By |

In waters where freedom whispers in ebbs

and the road unyielding,

we seek something in nature’s solitude,

in nature’s tilt, a lisp, delicate.

Bittersweet is the hope that holds

melancholy and turbid dreams patched together

in aging vessels, where our stories lay.

Of dreams and of dreaming, something buried within

where our  lives have unraveled

From what we used to weave, hands together

with threads, pulling apart

the edges from where the sky’s shadow engulfed us.

Before we became the songs we had refused to hear   

Before our blossoms became the diaspora dance, now alien to us

Before our souls finally leave the home we carry,


And hope finds something buried within us.


The Forgotten Dance

 Within the land, we weave

  in the colors our mothers used to weave

The hues they proudly  embedded in

  the paths marked by their song

Each day wounds sought and  found

  solemn journeys guided by footsteps

Testifying for the dance


That still holds posterity, stitched together.


Lind Grant-Oyeye is a poet and literary critic of African descent. She is widely published in literary magazines globally, including New Verse News, Poetry Ireland, Radius magazine, New Orleans Review, and Books Ireland. In her view, poetry is a voice and also a medium for change.

By |

mira martin-parker poetry august 2023

I’m wondering if you ever reflect on your social position, function, and corresponding duty? I do. I reflect on it all the time, here on the other side of your opinions, peckings, and ideas. I ponder your shadows, try to discern their meaning, try to discern what’s valid, true, and hence sound.

Sometimes down here on this end, it feels like there’s an element of disdain—or is it contempt?—involved in what’s coming from your direction. I sense you don’t particularly care for me. Like me. I suspect you even think I’m kind of trashy, in all the many ways one can be trashy.

But I wonder about you as well. Can you be trashy, too? Or do you feel yourself obligated to be good, obligated to guide, to help others improve their trashy condition?

What are the ethical rules of your occupation? Clearly I’ve broken the social rules governing the place, for I’m definitely kept in place down here below in the cave, I mean the trash can, waiting to be picked up and taken away. Dumped.

How are things up in goodness land? Is your master, your boss, your patron being good to you? Does he love you and pay your rent, put food on your table, buy you pretty things, give you cigarettes and beer, perhaps a pretty dress, a lovely compact to check your reflection in, make sure you look nice and held together? (You’re perfect in his eyes, after all.)

There’s a scene in Dostoyevsky’s Notes From Underground in which Underground Man lectures a poor young prostitute. He helps her see her actual condition, what will happen to her if she doesn’t correct her course. He’s a rotten egg, a real nasty misanthrope, and he only does this guiding for selfish egotistical reasons. He’s ashamed to be caught with his pants down, after all.

But ultimately he was right, and she saw the truth and lit up. He opened her eyes to the light, it was her!She was the light, she was beautiful and good. Once she saw this, she had to leave, run, get away from that awful debt-trap, that meat grinder, that cauldron waiting to consume her.

Underground Man used his skills for good. And it worked. He saved her ass.

What about you? What’s your duty? Are you saving asses?

Or are you leading asses into meat grinders, cauldrons, and dirty beds in dirty places with dirty selfish men?

Do you ever reflect on your duty? I do. I live in the trashcan where you toss your waste.

Mira


Mira Martin-Parker earned a B.A. at The New School for Social Research, and an M.A. in philosophy and an MFA in creative writing at San Francisco State University. Her work has appeared in various publications, including the Istanbul Literary Review, North Dakota Quarterly, great weather for MEDIA, and Zyzzyva.

By |

kelli green short story august 2023

I wake up at 6:00 am to the sound of my Pa’s alarm clock. He comes into my room and sits on the edge of my bed poking at my feet and telling me to get up. I beg for five more minutes, then he sighs and sings me a song until I crawl out from under the covers hoping to stop him from starting another verse.

I walk on my toes all the way to the bathroom. The floor is cold in the morning, so I have to get used to it. Sometimes I walk on my heels, but that’s harder. And Pa says I’ll fall and crack my head.

Once I fell asleep on the toilet while waiting for the water to heat up so I could wash my face. Next thing I knew, I slipped off the stool and scraped the side of my head good on the sink. Blood dripped down my face and onto the floor, all red and messy like strawberry syrup. I tried to wash the blood away, and it just got everywhere. As soon as Pa saw me, he almost passed out.

It’s a good thing Nilah was there because she’s tougher than Pa. Nilah is Pa’s girlfriend and my buddy. I don’t remember a time when Nilah wasn’t around. She doesn’t live here, but she should. She cleaned up my blood and helped Pa take me to the doctor. They said the cut was very small, and they gave me a bandage. Pa wanted me to have an X-Ray. I wanted to too, so I could see my bones, but the doctor said we didn’t need to get an X-Ray.

Nilah told me that it’s a good thing they didn’t put me in front of the X-Ray machine that day because it would be rude to take pictures of the troll that lives inside of me without warning him first. I told her that was silly, and that I didn’t have an inside troll. She swore that I did and started poking and tickling my tummy to find him.

Anyway, I didn’t crack my head this morning, and when I was done in the bathroom, I changed into my school clothes. Nilah, Pa, and I ate breakfast and talked about our plans. This weekend we’re all going to the beach, and Nilah is going to teach me to swim. She says that six years old is already old, and if I don’t learn now, I’ll never be a mermaid. She’s goofy, but I do want to learn.

After we give each other kisses and hugs, we leave the apartment. When we get to school, I give Pa another hug and run off to find my friends.

When I run, my backpack slaps my back. And I hear my pencil box rattling around. Sometimes when I stand in one place, I still swing my backpack to hear the shaking. I find my friends by the basketball courts. They’re watching the 11th and 12th graders do their morning rap battles. I can’t tell that any of them are doing well, but sometimes a kid will jump up and go “whoaaaaa” like something crazy was just said. I like watching them, and they don’t care that we’re there.

When the bell rings, everyone walks the way they’re supposed to walk. We all split off like the branches on a tree. I’m still little at this school, so my class is on the first floor. I think they do that so we don’t get lost, or maybe it’s because we’re so small that we may get knocked over on the stairs. That’s probably it because that’s exactly what happened to me one time when I had to go to another floor for my advanced reading class. Big kids will just run on your back if you fall down in their way.

I like school, but it’s a Friday so no one wants to be here. We’re all ready for the bell to ring so it can be the weekend. My friend Chloe talks to me while we do our worksheets. She tells me that this weekend her mom and dad are going on a vacation for their anniversary. While they’re gone, she gets to stay with her aunt. And they’re going to eat all the hot chips they want and watch music videos. Chloe’s mom doesn’t like for her to watch music videos with booty shaking, but her aunt doesn’t care. So, she’s excited.

I hope Nilah and Pa get married, too. When they have their anniversary, I’ll go to my Papa’s house. And we’ll play checkers and watch old movies for the weekend.

While I’m playing, I hear a teacher say something about a shooting on the South Side of the city. That’s my side of the town. I try to listen to learn more about what happened, but Mrs. Estes asks me if I need anything. I shake my head no, so she smiles and tells me to go play. I shrug and run to an open swing.

I still want to know about it, but I’ll just ask Pa to watch the news with me tonight. Shootings happen a lot though. One time, someone shot our car; but we weren’t in it. Pa found the bullet hole in his door one morning before school. In the summer it gets really bad. Pa says it’s because people get boiled in the heat like spaghetti noodles; but spaghetti loosens up, while people get hard and break.

We have art class last. I start coloring in the picture I drew of a garden, but then I feel like I need to use the bathroom. I need to use it now! I get up and ask Mr. Long if I may go to the restroom, and he says I can’t. Well, this is a problem because you can’t just say no to urine. Pa says I should use real words like urine and not pee. Nilah agreed and said that it’s easier to make people understand things if you use the right words. So, I ask Mr. Long the question again. This time I tell him I need to urinate because maybe he’ll understand that.

Now Mr. Long looks frustrated, and he tells me if I ask him again, he’ll call my father. I ask him if I can go after he calls Pa. He looks at me funny and asks if I’m trying to be smart. Well, of course, I am. I don’t think anyone tries to be stupid on purpose. I ask to go a third time. He says yes and tells me again he will be calling Pa. I say, “Thank you,” I rush to the bathroom, and I make it just in time.

When class is over, Mr. Long lets me know that Pa said he was coming to pick me up right after the last class. Mr. Long tells me he’ll be waiting to talk to him. I say, “Okay” and go back to my coloring. I wonder why Pa is coming early. Is it to make sure I got to the bathroom okay? I still don’t know why calling him made any difference, but maybe it did if he’s coming early.

When the last bell rings, I wait by the globe with Chloe. And we tell stories about where we’ll take our vacations one day. I didn’t know Pa had come in until I heard Mr. Long say my name. Mr. Long told him I kept asking to go to the bathroom even though he said I couldn’t. Chloe makes an “oooh” sound, and now I understand. He must think Pa will be mad at me just like he is, but that’s silly because Pa knows how much I have to use the bathroom. He says I’m bad for road trips.

Pa doesn’t look interested while Mr. Long talks, and soon I hear him say that he doesn’t have time for this. They say some other things I can’t really hear because Chloe talks a lot.  Finally, Pa holds his hand out for me to take and I say, “Goodbye” to Chloe and Mr. Long.

