issue 5

Miracle e-zine Issue 5

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Vaaho vaaho


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#5 The

INspiration

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Cover Art by Aleksandra Harizma

“If you don't have time to read, you don't have the time (or the

tools) to write. Simple as that.” ― Stephen King


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MIRACLE Short Fiction. Poetry. Non- Fiction. Art. Interviews. Reviews and much more...

Editorial Bonjour!

Inspiration- this word in itself describes the being of us writers and artists. Some real inspiration can only make us what we are.

Welcome to the Issue 5 everyone! I was stunned to see the quality of writing this time. I must say that it keeps getting better with each issue. It’s really all of your support that has brought us to this stage today; our journey keeps getting better and better. You’d be obliged to know that we are now going into print! Just a matter of few months and the magazine would actually be available in hardcopy. Exciting, isn’t it?

Well, we also have great news for our young writers and artists here! Miracle e-zine is launching a project for young people. We have some great opportunities for everyone and this wide-ranging project aims at bringing together creative minds from around the world. This is not it, with the magazine going into print we have some exciting adventures for everyone. You will come across some within this issue.

Speaking of Issue 5, this issue is filled with exciting interviews. I’m sure you are going to love what we have got for you this time. I think I’m gonna say no more and let you see it for yourself.

I hope you enjoy it and happy reading!

Guntaj Editor Website: http://miracleezine.wix.com/miracle-e-zine Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Miracle.ezine Twitter: https://twitter.com/Miracleezine

April-May 2013 Issue 5

For any queries contact: [email protected]

Assistant editor: Natasha Pasch

Disclaimer: Matter published in Miracle e-zine is the work of individual writers who guarantee it to be entirely their own work. Contributors to Miracle e-zine are largely creative. The publishers accept no liability for them. Opinions expressed by our contributors do not necessarily represent the policies or positions of the publisher. The publisher intends no factual miscommunication, disrespect to, or incitement of any individual, community or enterprise through this publication.


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In This Issue:

Author Interview:

Kayo Chingonyi

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Featured Interview of Leeroah Hursky.

Written By: Catherine Schythe

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A Writer’s Refugee

The World of Digital Publishing – Troy Cabadia

23 An Author’s Profile Up-Incoming Author: Getting Started By Christopher Stewart

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A Journal Review Reviewed By: Michelle D’Costa

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Film Review: Life Of Pi Reviewed By: Sara Koch

47 Meet The Young

Movellians

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Theme Column Written By: R.G. Summers

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Author Interview: Lawren Greene

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Film Review: Oz: The Great and Powerful By: Patrick Satters

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Poems By : Olga Kolesnikova, Pd Lietz, Darren Donhue, Miceal Kearney, Rupam Goswami, Michelle D’Costa, Steve Moore, Konrad Noronha, Phillip Larrea, Allabhya Ghosh, Silva Merjanin, Genny Rushton Givens, Scott Sherman, Emily Jones, Michael Lee Johnson, Sasha Milivojevich, Daniel Voicu, Luke Surl, Amit Herlekar, Maire Morrisey-Cummins, Paul Tristam, Steven Fortune, Joanna Ngai, Jake Reynolds, Davod J Delaney, Enya Sanders, Keith Charles Dovoric, A.J Huffman, Jamie Uy, Patrick Jamieson, Phoebe Duffet, Jeremiah Walton, Chrysovalanto Papanikolaou, Dah, Karima Puzon,Lim Sioh Huang, Bola Opaleke, Brendan Sullivan and Bhisma Upreti

Writing Workshop by Marie Lightman

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Book Reviews by Julie Stanley & Adam Skidmore

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Fiction By: Nathaniel Tower, Jeff Dupuis, Nina Knowles, John Howell, Belle Duffy, Gerardo Delgadilo and G.D McFetridge.

Non-Fiction By: Chew Yi Wei and Sara Koch.

Writing Contests

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Shifting Hexagon -Olga Kolesnikova

I think I’m trapped in a cube Or a triangle Or a hexagon A shape which shifts around me Is it me who made the sand melt, Melt into gold beneath my feet? The sky is an orange shade of blue, And it looks at me. I can make the pyramids balance on glass needles Upside down Pick the colour for each one: Always green. Make them spin in the sun. The sand is merging with the heavens Purple sparks at the horizon The sun is going out now Now that I am here. Suspend the grey rocks in the air Dry and burning and trembling They will circle the pyramids slowly As the liquid sand boils below And I am the sun trapped in a shape above, Always watching.

