bottle here. I’ll get it,” said David suddenly.
“Do you think that’s wise?” put in Lona.
“What’s wise got to do with it? We’re in the Soviet Union, guys!”
The conversation continued, the waiter brought a tray of snacks, the level in the vodka bottle plummeted, and Jennifer couldn’t quite remember how they had acquired another guest at their table. He was a Soviet man, about 45, with curly hair, dressed in a fashionable lounge jacket. Apparently he had been listening to their conversation for some time. He shook hands all around and told them in fluent English that he was an editor of a prominent Soviet newspaper. None of them really believed him. What would an editor be doing sitting in the bar of a Soviet hotel that catered exclusively to tourists?
“I bet he’s a black marketeer,” whispered Ted loudly, leaning towards Maria. “He wants to buy our jeans—or get into your jeans.” She giggled. Lona looked puzzled.
“Is this a joke?” Paul asked.
“No, he’s a spy,” said David.

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

Red in Black

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Victor’s March
Among decapitated houses
resembling toothless sculls
we marched in their towns
tumbled buildings devastated
by smart bombs outsmarting
thoughtful animals
and we sang marching paeans
band played freedom songs
for the sarcastically smiling youths
who had implanted deep in their souls
the plan for revenge, youths
who in groups of three or four
planned their act of defiance
youths who had dreams
of killing us by the thousands
shoeless youths with grand dreams
that one day they’d become jihadists

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1771713208

Constantine Cavafy – Poems

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Walls
Without much thought, without pity, without shame
They’ve built these high, thick walls around me.
And now I sit here in despair.
I think of nothing else: this fate consumes my mind;
because I had so many things to do outside.
Ah, why didn’t I notice when they built the walls?
But I never heard the builders, or any sound at all.
Imperceptibly, they shut me off from the world.

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

Arrows

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Excerpt

A Woman
There was no visible threat in the mountains, only the
unnerving shrieks of birds, howling of monkeys and cawing of
chachalacas, and the occasional roar of jaguars and cougars. Far to
the north, tiny black dots described spirals in the sky—vultures. I
was weary from the waiting, and my head snapped at any sound or
flicker of movement.
The mountains were a deep green. The forest appeared
impenetrable. As we climbed, the searing heat dissipated. Huge
rubber trees, mahogany and West Indian cedars gave much needed
shade during the day. Abundant lianas hung from their boughs, and
climbing plants—many thorny—crept up any vertical thing that
could help them reach the light. Often they crawled along the
ground, creating a tangle that could trip any man.
My hands had browned since I left Spain. My toes were reddened
and thick, grazed by stones and swollen from the chigoes that had
settled between my skin and nails.
A collective, unspoken effort to keep calm had come over us. For
the conquistadors, this was natural. Many of them had been chasing,
or been chased by, Indians for a good part of their lives, and, before
that, they had trampled much of the world in a variety of battles:
against the French, the Berbers, the Turks, the Pope. I supposed that
when you find yourself in constant danger, you begin to disregard it.

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