When we get to the car, Pa straps me in. And I ask him why he came early. He looks at me kind of funny and opens his mouth to answer. Then instead of answering me, he swallows his words like sour candy. Then he smiles and says he wanted to start the weekend early. He gets in the car, and we drive for a long time. We listen to the 70’s station which is my favorite.

After a while, we pull into a big parking lot; and I see the words Kidz World. I shout out the name because I’m so happy. I’ve never been here, but I hear it’s super fun. Pa gets me a wristband and I trade my shoes for fun socks. I ask him if he wants to go through the tunnels with me, but he says he wants to sit down for a while. That makes me sad, but it’s okay. I’ll explore for us both. I crawl through the colorful tubes and rush down the slides, pretending I’m a secret agent trying to complete a mission.

I wish Nilah were here to play. They have trampolines, and she’s good at flipping. I want her to teach me that too. I could learn how to do flips like the cool spies I see on TV. I could be a spy a lot easier than I could be a mermaid.

I finally get Pa to jump with me for a while, but I get tired quickly. After we’re done playing, Pa and I go get dinner at our favorite seafood restaurant. I order fried shrimp and a bowl of fruit. We say our dinner prayers and then Pa asks a waitress to sit with me for a second while he runs to the bathroom. He comes back fast but his eyes look weird like he was crying or had allergies. He gives the waitress three dollars for sitting with me.

Pa’s phone keeps buzzing. He finally puts it on silent, but he flips it up so he can see who’s calling or texting. He never answers any of the calls or messages though. I ask Pa again what’s wrong as a tear rolls down his cheek before he could hide it. He tells me there isn’t anything wrong as he puts money on the table. I cross my arms and frown because we aren’t supposed to lie. He nods his head and says he will tell me what’s wrong but not yet. He tries to get me to order a dessert, but I’m not hungry anymore.

In the car, I sit back and watch the lights dance in the window as we drive home. On the radio, I hear a man say something about a shooting and Pa immediately switches it off.

“Pa wait!” I call out. “I think they talked about that at school. It’s on our side of town.”

Pa shakes his head and says he wants to hear something else right now and then changes to the cd player. We drive a little longer, and we get to the street we normally turn down to go home. It’s the street where Nilah’s beauty shop is. And every time we pass by, I wave; even though I know she probably isn’t in the window looking. But instead of turning, we drive right past it. I twist around to make sure I saw the street right, and there it was right there with Jimmy’s Chicken on the corner.

“Pa, you missed your turn.”

Pa shakes his head again and tells me he wanted to go a different way. He’s being so weird tonight, and I don’t like it.

“Is Nilah going to be home before bedtime tonight?” I ask. I need someone normal to talk to. Maybe Nilah can tickle out whatever weird troll has found its way into his stomach. Pa doesn’t answer me. And I know he heard me because he looked in the rearview mirror at me when I asked. I begin to re-ask the question, but I get a bad feeling in my tummy.

“Kayla, we have to talk about something important when we get home.” Pa’s voice sounds weird, and it makes my tummy feel worse. I don’t say anything. I sink into the back of my seat, and I can’t help but tap the side of the door with my foot. I don’t know why I’m doing that, but I can’t stop it.

Pa doesn’t want to hear about the shooting, and he doesn’t want to talk about Nilah. And I’m scared. I once watched a movie with Nilah and Pa. And in the movie, a family heard a gunshot. They all got on the ground so if something came through the window, they wouldn’t get hit. So, if something like that happened near her shop, I know Nilah would know to get down. Right?

So, I try to tell myself that Nilah will be home when we get home, and then Pa will tell us what’s wrong. We finally pull into our parking spot at home. I hold Pa’s hand and look up and down the street hoping I spot Nilah’s car. We get inside, and Pa takes his jacket off and hangs it up. Pa starts to talk and says that this morning something bad happened, and I immediately cover my ears. Pa puts his hand on my back, but I don’t want to take my hands down. I don’t want to know about Nilah’s blood, red and messy like strawberry syrup. I want her to just come home and tickle me. I want her and Pa to have a big wedding and anniversary trips. I want to go swimming and learn how to be a mermaid after all.

I take my hands off my ears and wrap my arms around Pa. I want to stay like this forever. I want us to stay frozen right in this spot, and then, at least, I can’t say for sure that I know anything is wrong. As long as Pa doesn’t say the words, then I can still wait for Nilah to walk in the door. Pa tries to talk to me again, and I squeeze him harder.

“Five more minutes,” I beg.

Pa rubs my back, and I can feel his tears raining on my head. He sings me a song, and I pray for a million verses.


Kelli Green is a writer, creator, and lifelong learner.  Green is from Chicago but has lived in Pensacola, Florida for most of their life. The author of three books, May, Elizabeth, and Cool and a host of poems, Green loves writing and storytelling and has always been intrigued by the creative world. The story, “Kayla’s Day,” is a narrative mixed with fictional and non-fictional events. You can find Kelli Green at @kelligreenivy on twitter, instagram, and tiktok.

By |

dibyasree nandy poetry august 2023

The floating white fire in the night sky dims

An outline looms, is golden-hewn

Across the crag, beyond the clouds

Our home seen in the horizon.

 

It’s no mere delf, a realm at the hilly toe

Halls of diamond, a silver grotto from days of old

Far down below, rills of jewels

Fall and tumble, fountains still flow.

 

At the cliff’s edge, we gaze and smile

Happy faces once weather-beaten

We traipsed for miles, our heads covered

To hide the shame that we lost our abode.

 

In rain and storms of hail, we bled

Our eyes focussed on the end

Where the thrush and eagles will fly

Oak and pine will welcome us soon

The scent of air, guide and chaperone.

 

We murmur notes of fog and snow

Passing by rocks of jagged stone

Through towns of wealth and lakes distrait

Inching closer, waiting domicile.

 

The quarters always gleamed bright

Seats of silks, burnished floors, a crystal sight

Our looks of hope, well-pleased, content

Even before we tapped on the door.

 

For those asleep, we play a song

For those missing, we sound the bell

We walk past fields and stacks of hay

The vales recounting the number of days.

 

If we falter, our brothers will support

If we are wounded, our mates will heal

A family knit, red-threaded unit

To stand beside in dire need.

 

The floating white fire in the night sky dims

An outline looms, is golden-hewn

Across the crag, beyond the clouds

The mountains call, a lullaby for home.

 

 

Dibyasree Nandy began writing in 2020, after completing M.Sc and M.Tech. She has authored poetry and short-story collections, as well as full-length fiction. Her works have appeared in more than 60 anthologies and literary journals.

By |

olivia andrade poetry july 2023

fourteen years old

on a westward-bound plane

i become an american.

not really,

i was always

american and mexican and

mexican-american and

just another

foreigner, especially

to those who’d say:


watch the way those people talk,

why is that daughter’s skin dark

when her mother’s is white

let’s charge them 200 yuan

instead of 50

but my mother is good at bartering

na tai gui la

we don’t need the extra 150 yuan

like they must


in the lift they ask where

i come from and i

respond, to their astonishment

in poorly-toned mandarin

with a place i barely know

but to them have more in common with

than my real home, right past

the bustling road

in the gated culdesac of

high-rise apartments reserved for

wealthy chinese diplomats

and expats, like us


english at home, english at

school, except for an hour

mandarin in the metro station

spanish when grandma calls

que inteligente son mis chinitos

american when my british friends

call it football

i stop calling it soccer, too


four years old, i hold my nose in the fish market,

savour the salmon my ayi brings home

in the basket of her little black moped

street stinky tofu stains my nostrils

sweet tanghulu strips them clean

let’s get family market baozi for the freezer

the ones with red inside, not green

if the video pirates are outside the store

can we watch something new tonight?


taxi cabs go

requested, but unhailed

because we look like we

probably don’t speak

mandarin. sometimes we catch one

only for it to be sent away by my

father, it has no seatbelts, laura

the roads are dangerous here, you know

but i was upset

because it was one of those cabs

with a TV in the back


the plane lands firmly

you’re home, you must feel so at home

i roll my suitcase

into a home with

fifty fewer stories

welcome back to the land of

grocery aisles miles long,

not kilometers

you love doritos, don’t you?

welcome back to

drive-thrus and

trash trucks,

youtube and

tap water

no more water bottles

to brush our teeth

this is your home.


everyone asks

what it was like to grow up

in china

but no one has

asked what it was like

to grow up in

a bubble of

america that is not america,

in some ways

not even close


Olivia Andrade is an English major at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo pursuing an emphasis in creative writing and a minor in music. Despite being of Mexican-American heritage and born in Pasadena, California, Olivia grew up in Hong Kong and Shanghai, China. She is a trained vocalist with a lifetime of experience and has worked as a vocal instructor. A lifelong lover of poetry and lyricism, she writes her own songs and performs them in the San Luis Obispo area with her band, 7blu. After graduation, she will embark on a career as a professional songwriter. Find her on instagram at ohliiveeyuh

By |

sophia khan short story july 2023

The first thing Zain decided to do when he landed in New York City was walk.