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Olga Kolesnikova is an aspiring 17 year old writer. She is currently writing a novel as well as short stories and poetry, and hopes to become a successful full-time writer in the future.


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bohemian Tendencies -Pd Lietz persistent resonance a synchronous vibration that materializes in an aura of blue drawing from an innermost place that has no name senses inundated right, left hemispheres madly volleying synapses fervor consuming strokes, breath quickening characters in subtle hues stutter and flutter upon pressed fibres everything detailed in a random process there is no control over this discerning gene with bohemian tendencies it strikes with full impact rampant and rabid

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Pd Lietz is a widely published writer, photographer and artist and illustrator who lives in rural Manitoba Canada. As a child both nurture and environment shaped her artistic abilities, her Grandfather and both Parents were Professional Photographers and Artists, the Studio then her home. Coming full cycle it is with delight she again picks up pen, paints or camera and simply enjoys what may unfold. http://www.pdlietzphotography.com/


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young people project page


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The sea -Bhisma Upreti When I went to meet the sea I found her stark naked, sunbathing. The sea's nudity was unexpected but beautiful, fitting and appealing. Human nakedness is most hideous and unpleasant, un-natural, barbaric and confidential. If nakedness must be, it has to be like the sea's of Sea a sophisticated nudity.

Bhisma Upreti is a award winning Nepali poet. He has acquired his Masters degree in Economics from University of Southampton, UK. His 6 books of poems and 7 books of essays have been published. His works have appeared in various national and international Journals, magazines and anthologies. He is a Joint Secretary of Nepal chapter of PEN International. He lives in Kathmandu with family.


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a future untold -Nathaniel Tower My buddy Doug and I were eating at this dive of a Chinese restaurant. The place is a total shithole, food included, but it's so cheap and fast it's impossible to pass up. We go there at least once a week. I don't even know what the hell the place is called. It's two blocks from the office. We order the same thing every time. When we walk in, they just punch in the order. I get the orange chicken, fried rice, two crab Rangoon. He gets Mongolian beef, white rice, egg roll. I ask how the hell he can eat white rice. I almost choke at the sight of the sticky white mess. Looks like maggots. Looking around the place, there's surely maggots in it. But the shit's so cheap. "Alright, let's go," he said through a mouthful of the maggot goop. "Wait a second. I want to read my fortune." He chewed impatiently while I cracked the little cookie. "Fuck's it say?" he said, some maggots leaping from his lips. On automatic, I read, "It says, 'Your life is in danger. Say nothing to anyone. You must leave the city immediately and never return. Repeat: say nothing.'" He stopped chewing and stared. "Bullshit. What's it really say?" He snatched it from my hand and read, "Your life is in danger. Say nothing to anyone. You must leave the city immediately and never return. Repeat: say nothing." I wanted to shake it off, but I could feel my heart pounding. I wasn't sure what I was

scared of. I'd eaten a thousand shitty meals in this hellhole, and none of the fortunes ever produced an iota of real fortune-telling. "Dude, what the hell?" Doug said, his mouth empty now. He stood up and walked to the counter. I followed. "What the hell is this, some kind of joke?" he yelled at the girl working the register. She looked at it. Her eyes widened. "Just a minute," she said as she turned to go . . . . behind the curtain separating the dining , .. area from the kitchen. "It's no big deal," I said. "The hell it's not. This is a threat. These people are threatening your life." The register girl came back with a grease-covered cook wielding a Santoku knife. "Get down," Doug yelled, and we both dropped to the floor. For a moment, nothing happened, so I glanced up and saw the cook and the register girl standing there with confused looks. They started speaking Chinese. The girl laughed at something the cook said. I stood up. "Come on," I said, smacking my still grounded buddy on the shoulder. "Let's get out of here. There's no danger. Someone must've gotten bored at the fortune cookie factory." With a look of mild disappointment, he rose, brushed the dust of his trousers, and we headed for the exit without a word to the laughing restaurant workers. Just as I put my hands on the door, the cook yelled, "Be careful out there." Doug turned and gave him the finger.