He walked for blocks and blocks, breathing in air that throbbed in his skin, crawled into his lungs and choked him on the vast matrix of the city. He longed to touch the metal of the subway and see if it was as cold as it looked. He wanted to go to Brooklyn so he could come back to London and agree with his colleagues at the fin-tech start-up, that Bed-Stuy had become too gentrified.

He had never been to New York, and the journey thrilled him whilst his nerves also rattled like loose change. He sat on the plane at London Heathrow, looking outside, waiting for it to roar its monstrous engine, engulfing his ears and making him hold his breath, saying ‘Bismillah’ as it sped along the runway.

He wasn’t planning on seeing family in America, but his Amma had let it slip to relatives in New York that her son was coming, mainly for work.

‘Tell him that his cousin Jamal wants to invite him for dinner. He insists.’

Panic had risen in Zain. He was already anxious about landing at JFK airport, possibly being questioned about his Muslim surname. To make the journey and see Jamal all these years later, after what happened seemed too much. But he acquiesced for his mother’s sake.

It would be fourteen years since he’d seen his cousin on his Abba’s side. He remembered the remote, intense, forbidding presence in Jamal. The sky he kicked the football into was not the same as Zain’s sky. The shaved, zig-zag lines on the side of his head did not look the same as it did on other boys. It was cooler, sharper, more threatening. He often took two steps back when there was a crowd huddling in conversation at a gathering. Always slightly further out, aloof, never wanting for company. So when, aged fifteen, he upped and left with his parents to move to Queens in New York, everyone was surprised apart from Zain.

When Jamal started following him on Instagram two years back, he thought about removing him. But then he became curious, checking Jamal’s posts every now and then which were mainly of his two daughters and his wife, an Algerian American who wore hijabs in pastels. Sometimes he posted flowery pictures of his favourite hadiths. Only one picture showed Jamal. He had a short, crisp beard, and his big eyes and nose no longer stuck out the way they used to, but rather had smoothed into his face, soaking up the rest of his features.

Would Zain tell him everything about his life? About his boyfriend Tarun, who was half Jamaican and half Indian and cooked him a meal every evening? Then there was Ahmed, the lover they took into their bed twice a week, who ate breakfast with them wearing a silk robe, a gentlemanly version of the titans they had been in bed the night before.

Would it surprise Jamal to hear about these things? Maybe not.

As the plane took off, Zain mulled over those days they spent in their youth. Jamal grew up to be more of a man than him. That’s what he envied. Not because Zain loved other boys but because Jamal had a certain steeliness in his masculinity. He walked silently with a single cigarette behind his ear, big puffer jacket shielding his body as protection from the police carrying out stop and search on the tube. His trainers as white as snow, his gold chain, his talking about girls and pussy and teachers at school who were as dumb as fuck. Whereas Zain felt too soft, too yielding and vulnerable, always looking for approval everywhere he went. Sometimes, the fear of making eye contact with others became too strong in case they could see deep into his pain. But with Jamal, Zain couldn’t hide.

#

“You wanna kick a ball about?”

“Sure.”

It happened the day Jamal slept over when they would all be travelling to a family wedding together.

The grass was damp from the morning’s drizzle; Jamal kept consciously looking at his trainers whilst Zain looked at Jamal. Did he know? Did he know that Zain felt like he was about to blow himself up with secrets? He tried to tackle him and get the ball off him, but Jamal was too good.

“Pussy, come and get it.”

It hurt being called pussy. He tried to throw Jamal down, but he wasn’t strong enough and soon the stronger boy had him in a headlock, fists clenched, and knuckles fastening themselves like bolts under his jawline. He held him in so tight that Zain couldn’t breathe and started beating him in his stomach, his legs, his arms, fighting to be set free. But something shifted. Whether Jamal had released Zain out of pity or it was done out of mercy, Zain wasn’t sure, but tears were streaming down his face from feeling choked. He hit his aggressor square on the jaw, seeing the blood come out of his mouth with satisfaction.

“Good,” Jamal said. “Good, good.”

They sat together on the step, Jamal with a crumpled tissue on his lips to stop the blood flowing.

“I’m sorry man.”

Jamal lifted his palm up though he was looking straight ahead. They sat in silence for what felt like years. The most painful, raw silence Zain had ever felt in his life.

Later that evening, Amma told Zain that Jamal would have to share his bed. “It’s only for one night.”

His single bed could just about house both of their slender bodies. He could hear Jamal’s breathing, deep in sleep. Except Jamal wasn’t sleeping, and he wanted to move his hand along to see if he was as hard as he was.

Their bodies found each other under the covers. Jamal’s hands were delicate but brutal, murdering his body with tenderness. His mouth was warm and wet, cleansing the hurt out of every bone, every organ. When Zain woke up the following morning, his soul felt rearranged. All the objects in the bedroom from his comb to his school books felt charged with power.

But Jamal did not look at him at breakfast and during the wedding sat as far apart from him as he possibly could. The silvery shimmer in his eyes had turned to flint, and Zain knew that there would be no more football and no more sleepovers. It wouldn’t be long before he would hear from his Amma that Jamal’s family would be moving to America.

Ever since, Jamal would come to mind, less so over the years, but still with a jolt. He thought of him when seeing a group of men on the bus, victorious with fighting from the night before, or when he sat in a pub with a bunch of post-graduates, suffocating under the weight of their intellectualism, looking for a way out, into something real.

#

He closed his eyes as the plane landed and bounced along the runway.

At passport control he tensed up, but he was let through with apparent ease.

He grabbed his suitcase and exited the airport, the air feeling smooth in its warmth.  He hailed a cab and upon sitting inside, took out the crumpled piece of paper with Jamal’s address on it.

“Where to, brother?” the cab driver asked. His name badge said Hafiz.

“I’m not sure,” Zain replied.


Sophia Khan is a writer, teacher, and graduate of King’s College London. Currently residing in the city where she completed her studies, she is a member of REWRITE London — a community organisation for writers that supports and champions Black Women and Women of Colour. She is presently on their mentoring program and has been published in their online magazine. Sophia is currently working on a collection of short stories set in the UK and in Bangladesh.

By |

salimah valiani poetry june 2023

–For Myesha Jenkins, who transitioned in 2020, after 72 years in Africa and the Diaspora


still bringing us together

two and a half years on

Tuesday poets what’s app group

you created for Myesha’s Memoirs

podcasting our poetry and jazz

to celebrate your life

soon to end


Jozi House of Poetry

where we first met

at the Bioscope where you started it

and chose to move to the Afrikan Freedom Station

when Maboneng became too lit


Out There Sessions you spawned at The Orbit

adding a new instrument    stanzas

to valves reeds and keys

featuring so many poets  musicians

rarely yourself


you and a few springing

Feelah Sistah! Collective

poets still backstage early

21st century Africa

Soft fists…

Heaving the needles

as Plath once wrote


how in Laughter Remembered you

rendered the poetry of a young girl’s

fierce hug

raw truth

unfurling art for humanity in schools branching beyond

the choice few into South Africa’s many languages 

spoken  written  drawn 


mushrooms that first appeared

in my mint patch day after you passed

orange on green yesterday

white on green today

What are you doing out so late, ma?

you once wrote

playing mushrooms in mint

you answer

like stanzas and jazz


Salimah Valiani is a poet, activist and researcher. Her poetry collection, 29 leads to love (Inanna 2021), is the 2022 winner of the International Book Award for Contemporary Poetry. She has published four other poetry collections: Breathing for Breadth (TSAR), Letter Out: Letter In (Inanna), land of the sky (Inanna), and Cradles (Daraja). Her story-poem, “Dear South Africa,” was selected for publication in Praxis Magazine’s 2019-2020 Online Chapbook Series. Her audio and chapbook, Love Pandemic, was released in late 2022 by Daraja Press. See more about her work on Facebook at SalimahValianiPoet.

By |

cheryl atim alexander personal essay june 2023

JESSICA and ANNIE were two of the most super-duper, uber forces in my second-grade class at Brethren Missionary School where I had been banished by my professor parents. Run by and for White expatriates, the admissions practice at Brethren meant no colour bar impeded wealthy Nigerian locals and rare hybrids.

At seven years of age, I was aware that these two big timers’ energetic vibrations seeped insidiously into everything – everywhere – altogether — without discrimination.

Yes indeed, everything about JESSICA and ANNIE was big, bold, brassy and BOMBASTIC.

Boom! Boom! Boom! KABOOM!

Reverberating echoes flared, flinched and flickered every time these two beauties entered any    room with their long, loose limbs, luxurious locks of accessorized hair, high top sneakers and empty, shell-blue peepers. It seemed that everywhere I went, they were there too. Not because they relished gazing at my brown face but because they took up SO-MUCH-SPACE, evidently enjoying using their invisible elbows to prod me out of their way with impunity.

OUCH!

My motley-type of mother said JESSICA and ANNIE were “strapping yet striking” in response to my query about how pretty she thought they were. Come again, Mummy?

“Strapping and striking like the Vikings?” I further inquired.

“That’s right, Cher!” she chuckled. Then smiling, she stated dryly, “Hitler would have been proud of those two”.

Her pointed wink and suppressed girlish giggle told me the last point wasn’t intended to be a compliment, and so I garnered she was trying to comfort me in her familiar, feeble-while-bizarre kind of way. Regardless, I was under no illusion that I was of any significance when standing alongside the two little-girl giants christened JESSICA and ANNIE. Me, with my cornrow hair; them, with their corn-colored hair seemed to say it all.

Corn-colored was better than cornrowed.

I didn’t know exactly why this had to be so, but it seemed incontestable by the way JESSICA and ANNIE looked right through me as if I wasn’t there.

I will never look like them, no matter how hard I try.

From their imperious ribbon hair ties all the way down to their frilly ankle socks, these two outdid me in every way. Even more hellacious were their voguish backpacks hanging side by side in their respective cubbies; one red and one blue, sequined embroidered initials and all, commanding attention from every corner of the room.

One warm morning, swaddled by the green-grey, partially misty hills of the Jos Plateau — an emerald shawl, perfectly draped, ethereal as a scene from the Brigadoon of my wildest daydream — all thirty of us children were sitting cross legged on the floor of our open-door classroom, when Miss Rose chose JESSICA and ANNIE to show and tell where they were in their science project. Springing to their feet in unison, and speaking accordingly, these beauties proudly yet aloofly held up their once empty jam jars now filled to the brim with piles of brown pellets. They explained that they had spent the previous week collecting the pellets, which were actually called cocoons — if you please — and were going to keep a close watch on them until they turned into butterflies. Up until this point, I had been staring at these two in reluctant admiration.

A shrill, sane voice from the back of the class asked Miss Rose, “What are they going to do with the butterflies?”

Now grinning in unison, JESSICA and ANNIE produced a glass frame divided into separate compartments, the way a pair of premeditating magicians might, and said they were going to poke the butterflies through the heart in order to kill them, using colored pins (they gestured to their weapons) then place them in the glass frame as a gift to the class so we could all admire them forever and ever.

Silence.

Then, the worst type of stabbing pain began to form in my gut, a sort of wretched chronic punch, as I slowly digested the information amidst these monsters’ beaming faces.

Jagged red evil eyes.

Why was Miss Rose nodding and clapping?

Looking around the room, I noticed some of the other children in my class with accentuated downward-turned smiles.

☹☹☹

I didn’t need to find out how many of them felt the same way that I did.

I just knew that I had to act stealthily and FAST!

***

If anyone had been paying close attention, they might have perceived that I became very quiet for a good portion of that whole day. Indeed, they might have noticed that I went missing at lunch time. But I don’t think that was the case. Nobody noticed at all that during our tennis class, on the tennis courts, while everyone else was baking in the generous Nigerian sun, under the scrupulous watch of three large birds of prey– stately as the magisterial magi of Persian fame and biblical proportions — I stole my wily way back up to the second-grade classroom.

HA-alleluia! It was my lucky day. (No one was there.)

Feverishly I made a bee line for those cocoons, and wouldn’t you know, when I ransacked the red and blue sequined embroidered backpacks, those darlings rose to the top almost immediately, making things easy peasy. I grabbed the two teaming-full jars, wrapped them in paper towels, wedged them under my arms and fled the scene running and running and running until I came to the old, prickly briar patch that nobody liked to go anywhere near — the one that I had always fancied the plantation proverbial Brer Rabbit would have loved. Then my seven-year-old fingers successfully prised off those ghastly jam jar lids, and I threw those darlings into that briar patch as far back as I possibly could.

 “You’re free now!” I whispered, gleefully.

***

Immediately fleeing the scene, my surroundings became more nether-worldly with each step. Somewhere in the not-too-distant landscape I pensively observed my sister, Clare, milling her way around the school compound.

Hmm. What was this?

Not only was Clare a whole three years older than me, but she was also quite a bit taller, and skinnier too, and she walked with a slight stoop. Her eyes were larger than mine, with a slight bulge about them, and she wore her dark brown hair in a short, tightish, slightly unkempt afro. Sometimes when she poked around aimlessly, she reminded me of an ostrich, and other times she seemed like Olive Oil (the cartoon character with the annoyingly high-pitched American voice).

Today my sister is an odd-looking ostrich.

At school, Clare was devilish in her modus operandi. As an interesting consequence of her “unacceptable acting-out behaviors” she was often to be found enjoying enviable coloring activities — during which she was allowed to use thick, bright, smelly, and interesting-looking crayons in the counselor’s office — and otherwise wander around, unfettered, to her hearts content.

Mmm, how I love the scent of those pens. Especially the grape.

Ordinarily Clare despised, and saddened me, but today I felt so happy and lucky to see that weirdo sister of mine en route to rejoin my classmates at the tennis courts! A potentially positive interaction had to be possible.

What if I tell Clare?

As I got closer to her, I became aware that my sister was not alone. Elouise, her orange-haired, freckle-faced partner in crime — as coined by my mother — had popped up like a bad penny, and now they both were looking at me with slightly sardonic grins on their faces. My feet, in seeming concert with my heart became languid with apprehension. I hesitated.

Don’t be a fraidy cat. Shuku shuku is for supper tonight!

Feeling a small burst of hopeful energy, I began to open my mouth…but before I could get a word out, the dubious duo vomited gibberish at me, projectile style, in the “secret language,” that existed only between the two of them, and ran off laughing, apparently metamorphosed into a pair of frenzied, howling hyenas.

I’d been effectively ditched by the feathered critter and its sidekick.

Once detached from Daliesque reality, it was easy to slide back onto the tennis courts unnoticed. Next to JESSICA and ANNIE, I was not that visible after all. Later on, back in the classroom, my spine trembling like a jellyfish, I watched and waited to see what would happen if per chance these two huntresses decided to furrow into their bags before the end of the day.

Well, they did of course.

Oh, my. Big ugly tears!

And later, threats that when found, their missionary daddies would expel whichever uncivilized thief it was who stole from them. I shrugged (inwardly, of course).

Oh, well. I suppose the crème de la crème did not get the cream today?

“Jesus is watching, he will PUNISH you!” was J and A’s final ominous warning, followed up by a long menacing stare unmistakably directed towards the five darkest-skinned pupils in the room. I must have been momentarily unrestrained for I accidentally allowed something sounding like a scoff to escape from my throat. Upon so doing, my thunderously unhelpful heartbeat dropped into my gut…and then, WHAT in the? Suddenly a storm of butterflies was trapped in that hysterical tummy of mine. Well, a real MIRACLE must have happened, right around that time, because somebody without any type of face that Iwas able to see, ever so swiftly transformed my scoff into a camouflage cough.

Ahem. Ahem, AHEM…!

“Oh, thank you, Miss Rose”. I watched the words float out of my mouth in a big fluffy thought bubble, syrupy sweet, and soft as candy floss, as I reached for the partial glass of lukewarm water my missionary teacher had extended in my direction as I furtively rubbed my belly.

Relax butterflies.

Jesus was not going to punish me. Up until this point, I don’t think I had ever been as sure about anything in my whole, little-kid life.

A little later on, the boarders and I watched the Nigerian Sun set

slowly;

a hazy, lazy red eye, filled up and fed up

with enough hungry secrets to last one hundred lifetimes,

its hot sultry stare seeming to devour my mulatto skin, knowingly

nurturing my Blackness without my consent,

and it was then that I remembered, something my misfit-of-a-mother liked to say:

“Cheryl wears her heart on her sleeve”.

Well, maybe—I thought, with the most insolent-looking, inward eyeroll that my mother could have possibly imagined. But, not this time. This time, my poker face was simply superlative.


Cheryl Atim Alexander is an African European woman primarily of Nigerian, Greek, and British descent.  Born into a family of readers and writers, she has never known a time when she wasn’t reading or writing lyrics, poems and stories. Currently an MFA student, Cheryl is enjoying leaning into a newer identity as a multi-genre writer. Her writing material emanates from lived, professional, and educational experiences surrounding holistic mental health and wellness, new thought spirituality, and human and animal rights. She aims to entertain, educate, agitate, and activate soul-filled inspiration to anyone who may have temporarily misplaced their voice. You can find her on LinkedIn at Cheryl Atim Alexander, LICSW, RMT.

By |

gemini wahhaj personal essay june 2023

In 2000, I was working at Shell in Bangladesh as a reservoir engineer, when I was sent abroad to Netherland for training. The training center was a microcosm of Shell’s global operations, with new employees from Scotland, Spain, France, and America, as well as countries that were just starting to hire local employees where Shell was developing oil and gas. There were geologists and engineers in training from Venezuela, Brunei, Syria, and other Arab countries.

In the Bangladesh office, I was the only Bangladeshi engineer in the explorations team, besides two local geologists. I had fought to join the explorations team, at great opposition from the explorations manager. The country manager had forcefully inserted me into that team. I forget what they, the expats, called us, the local employees, in the Bangladesh office. Perhaps we were locals, or perhaps we were called natives. The global employees sat separately at lunch, and, in general, expressed vicious frustrations about the country and the local employees working for them. They complained about the air quality – they were concerned about their children’s health, and many of the employees’ spouses wanted to leave Bangladesh. One geologist referred to Dhaka as a block of concrete. There were other, constant snide remarks, about the corruption of Bangladeshis, the laziness of Bangladeshis, and the lack of technological capacity. Once I made the mistake of asking an expat if they had traveled in Bangladesh, mentioning the Sundarbans, and the man looked at me with shocked eyes before replying that his children were too small to travel.