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"Was that really necessary?" I asked. "Those are some sick bastards. I'm not going back there." "They don't make the fortunes, you know," I assured him as we headed back to the office. "And how the hell do you know?" I looked at him and noticed a maggot grain on his chin. I didn't tell him. "Because they aren't a print shop. They order all that shit from somewhere else. Every Chinese restaurant gets all their supplies from the same supplier. Haven't you ever noticed that the printing and design is always the same no matter where you go?" "We only ever go to that place," he said. The maggot grain flapped a bit as he spoke, but it didn't drop. "Trust me," I said. "It was just someone bored with his job. You know how boring work gets. Wouldn't you start making fortunes like that if you just sat there all day with those tiny strips of paper?" "Whatever," he said, obviously not wanting to admit defeat. "Still, maybe we should steer clear of that place for a while. And maybe you should watch your back." "I'm not going to watch anything. That's irrational. How many times has a fortune cookie ever predicted anything?" We entered the office building and walked to the elevator. As the elevator doors shut and we began our ascent, Doug said, "I had a real fortune once." "What was it?" I asked, knowing he wouldn't tell me until I asked. "Well, the fortune said I would have a close encounter with a new friend. That was the night I banged that new chick from accounting." He smiled and nudged me a little.

"I'm not sure that counts. She was never your friend. Besides, there is such a thing as coincidence. And you know those things are so vague that sometimes they can seem true." "Still, maybe you should watch out. Maybe you should leave for a few days." The elevator dinged and the doors flung open. The greasy cook with his knife stood right in front of us, blocking our path to the office. "What the hell?" Dough shouted. He pressed the close door button repeatedly, but the cook stalked into the elevator before the doors obeyed. "Going down," the cook said as he jabbed the blade into Doug's chest. "What the hell?" I yelled at the cook as Doug dropped. "I thought the fortune was for me." The cook shrugged. "I thought he was you. You guys all look alike to me." We rode the elevator down to the bottom floor in silence. I didn't know what to say. I kept waiting for him to stab me, but he never did. When the doors opened and let him out, I took out my phone and called the police. "It'll be okay," I assured him as I thought about how hard it was to predict the future.

Nathaniel Tower writes fiction, teaches English, and manages the online literary magazine Bartleby Snopes. His fiction has appeared in almost 200 online and print journals, and he has a novel and novella out through MuseItUp Publishing.

Visit him at http://www.nathanieltower.wordpress.com.


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Author Interview Kayo Chingonyi

Kayo Chingonyi was born in Zambia in 1987, moving to the UK in 1993. He holds a BA in English Literature from The University of Sheffield and an MA in Creative Writing from Royal Holloway, University of London and works as a writer, events producer, and creative writing tutor.

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1. Can you tell us a little about yourself?

My name is Kayo Chingonyi — pronounced kai-o chin-gone-yee. I write poems and, on occasion, I read them aloud for audiences as well as publishing them in magazines, anthologies, and in my first pamphlet Some Bright Elegance which came out about a year ago. I also write stories, plays, critical articles and reviews — though not as much as I’d like to. I teach creative writing on a freelance/part-time basis and also produce arts events with a focus on mixing genres and audiences. In my spare time I like collecting vinyl (to listen to, not just to have around as some emblem of my retro sensibility). I usually leave the house with at least two books on my person.

2. What does being creative mean to you?

I think, perhaps, we’ve made too much of the idea of ‘being creative’ rather than emphasizing the work involved in becoming good at making things. For me, creativity is just the name we give to the capacity human beings have for making things (poems, houses, business deals etc). In the discussion of art there is an emphasis placed on certain fields that are considered to be more creative than others but I think anything that involves engaging the brain’s potential for invention can be considered


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creative. In terms of what this capacity for creativity means to me personally…I’m glad I live in a country where the making of things that aren’t commercial products is, albeit on a rather superficial level, valued. I’m conscious that cuts to arts funding are running very deep at the moment but at least I am living in a country that funds art in the first place. This seems a poor consolation at the moment but it is important to consider the alternatives when we complain about our lot.