Most of the global employees were Dutch or British, with a few Americans. The atmosphere was toxic. In the explorations team, no one spoke to me, except for the reservoir engineer who was training me. When I did speak to someone, they were hostile, and they let me know what they thought of me. I had studied in the US for my undergraduate and master’s degrees and just returned to the country, so this level of open racism was shocking to me. It felt like I was back in colonial times. Once, I was asked to prepare a report. When I was about to send it out, the English engineer who was supervising me, a tall, bald-headed, smooth-faced guy, one of the nicest people in the office, said that he would check over my work first, as he was a native speaker of the language.

After months of facing constant prejudice and humiliation in Bangladesh, being in the Netherlands among other bright-eyed international trainees was a welcome change. Everyone was friendly, and there were no barriers among us. The training center was located between Noordwijk and Noordwijkerhout, beside the North Sea. I believe this was the Hotel NH Noordwijk Conference Center in Leeuwenhorst. At the end of the day, we went out to either town, Noordwijkerhout or Noordwijk, for shopping or dining. We hired out cycles to bike to the North Sea and walk on a beach scattered with striking blue jellyfish.

I was there to attend two courses. The first course was introductory. Expensive consultants had been hired to facilitate team building among new employees. We were split into several groups. Each group had to arrive by themselves at a retreat in Liege, in Belgium, while performing some wild tasks en route. The first challenge was that we had to hit about five or six countries on the way. We cracked the riddle ecstatically, putting our heads together. We would simply visit the embassies of these countries in Hague, and then take a train to Maastricht. On the train, we had to sing a song and get strangers to sing along with us. In Maastricht, we slept outside the train station all night in the cool fall weather, till finally making it to our cabin, where we slept on bunk beds and cooked and cleaned the cabin ourselves. By the end of the first week, we were fast friends.

When we returned to the training center, many of the trainees would show up at the Schiphol airport on the weekends to catch a flight to another European city. Others rode the super-fast trains to cities in the Netherlands, Belgium, or Paris. There were other kinds of entertainment. Some of the men went to a live sex show, or they brought women home with them to have sex and then later clean up after them. At our training center, no outside visitors were allowed. It was a big hotel, with a dining hall downstairs that served the same food for weeks. The only relief was the Indonesian sambal served on the side, an acquirement from the Dutch colonization of Indonesia. This bottled sambal added some spice to our bland food. We used to all dream of our native foods at night. Once, the young American engineer from Texas begged me to go out to a McDonald’s restaurant with her. I forget where the McDonald’s was. Amsterdam? Hague? Or in the local village? I will never forget that meal. We relished our burgers and fries, marveling that Europeans ate their fries with mayonnaise. The American engineer, whom I remember as a round-faced, blonde-haired, jolly person in T-shirts and jeans, was my favorite person there. She was charming in her innocence and earnestness, and we soon bonded over our nostalgia for America.

On a November day in 2000, as I watched the US election results from my hotel room, there was a shocking turn of events. George W. Bush had won the election. When I rode the elevator downstairs, all the international trainees at the dining table were stunned, either speaking in fast voices or sitting mutely with ashen faces. There was a heavy sense of bad things to come. Only my dear American friend from the Houston office seemed blithely unaware of the cataclysm the rest of us feared. Despite being my favorite person, she often made remarks with which the rest of us vehemently disagreed. We would round on her and educate her on the spot.

Once we had been having breakfast in the dining room, digging into fried eggs and fried tomatoes and paring grapefruit, when she had said, “America is trying to help world poverty by sending food and money to other countries, but how much can America keep giving?”

The rest of us had challenged her, saying that was not what caused poverty or famine, not a lack of food, and that America was not helping by keeping countries in debt. Through these debts, America and other Western countries controlled these countries’ government budgets by spending, siphoning off poor countries’ resources and controlling their policies by holding them hostage.

In a few weeks, we finished the introductory course of team building and bonding. I stayed on for another course with the other engineers and geologists. Downstairs in the hotel lobby, a large poster showed the price of oil in barrels. One day, an Iraqi employee arrived. We were immediately put on high security. Even before the man stepped foot on campus, all the trainees were briefed on the conduct we would have to follow. We were not to speak to him. He was not allowed in several areas. I believe he was not allowed access to the computers. I never saw him, but like others, I was disturbed by the tense atmosphere in the conference center. I couldn’t stop thinking about how he must feel, moving through this sea of hostility, restricted access, closed doors, and frightened faces turning away from him.

In 2008, when I read Joseph O’Neill’s Netherland about 9/11 and its aftereffects on a Dutchman living in New York, a novel the former President Barack Obama gave his seal of approval by telling the New York Times magazine that he was tired of briefings and was relaxing at nights with the novel Netherland, I was already familiar with the Netherlands, its colonial history and its neocolonial present. In 2000, I had sat together at meals with young people from all over the world with a dread in the pits of our stomachs that President George W. Bush was going to turn the world upside down. For O’Neill’s character in Netherland, 9/11 was a shocking, lifechanging event that struck a blow to his comfortable cosmopolitan existence in New York. His character didn’t seem too concerned about the US invasion of Iraq — a war that would result in over a million dead Iraqis, over five million orphans, the torture of Iraqi civilians, depleted uranium waste left behind that caused widespread cancer, and the rise of ISIS. But from where we were sitting in 2000, the people outside of America, we could already see the future, beyond the scope of the novel Netherland.


Gemini Wahhaj is the author of the novel The Children of This Madness (7.13 Books, Fall 2023) — a complex tale of modern Bengalis that illuminates the recent histories not only of Bangladesh, but of America and Iraq, and the short-story collection Katy Family (Jackleg Press, Spring 2025). Her fiction has been published or will be forthcoming in Granta, Third Coast, Chicago Quarterly Review, and other magazines. She has a PhD in creative writing from the University of Houston, where she received the James A. Michener award for fiction (judged by Claudia Rankine) and the Cambor/Inprint fellowship. She is Associate Professor of English at Lone Star College in Houston.

By |

brandon kilbourne poetry may 2023

On exhibit at the Berlin Museum of Natural History is the dinosaur Giraffatitan brancai, which, like a giraffe, had a long upright neck and forelimbs longer than its hindlimbs. Notably, Giraffatitan is a specimen of colonialism, having been collected from the locality of Tendaguru in the colony of German East Africa (Tanzania today) between 1909 and 1912 and brought back to the German Empire’s capital.


Here in Berlin from Africa,

taken from Tendaguru’s hills!


Lofty among the atrium’s

glass and steelwork high overhead,


eye-socketed summit of bone—

The Giraffe Titan, astride Earth


once again! Do not strain your necks

as you gaze upward in awe, dwarfed


by Mesozoic proportions—

Depleting a continent green,


between this cavernous ribcage

and pelvis sat the source of its


insatiable appetite that

was fed by devouring its way


across Africa’s rife lushness

Strung along these gargantuan


bones were insensate muscles, their

violent contractions swinging


the limbs lumbering wantonly

to leafy troves snatched by its maw.


Next, note how the skull would look out

from this neck tall as a tree’s trunk,


the inhuman heights distancing

higher thoughts from the disasters


waged as each footfall would convulse

the earth, the trail of footprint scars.


Do grasp ladies and gentlemen,

that before you stands the terror


of its time, hunger incarnate

covered in scales, a creature who


by a glutton’s nature, would not

leave a single leaf on a twig


as whole forests suffered its teeth,

entire lakes flowing as rivers


guzzled down a sluice-long throat,

vast wilds fouled to wastes by sludge dung.


My good people, I implore you

to know that this scourge preyed upon


lands homing other animals,

availing itself of food


that would sustain them, untroubled

by whether then they might perish.


Woeful species that could not flee

Were left to the famines sprouting


from its presence, fields of ribs bleached

by the sun, with any challenge


extinguished by the immense weight

crushing bodies beneath four feet.


Be thankful that our Berlin Beast

is but a nightmare’s memory


bound to this defunct skeleton—

Please though take care to remember:


Evolution has a knack for

repetition, reinventing


wings among birds, bats, and beetles,

sleek fins among sharks and dolphins—


She’s likewise over the ages

rehashed her ravaging Titan,


finding a new form to harbor

its continent-gorging greed.


From Europe’s soil, her behemoth’s

avarice arose once again,


albeit in a much smaller

human’s stature. Staking feeding


grounds in Africa through charnel

colonies, this voracity


without end tries in vain to cram

itself full, stuffing its mouth with


diamonds and sapphires, rubbers sap,

gold and copper, clear-cut timber


medicinal herbs, ivory

and hides, animals bound for zoos,


fossils destined for museums,

plantation-grown cocoa and cane,


coffee, sisal, and palm’s red oil,

despoiled rivers and vistas, lands


fertile, grasses for cattle, men

yoked faceless for beast’s hard labor.


If you were to tremble at just

the mention of such crazed desire


not content until Africa

was consumed down to mere pebbles,


I could not blame you. However,

do know I tell you these horrors


alongside the bones showcased here,

so you can recognize as truth


that a rapacity apt for

a dinosaur can masquerade


as something human, giving you

no future reason to gawk, breath


stopped by a gasp betraying

an ignorance of our darkest


nature. Take this chance to acquaint

yourselves with this recurring bane


so to know when it walks the Earth

again, as we can but surely


wager that this monstrosity

will be reborn at a mere whiff


of wealth wafting from soil, luckless

lands left to fend off famished jaws.


Brandon Kilbourne is a Pushcart-nominated poet and research biologist from Louisiana who is currently based at the Museum of Natural History Berlin. Since 2018, his work has appeared, or is forthcoming, in Poet Lore, Ecotone, Obsidian, Tahoma Literary Review, Artemis, West Trade Review, Split Rock Review, The Fourth River, Santa Fe Literary Review, Panel Magazine, Slant, Sky Island Journal, Catamaran Literary Reader, and elsewhere. His work has also been translated into Estonian in Sirp.

By |

delaney olmo short story may 2023

I didn’t visit the country by choice. But grandma was happy to see me. Her surgery earlier in the year had left her unable to help herself as much. I knew my mom wanted to finally get rid of me. Now instead of spending the summer flirting with boys and browsing aisles of overpriced makeup, I would be here. Hours away from the city.

Grandma asks me to help her clean the house. I find myself enjoying some of the cleaning and the way my nostrils burn from the fumes. The nothingness around the small house surrounded by forest trees. My body craves that unknown feeling.

In the mornings, I wake to the chirping near a pine tree outside my window. I grab water from the nightstand and take a few sips. My dry throat feeling some slight comfort. From the edges of the windowsill, I see what I make out to be a few feathers. I pull myself out of bed and open the window trying to grab one. They fall to the ground looking like glass shards ready to impale my body.

I never actually see the crows, but sometimes I hear them.  Hanging laundry on the clothesline is usually when I hear them the most. From the tops of the redwood trees. Sometimes it feels like the forest behind the home is their playground. I find myself wondering what it feels like to be pecked to death by them. Grandma calls me back inside. They continue laughing, knowing I’ll be back near them soon.

The neighbor girl, Esther, tells me the crows are very smart. She’s about my age, a little nice but slightly weird. I could see someone like her not fitting in with other kids. She explains she can understand birds. I don’t know how to respond. I agree with her about the ways city folk are not in tune with nature. The city is surrounded by skyscrapers and sidewalks. Brief trips to the park are not the same as being on the Reservation surrounded by nature.

When I left the treatment facility, I knew my mother was embarrassed to take me back. The way she looked at me as I was being discharged made me feel ashamed. The life she wanted was limited by having me around. Her new husband hated kids. There was no space for me in the cramped apartment. The resentment from the years of being a single mom, and the drama with my father in and out of prison.

Grandma has always been kinder to me than my mother was. But she lived too far for us to regularly visit. I knew she would not treat me like a burden. The only feeling I knew my entire life. Around her I didn’t need to pretend, try to satisfy like I did around mother. My grandma, at her old age, chose to move back onto our ancestral lands.

For once in my life, I felt a freedom I never felt. The iron cage I always imagined holding me down inside, loose. When mother drives away, I feel it swelling. That feeling of knowing I will probably never have to see her again. The freshly lacquered nails and her peony-stained cheeks. I won’t miss the rude comments she makes about the plainness of my face or how my new haircut makes me look like my father.

Esther is the first person besides my mother I allow to touch my hair. I let her braid it for me. Her delicate fingers weave in and out of each strand. She is the first person I tell, outside of my family, about my time at the facility. Never does she judge me or make me feel as if I am being observed. When the sunlight hits Esther’s round face, her eyes look a pretty golden brown.

I tell Esther about the time my mother came to visit me at the facility. The meeting was short and awkward. My mother’s makeup looked dark, and her outfit overdone. The echo of her heels against the linoleum floor louder than I had remembered before. We didn’t hug or say we loved each other. That was when I realized I would never be wanted in her life.

In the evenings, I sit and watch grandma do her beadwork. She tells me she will teach me if I want to learn, and even the tricky peyote stitch. Sometimes I want to ask her how my mom was when she was younger. Was she a kind girl like Esther? Was she as selfish as she is now? These questions seem important but when I want to ask, it’s time for bed.

In the city, I struggled to make friends, as much as I hate to admit it. There was always something I desired more than I could find. But I hid it from myself. I tried to make my mother happy. I stained my lips and cheeks. Dressed like the girls I envied. Starved myself so she wouldn’t comment about my figure anymore. Wore dresses even though I hated them.

For months, I stole medication from her new husband. I’d swallow them to see how I felt. He didn’t notice at first. His eyes stayed glued watching old cowboy shows when he got home from work. The type of man who wanted a wife to wait on him. I watch her trying to mold into a role she can never be. Especially as a Native American woman married to an older White man like him.

When I eat dinner, I do so in my room. I avoid my mother and stepfather as much as I can. Sometimes I steal his cigarettes. Occasionally I ration the ones I have so he won’t notice. When everyone is asleep, I go on the balcony and pretend I am someplace else. I enjoy watching the blanket of stars greet me. A sense of comfort as I exhale the smoke.

They found me on the bathroom floor. The doctors thought it was a suicide attempt. I don’t remember much. But I remember that almost dying felt better than living. Felt that missing desire for something I didn’t understand. The room of the hospital felt so quiet. The white walls, hearing each patient breathing. When I sleep, I see friends that don’t exist in real life.

The unusual thing about watching baby crows hatch is the sliminess of their skin. The way their mama seems to understand naturally how to care for them. How defenseless they seem. But I desire to see what they will become. Esther tells me about a dance she heard about that some tribes do called a Crow Hop, and I find myself wishing I could see this. She promises me one day we will go to a Pow Wow to see it. Somehow, I envy the baby crows even more.

Sometimes, when I’m busy in the house, I look out the window to make sure the baby crows are okay. When it rains, I worry they might not survive. I try to imagine their mother is nearby, ready to conceal them with her leathery black wings. I worry about the wind knocking down their nest. But maybe once the sunshine comes, it will warm their small little beaks.

Esther comes and asks for me one morning. Usually, we meet in the evening. I peek my face through the cracked window near the door telling her to wait. I grab a basket of freshly washed laundry preparing to hang it as we talk. I notice a new parka on her body. It’s black and almost looks a bit too large for her small frame.

We walk near the clotheslines as I begin quickly hanging the clothing. I want to ask her about the baby crows. But I wonder if she already knew. Would she feel sad as I did realizing they might finally leave us? My grandma’s house was closer to the nest than hers so I felt responsible. Because of the weather, I hadn’t checked in a few days. Her mood told me not to be worried.

Beneath the early morning sun, her brown eyes looked lighter than I noticed before. We walked towards the tree. I wanted to tell her I saw the nest empty last evening, but I didn’t want her to know my obsession with the crows caused me to peek before her. My stomach churned slightly, unsure how to proceed.

Beneath our feet we see it. A small black trail of feathers scattered around the dirt floor. We both stay quiet until we finally hear them. She looks up and seems slightly surprised. The wind hits some of the branches making a swishing sound. I look up and see it. On a small dogwood branch I see what appears to be small crows swaying. Something about it makes me cherish this moment between us. These baby crows are motherless, and ready to face the world.


Delaney R. Olmo is a writer who graduated from the MFA program at California State University, Fresno. She has been a finalist and semifinalist for several poetry prizes. She is an enrolled member of the Kashia Band of Pomo Indians. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in Feminist Formations at John Hopkins University Press, Green Linden, Solstice Literary Review, Abalone Mountain Press, and many others. Read more of her work at delaneyolmo.com.

By |

K.O. Bailey poetry may 2023

Dey said to sit and wait behind dees bars

and as it was, I heeded dey commands

because I knew dey light and I was dark.

Dey promised me a trial was at hand,

but damn if I ain’t tryna lee dis place.

No food and all dis heat sho’ ain’t no joke

but lissen here, da smile on my face

was big when all dem boys came in and broke

me out! And I could hardly stand but dey

paraded me aroun’ fo’ all to see.

Befo’ dey took me to da bridge, I say,

Dat white girl dere, she happy as can be!

They didn’t let me turn around to check.

The trial was the noose around my neck.


K.O. Bailey is a recent graduate of Washburn University, earning his English degree, with an emphasis in Creative Writing, and a minor in Film & Video. As a member of Sigma Tau Delta, he is a well-rounded author of fiction, non-fiction, poetry, and screenplays and is currently working on a historical-drama screenplay about the real-life lynching of four people in Shubuta, Mississippi in 1918. In addition, he is working hard on a poetry collection inspired by a recent grant-funded trip to the National Memorial for Peace and Justice in Montgomery, Alabama. Follow K.O. (@kobaileybooks) on Instagram.”

By |

david agyei-yeboah short story april 2023

“Welcome to Owuooo.[i] We promise you nothing but the pain you deserve. Lucifer kingdom alande.”[ii] Five hooded figures gesticulated to market women. Passersby inched away from them. Some market women screamed when they approached. The way they pronounced the word, “owuoo,” their tongues coiling up between their teeth, like snakes, made a few women leap from their workstations and topple over. Kenny giggled. Before those buffoons performed their act, oh, for that’s what it was, they’d approached him thirty minutes earlier to join in and be the sixth member because in their words, he towered, had a broad chest, and would be feared and loved in like measure. He’d declined. Definitely wasn’t ready to partner with Luciferian acting. Pastor Jefferson would not be pleased.