3. What inspires you the most?

No one thing inspires me, if we’re talking about what compels me to write. In general, the fact of being alive and able to engage with the world is something I find very inspirational. In terms of art I’m drawn to work that has flaws or is somehow incomplete. I find that to be most human and, in spite of our many shortcomings, human beings inspire me.

4. Name a poem that you are most proud of writing, the one you personally cannot forget?

Well, I tend to share my poems with audiences from memory, more often than not, so I remember most of them but I sense that isn’t what you mean. The poem I’m proudest of in Some Bright Elegance is ‘Alternate Take’ because it was a long time coming. I began the first draft of the poem in 2004 and I re-wrote it a number of times before putting it into the manuscript (to which it was an eleventh-hour-addition after several days of tweaking and gnashing of teeth).

5. Can you describe the time when you first realised that creating verses or poems was something you absolutely had to do?

Initially I was more interested in reading and writing fiction and didn’t really read poems that much. Then, when I was thirteen, I started taking more of an interest in poetry and in the thirteen years since my interest has spiraled into something of an obsession. It was a gradual thing and I don’t think that I have to write poems, I continue to do so because – when it’s going well – I love doing it. There are days I want to give up (does the world need more poems and if it does who am I to write them?) but if I don’t or can’t write I become very unhappy.

6. How was your journey towards getting your first pamphlet Some Bright Elegance published?

The pamphlet was a long time in the making. I met the editor, Roddy Lumsden, in 2008 at the launch event for two pamphlets he edited for Tall-Lighthouse (as part of the Pilot series featuring the work of poets under 30). I sent him some poems after that. Looking back, I don’t think I was ready for publication. After a while, though, Roddy asked me to read as part of his event series BroadCast and since then I’ve been going to these events regularly, as both contributor and audience member. The idea of putting together a pamphlet with Roddy as

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editor was still bubbling away and after he joined Salt Publishing as poetry editor he got in touch to ask if I wanted to publish a pamphlet with them. This was in 2011 and the pamphlet came out about nine or ten months later, maybe a little more. The oldest poems in it were written, or at least started, in my teens so in total the pamphlet took about eight or nine years.

7. Is there a message you want your readers to grasp?

I want my readers to find their own meanings in the poems, which is good since that is what readers are inclined to do anyway (or at least that has been my own experience of reading and literary study and teaching). Admittedly, there are some things I’d like readers to pick up on, since I put a lot of time and effort into the writing process, but I’m interested in the meanings I didn’t intend, too.

Two fleas -Darren Donhue As I threw one chipped word after another Between the lines, Two fleas, Black as indefinable matter, Locked in a microscopic embrace, Fell upon my page. I tried circling them To give their union a Modicum of profound emphasis. But they hopped nimbly away from my pen Each time it reached to enclose them, Leaving a ladder of empty crop-circles Climbing to the roof of my ledger.

Darren is a playwright and poet currently based in Kilkenny, Ireland. His plays have been produced in Dublin, London and Prague and his poetry is published in some of Ireland’s leading literary journals.


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sky volcano -Jamie Uy

you & i, we were exploring underneath the cool clouds of summer daze walking aimlessly amongst the austere plains tattered technicolor map in hand as we tried to make sense of our dreamscapes you took my hand away from the fluorescent telescope for a second, it was wet with tears i’d never shed and you smiled a little and dried it with your cashmere scarf whispering ‘it will be ok’ i never knew reality could be so unreal until i met you, melodies steaming out of your iridescent eyes and flowing into the lava of sky volcano. the stars were blinking Morse code and your skin was the color of pumice your hair was singed

from being too close to the stratosphere. you begged me to make you a ladder to climb up to the volcano and touch the silver lining up there but i was afraid you’d forget about the real world so i held you close to me promising you that whatever was up there was so beautiful it would kill any human. out of the blue you grabbed my arm with smooth frail fingers and i could see the quarter notes falling from your cheeks. you don’t understand you said, voice already a murmur in the past - i want to die. we stumble on barely dodging the memory meteorites... is this real or just a dream? i guess we’ll never know, being so close to the sky volcano.