He’d only wanted fruits from the market so he wound up on Ntreh Avenue hoping to grab a few and head back home. KIDI’s music blared through. I go kill you with.. Enjoyment. Enjoyment. Herh. And then Kenny’s eyes scanned the perimeter. It had been cleared of animals and men. A celestial figure gleamed before him. Weirdly enough, he could hear the bustle of the market. At the same time, he could see the eyes of this being searing through him. It called out to him. Or was it a her? It was about 11 feet tall, with eyes that seemed dunk in fire, robe of magenta and mane of icy-white. Then it fizzled out of sight.

“Herh, young man, why are you drooling?”

 He composed himself. “I was?”

“Why do you look like you just woke up?”

“Cos I literally just did,” he muttered. “Please hand me some apples and pineapples.”

“50 cedis.”

“Ahhbaa!”

“Herh, εnfa saa nkwasiasεm no mma ha o. M’ayε hye. Sε wontɔ a, kɔ wo baabi.”[iii]

“Oh, madam, but it’s just apples and pineapples.” He scratched his head. “Alright.” Carefully removing five crumpled 10-cedi notes, he handed it to the buxom lady and took a bite out of the juiciest apple on his way home.

What the hell was that? What figure was that? He couldn’t seem to get the image out of his head as he stepped into his one-bedroom, chamber-and-hall apartment at Teshie.

He knew he had been told he had prophetic gifts. Were they manifesting?

                                                                *

Sundays were always ferocious. There were always blobs of sweat swirling around the room. Pastor Jefferson would boom and lay hands and the congregants would fall dramatically, the ground littered with their bodies, hope-filled, yearning for redemption, manifestation and stolen glory.

Kenny would always munch on apples after service before packing the plastic chairs.

“PJeff,” Kenny called out. Pastor Jeff had just returned from escorting the wealthiest member to her SUV and was sauntering into his office. “Something weird happened yesterday. You always told me I had prophetic gifts.”

“Kenny, my beloved son, I know you saw something strange yesterday. That white figure.”

“How- dd- id – you – know –“

“That was me, boy.”

“Huh?”

“I’m always watching over you.”

That was the day that Kenny realized that he had to leave Pastor Jefferson’s church. He had always seen the negative signs. Something always irked him, jarred him even, the way people were overly sentimental about his messages and overextended themselves in pleasing him. Then there were those messages he would preach that would shroud the room in fear.

“Eben didn’t listen to me the last time I advised him. Are you all surprised that a tipper truck split his body into two? Montie afutusεm oo.”[iv] A restless calm arrested the atmosphere.

Kenny had always stayed. He needed Pastor Jefferson. Needed his money. His mason job didn’t fetch much. Although he’d graduated top of his class at the university, he’d failed to get any job after graduation. Postmodern Ghana was rough, from the prestigious jobs offered to recent grads on a who-you-know-basis to the numerous job applications that required three years plus experience. Like how?  It seemed like his country just wanted him to lose it.

It was about that time that he roamed from church to church, seeking a solution to his problems. The church at Mamobi hadn’t helped. The Pastor there secretly sent him DMs for sexual favors following their exchanging numbers after the alter call. Abokobi’s ‘Fire for Fire, Brimstone for Brimstone’ Ministries hadn’t helped a wink either, what with their mortal combat with Satan every Sunday, each congregant armed with boxing gloves. I mean, he should have known. Brimstone for Brimstone?  But desperation had a voice that couldn’t be silenced even in the face of danger and hoodwink. As for Nungua Love Centre, the ushers were so rude; all they cared about was gathering everyone so the pastor could pull congregants onto the floor by sheer force of will. Their violence was staggering. Church culture just generally seemed steeped in mystery and pomp; no depth to satisfy parched souls.

Pastor Jeff seemed genuine the minute he walked into the Community 12 Covenant Family church. But over time, his character unraveled and became unrivaled. It was too late then because the money that Pastor Jeff supported him with became his lifeblood.

But tonight was different; the way Pastor Jeff cocked his head to the side; the way his mustache suddenly marched to a devious tone, arched like a Mafioso’s; the way his eyes burned into him. All of a sudden, new scales fell off his eyes. Then Kenny finally gathered courage and did what he’d felt compelled to even in the face of complete failure. Step into the unknown with no bulwark.

Yes, he’d starve for a while but goddamn these pastors. They were clearly not the answer! At least the kind he’d found.

He would find out what his vision meant. On his own.                                                      

                                                                      *

There was a wide lake before Kenny. He would see a crocodile dip into it and re-emerge a golden antelope. A mouse would sip and emerge a deer. Then he saw that creature again. It stared intently at him and smiled. Then he woke up.

The plates around him clinked. Grains of gari layered the plate like a sickle. Shito lay dotted all over the floor. “Shit.” He looked around and saw the bottle of shito, ajar because of his restlessness during the night, the floor a cream of black and auburn.

His phone beeped.

“Kenny, we get some job bi for Lashibi oo. Make you make ready,”[v] Diaka, who’d recommended him for his last job, said.

He prepped and within minutes, the flaming sun slapped his back as he carried blocks to an uncompleted building. As he narrowed the curve to the entrance, he saw a group of young women ogling at him. One licked her lips. He wondered how she could be so crude in her opulent expression of desire. I mean, he knew that his body had definitely packed on some muscle from two years of consistent mason work. He also knew it was natural to feel things. But these were teen girls on the cusp of womanhood. They should be ogling at their textbooks. Not him. And the way they leered, unashamed with longing, eschewing the courtesy to bridle and expunge desire in secrecy or behind a screen was utterly bewildering to bear, to say the least.

“Kenny, mortar, mortar, mortar!”

He dropped the blocks and picked up the empty ceramic slate before him. One of the girls giggled when he crossed the bend again.

“You know Kenny, you should stop wondering about those lustful daughters of Eve over there.”

Enningful stifled a laugh, eyes burning bright as he joined Kenny to carry off mortar in his own slate. The dji, dji, dji sounds from the concrete mixer blared through the air as they trudged along.

“Ah Enning. These are not daughters of Eve. They are daughters of Satan.”

They both laughed heartily.

“Stop exaggerating. Don’t tell me you’re not enjoying it. I know I am.”

“Ah, so you too?”

“Those Gen Z girls have been here since morning oo. Staring at us like we are well glistened trophies. They want a piece of us, chale. We be hot cake. I for make my move soon kraa.[vi] Na body no be firewood.”

“Hahaha. You that. Shocked you haven’t yet.”

“Biding my time. The longer they want me, the easier my move. They will fall like flies soon.”

Their laughter echoed in the distance.

“But eii Enning how far with the new job applications?”

“Hmm, broooo, same old oo.”

Enningful had struggled after school to get a job too. In fact, he met Kenny at a Uniliever interview, they vibed and then exchanged contacts. After both failed to get the job, Enningful began mason work to while away time and make a little money at the side while still applying for jobs. He advised Kenny to join in the mason work.

“Why did we even break our backs to make first-class degrees, hoping that Ghana would open up to us. See the way all these organizations are rejecting us!” Kenny said.

Enning shrugged right before they reached the mound of mortar that the other masons had rounded.

“Kenny, I no de barb sef. This country be forking, rough.”[vii]

                                                                     *

It thundered. Rain poured out of the sky in a flurry dance. A dim mist arrested the bed. Then a blast of white light filtered through the dark. Kenny awakened. Stared into nothingness. There was no one in sight. Suddenly, voices rang out.

“Rainbow-whisker, you are chosen! You are chosen! You are chosen!” Voices uttered. He could hear honey-thick baritones and soaring boy sopranos.

“Who are you?”

“Kenny! You are chosen! You are chosen!”

He placed his hands over his ears. Then awoke. A dream within a dream. Beads of sweat paddled across his face.

“What the hell? This has to stop. All these weird stuff. Naa, naa.”

He picked up his phone.

“Nancy, I know it’s late. I just have to talk to someone.”

“Okay.” Nancy hesitated, groggy. “Is anything the matter?”

“Yeaaah. Everything is the matteeeer. Okay, you-you-you wait. Maybe I shouldn’t talk to you about this on phone. I’ll come to your place early tomorrow morning.”

“You sound terrified. Are you sure we can’t talk now so you feel a bit better?”

“Nancy, I think I’m losing it! Freakin losing it. Pastor Jeff said prophetic gift or whatever but I think I’m just going coo-koo.” Kenny’s voice cracked and he began sobbing.

“You know what? Don’t move. I’m coming over.”

Nancy just lived two blocks away. She was the only female friend he’d made since he moved into his beat down one-bedroom apartment.                                                 

                                                                         *

“I keep seeing a super tall and big creature.” Kenny’s voice was calmer. “He looks at me like he knows me. I saw him like I’m seeing you fili fili[viii] in the market. Then I had a dream about him the other day. Or her. I don’t know. He seems androgynous. Then just tonight, I heard voices saying I’m chosen. They called me a rainbow-whisker. What the hell?”

“Hmmm. Let me boil a pot of hot tea for you.”

“Sure.”

Nancy began walking over to the cupboard at the corner to grab a teabag.

“Wait.” She stopped, turned and stared intently at Kenny. “Before then, I think you need a hug. A big one.” She smiled. Nancy always had a way of calming him and stealing a smile out of him, even in the direst of situations. In the past when Pastor Jeff’s financial assistance delayed, he’d hit her up and she’d loan him some money. Then she’d hug him afterwards. He kinda knew she had the hots for him. He would use it, somehow. In the future. But tonight, all he needed was his friend.

“Honestly, Nancy, what do you make of all of this?”

Nancy smiled again, and shrugged, “I don’t know Kenny. I’m no spiritual person, to be honest. Why didn’t you tell Pastor Jeff?”

“That charlatan.” Kenny scoffed. “Can you believe he told me that he is that creature?”

Nancy burst into uncontrollable laughter. “Ah, akoa wei paa.”[ix]

Somehow, her laughter comforted him.

“I need answers.”

“Clearly. And you won’t get the right ones from him. I always told you he was fake. It doesn’t even take a blind man to see that.”

“I always knew oo. But na mehia sika no oo.[x] Hmm. Ghana is sooo hard. But you know, when he said it, it’s like something just came over me. I knew then and there I was done with his ass.”

“Hahaha. I’m glad about that. Maybe you should go see a genuine prophet in the land.”

“Prophet?” Kenny’s eyes widened. “I’ve seen so many fake ones, they are all the same to me.”

“Just as much as there are many fake ones, there are genuine ones too. You never know. What about your friend that you said is now a prophet?”

“Hmmm.” He began rummaging through his drawer. “Charles. He always seemed like a kind fellow. Maybe he can help me.” He tore a leaf out of a book and peeked.  “Got it. Class list, college 2015.”

“I hope you’re ready for what all this means.”

“Nancy, I don’t care. I just want all this madness to stop.”

                                                                *

“Charlessseeey gbemi.”

Kenny hollered as he noticed Charles seated at the bench in their former Psychology Department. The night sang a quiet song; no one in sight at the department except the two.

“Brooo.” Charles got up and hugged Kenny.

“Don’t call me that no more. I work for the Lord now.”

Kenny lowered his arms, in a symbolic bow to his old friend.

“Pressure! Hahaha, chale, what have you been up to?”

“Me? Oh, hmm. Mason work oo. M’asoa blocks saa.”[xi]

“Oh.” Charles face was etched in a frown.

“But bro,” Kenny laughed. “That conversation will be for another day.”

“Okay. You seemed anxious when you hit me up. What dey go on?”[xii]

“Been having crazy visions and hearing weird shit. Sorry, stuff.”

“Bro. Flooow.”

 Kenny giggled.

“What are you seeing in your visions?”

“I see a tall figure staring at me like it knows me. Then I hear voices saying I’m chosen. It’s crazy bro.”

“When you hear these things and see these things, how do you feel?”

“Uncomfortable. The sounds I was hearing were literally beating my eardrums.”

“Wow.”

“Let’s pray a bit.” Charles spoke in tongues. A frigidity arrested the atmosphere. It tingled Kenny’s skin. He suddenly stared at Kenny, a wildness waltzing in his eyes.

“Heaven and hell are fighting over you. You do have a divine assignment. But the things you are seeing and hearing are not from God. Your mother’s clan served the enemy in the past. Your father’s clan is the direct opposite. You are destined to be a prophetic painter. You will see things in the spirit realm and translate this to your drawings.”

“But I don’t even draw.”

“Be careful of your associations. All the people in your life at the moment have been sent to distract you. Enningful, Nancy are out for blood.”

“But Nancy. How? She encouraged me to seek you out.”

“And that’s why I’ll take you out. Before you become what we all fear.”

Whack, whack.

Something suddenly hit Kenny’s head from behind and he fell. The last thing he saw was blurry images of Nancy, Enningful and Charles. They sneered at him with eyes of pity and disgust.

Nancy glowered. “You were chosen to die. Eventually. We’ll take you to the creature you saw. He has a looot of plans for you.”

[i] Death

[ii] Has landed

[iii] I don’t condone such foolishness. I’ve got a lot on my plate. If you won’t buy, leave.

[iv] Listen to good advice.

[v] Kenny, we’ve got a job offer at Lashibi. Prepare.

[vi] We’re desirable. I have to make my move soon.

[vii] Kenny, I don’t even understand. This country is so pathetic.

[viii] In the flesh/for real

[ix] Ah, really, this dude?

[x] I needed the money oo.

[xi] I’ve carried blocks on my head for so long.

[xii] What’s going on?


David Agyei–Yeboah holds an MA in Communication Studies from the University of Ghana. He graduated with first-class honors in English and Theatre Arts for his B.A.  His writing has been published by Deep Overstock Publishing, Freshwater Literary Journal, The Quilled Ink Review, Tampered Press, Lumiere Review, Journal of the Writers Project of Ghana, and elsewhere. He was longlisted for the Totally Free Best of the Bottom Drawer Global Writing Prize in 2021. He enjoys everything art and anticipates an academic career in the future. He tweets at @david_shaddai and sings on instagram at @davidshaddai

By |

kathleen hellen poetry april 2023

Reputation for decay, for violence


where billie used to sing. The rows in a tableau, the decades of eviction

and their fruits. Strange


the murals brightly painted, icons I’ve not heard of.

Conflicted histories in the list


for English B: Wilkerson and Hooks, Staples, Ta-Nehisi.

How to know what’s implicit? Black


communities fanning out like wings. Black

on the map the outline of an etherized


insect: what you see when you pin the red

line of a city slinging plaques


for people you’ve not thought of.

Around the picturesque, the lakes and parks


“You see a spot on a window, and sometimes you don’t see

past that spot,” the heritage director says,


though tourist maps will scrub the areas in gray. Invisible?

No gift shops where the cops go rogue in episodes of Homicide.

No iridescence.


crawling toward mirage

EL PASO—If only you can get there—from desiccated beds along

forests of saguaro, in fiendish shade of canyons … to walk out in the open


Some argue

the narrative becomes too difficult to understand

if you give away


the ending first, cut

from the bottom


who? for instance, the bones under the bones exposed,

scattered by the coral snakes and rattlers

for instance, what? the tatty blankets hanging on barbed wire 


        

somewhere near black mountains, where?

flayed in dehydrations, when?


why and why?

Notes, below the fold: Anything you want

Shrewd coyotes making the arrangements


cities at dusk, winter light

“As long as I kept walking I didn’t hear [the cries] ….” — Beckett



Water sounds like wind, wind like water over riprap, over

fallen masts that straddle the embankment. Black

rocks form entanglements. Black

ballast for the ship of night the wind is navigating.


Fog settles in the darkening. Along the falls, a figure with a dog.

A figure backing books, looks to where a deer is bounding

toward the bus. Near miss

where children in my thinking

wait with flashlights for their mothers’

gas-lit stoves. Light from cell phones.


Flash of the explosion. They cover themselves with cardboard.

They fall with their mouths open.


Kathleen Hellen is an award-winning poet whose latest collection Meet Me at the Bottom was released in Fall 2022. Her credits include The Only Country Was the Color of My Skin, Umberto’s Night, which won the poetry prize from Washington Writers’ Publishing House, and two chapbooks, The Girl Who Loved Mothra and Pentimento. Featured on Poetry Daily and Verse Daily, Hellen’s poems have won the Thomas Merton prize for Poetry of the Sacred and prizes from the H.O.W. Journal and Washington Square Review, as well as from the Maryland State Arts Council and Baltimore Office of Promotion & the Arts. She can be found at KathleenHellen.com and on Facebook.

By |

aubrianna snow poetry march 2023

Zero is equilibrium, balance

The moment before overdraft

And every night, I watch you lose the zero

Stumbling, falling, cussing these four walls into blank discursive space

Swaying back and forth, like a flag for the nation of our trauma

Back and forth, beyond the negatives or positives

Fumbling, dropping, spilling

You lose the zero in so many ways

But never more than when you stand in front of me with your child eyes

And 50 becomes 5


Snake Charming

For thousands of chainmail-clad nights

I watched you cleanse yourself of demons on the kitchen floor

Pulling snakes from your throat

And hope from your head

Years of resentment under foot

I step softly

And laugh as you watch me

Swallow the serpent of our collective pain


Worldly

Where the train goes, my heart goes

Getting off at every station

Stay for a minute, stay for a year

Each place the same in culmination


In every new city, I worry

There’s nowhere further to go

Yet eventually, the trip continues

Always a new place down the road


Most places, there’s nothing to keep me

Nowhere to rest my head

A quiet escape in the morning

An empty impression left on the bed


But what is it to stay here

To breathe with the seasons change

To know this place throughout

To sing and praise its name


Aubrianna Snow is a Mi’kmaw writer and feminist living and working in Treaty Six Territory, Canada. A graduate of MacEwan University’s journalism program, she writes primarily creative non-fiction and poetry. As a survivor and violence prevention worker, she centres themes of healing from interpersonal and systemic violence. You can find her work in Chatelaine and Muskrat Magazine. Find her on twitter at @aubrisnow or on her webpage aubriannasnow.com.