Jamie is a buoyant fourteen-year-old with ties with to

the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, and China. She has a wacky white highlight and loves playing the flute. In her spare time she edits "Parallel Ink", an e-zine for young writers, and manages the sales of her first poetry anthology, "The 1 AM Astronaut and Other Poems". To her delight, Jamie was named a Commended Foyle Young Poet of the Year 2012.

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Paper, Ink, Sound -Genny Rushton-Givens Cardboard and colour Voices altered with equipment Just paper and ink But it is so special to me I watch as he is assembled from raw materials Black pen Markers Pro Tools Adobe Microphones Cameras Clicks of the mouse They gain meaning in seconds Create a life Something so close to life And truth In the animation studio They have no idea what they have done to me How they have possessed me Locked in my bedroom for days He is ready to haunt my dreams As I recreate the narrative in my head Alter it Play with my love object The soundtrack softly playing in my mind Every nuance replicated More in love with him than any human After all Could any human ever be so perfect? I watch his every move on screen Drink up every detail around him So it is locked in my memory Every character in every book becomes him Every situation, every plot described to me is tainted with his presence He keeps me up late at night I burn his face into my memory My soul

Genevieve Rushton-Givens is 22 years old and a recent university graduate from Wilfrid Laurier University in Ontario, Canada, majoring in Music (Voice) with an English minor. She is from the rapidly growing town of Milton, Ontario, Canada. She has been writing poetry and prose most of her life and it is her favourite hobby. Rushton-Givens mostly writes poetry, but she also writes short stories, flash fiction, fan fiction, lyrics and song parodies.

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No need to wait inline, just go online to have the book you always dreamed of!

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outh Africa may seem across the other side of the . world, but for Leeorah Hursky, an author who has . . been using digital media for publishing for a few . . . years now, the other side of the world was not far enough, for her to give her time to talk about her experience in publishing. Being a successful author of 4 books, Emotional Fat, Naked Soul, Puppets on Strings and I used to Paint Monsters, with a 5th book on its way, Leeorah kindly gives her advice to those wanting to publish their own books and don’t know where to begin or how to do it. We begin our interview through Skype.

“I published my first book using digital media in 2009. The process is very easy, you can publish your own book yourself, have as many copies as you want and have it within 48 hours.” As an author who has published 3 books online and is a real advocate for digital media for publishing, Leeorah talks about how this simple publishing format works and the benefits of using it. “In the past it was difficult to get a template, but now it is all done for you, I work off a template that I get off createspace.com and I work directly onto the template.” The website allows

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you to see what you have created and it even gives you a sneak peak of how your book will look like. “They will even let you know how thick the book will be, you can print on demand.”

With many publishing companies out there and many people trying to get their work out, publishing is easy as abc these days. “Trying to get a book published through a publisher is very difficult; I self- published one book through a publisher in 1999 and then the other 3 using digital media for publishing.” But now with digital media for publishing, you don’t need to go through all the waiting and the hope that someone will look at your work, the online template provides the writer with the option to store and save their work so they can return to it and edit as many times as they want. The benefit of this template is that it cuts out many hours of work.

So how much would all of this cost to do? Well, to add to the excitement of having your first book published, this publishing format is very cost effective, “the cost is nothing and the outlay is minimal, you even have the option of buying a hardcopy or an eBook.” There are other websites like LuLu.com for

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example, who are also available for print on demand and provide the services you need to have your book published at your wish. The website also gives you the choice to where you want to have your book sold. “Once you have created your book, you will then be given the option on whether you want your book sold in Barnes & Noble or Amazon and all the other different online book stores available.” Once a sale has been made through the bookstore, a percentage is then taken from the sale. The bookstore however doesn’t advise you of the sale, you need to have an account with KDP (Kindle Direct Publishing) as well as Amazon where you can personally track your sales.

When publishing through digital media, Leeorah suggests the importance of finding a good editor to make the necessary corrections before sending it off to be published. “It is important that you find yourself a good editor, I found one straight away. When I write, I am keen to keep the flow of creativity flowing and hence will only use an editor at the completion of each project.”

The final process involves obtaining a cover. From this point on, you are one step closer to having the published book you always dreamed of. This process is, believe it or not, just as simple as publishing it. “There is a cheap option people can use on fiverr.com and for as little as $5 they can create a book cover for you.” In order to do this a template needs to be downloaded from the website once the final page count is finished. “If one is making the cover alone then it is good to have a graphics program that can allow layering, or alternatively you can pay a graphic artist to make the cover for you. In an eBook for example, only the front cover is required, but if you are printing hardcovers then the full cover will need to be created.” It is important to keep in mind, that the final product is what’s going to draw people to want to read the book, therefore the cover is what’s going to sell and furthermore, it is then the duty of the author to promote their work so people buy their books. “This is most probably where most of the work needs to be done. There are social media pages, people reviewing your work, talking to groups of people, just getting word out there.”

To come to an end to this enlightening, inspiring and motivating interview, Leeorah leaves the readers with some advice to those wanting to take the first step in publishing their first book. “Inside many people is a book waiting to be written, the main factor stopping most people is the fear factor. It is the fear that will say you have no time; you don't have the skills or the ability. Now days with digital printing there are no excuses, admit your fear and then just go for it.”

For more information on Leeorah Hursky visit www.leeorahhursky.com

Written and Interviewed By : Catherine Schythe


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Stag night -Miceál Kearney It began with a bang: the taking of a life. Collecting his body, the car would alert to our crime. (Gran was once a passenger in the wheelbarrow. She fell back the land — sat in and wheeled home.) One mile, took us 3 hours he weighted a bloody ton. They don’t make wheelbarrows like that anymore. Next time: we’ll use a rifle, shotguns are messy. Chewing on pellets, ruins the venison.

c.r.O.W -Rupam Goswami

Winds that swirl around old teaks cause little wings’ flesh to tremble, crushing ice of demeanour, summoning her claws in free air. She hops and halts,

Miceál Kearney, 32. West of Ireland. Miceál's debut collection; Inheritance was published by Doire Press in 2008.

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yet bold, o’ sweet stubborn, breathing ancestral spirit of a Captain’s efforts- she droops her head not despite storm and cold! Here gushes in dust vigorously vague; Oh! Where’s her nest? Seldom in range… Twigs and boughs disorderly lay- the banyan’s shade’s her shelter, her diet… decayed ants. Elegant she was a banyan princess, her elegance now ridiculed by winter’s terrifying campaign! What followed next is that I fear to immerse in ink the truth behind- She wept and wept, her feathers bright shed by storm’s aftermath- a sour famine! The banyan shade held a paralysed she shrouded with misery of being ugly! A morning received her old consciousness thousand years after; she cried out poor, “Please say I haven’t changed, dear Banyan!” A grieved reply merged with the air: “O’ sweet bird of precious morale, you are a blessing as before- I in peace say; only times have met barriers of minds. Now they call this place civilized, while in bitter tongues jeer at you: “A ‘cursed rust of winter’ is this, a dreary CROW!”

Midnight Drums -Belle Duffy It had been a sparse evening for summer. We’d been walking for hours looking for bikes; Cannondales, Treks, Saracins, fat tubing preferred, hopefully locked by a front wheel or a brass D-lock (gone in twenty seconds). But nothing, not even a jalopy. We’d trawled the bike racks of

Imperial College, the lampposts of Mayfair and the railings of Soho Square. Nothing. We were on the edge of defeat, somewhere behind Gower Street, trudging back towards Angel. The thought of waking up sick and sneezing the next day was on both our minds and we’d fallen

Known as Mr. R, Rupam is a poet who would wish to go about narrating stories and pictures through 'words of pattern'. He is one who believes that every man lives in poetry at least for a second during his lifetime. Presently pursuing his Master of Technology for National Institute of Technology Silchar, Rupam is at present drawing ink on his 121st poem!


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into a silence matching that of the London streets in those early hours. We passed an orange V.W camper and suddenly Steve’s head came up and he doubled back to peer through the rear window... “Eye eye” he half chuckles “there’s a drum kit in there.” A screw driver appears in his hand “keep an eye out.” My heart starts to race as I scan the street ‘come on Steve’ I plead in my head….eyes darting back and forth whilst trying to look casual…’come on!’…the lock clicks… “Grab this” a cymbal appears and another one, some stands and finally the drums. We run up Chenies Street and manage to do it quietly. We grip everything tightly to our thin bodies so it doesn’t clash or bang. We head north up Tottenham Court Road away from the police station, turn into Howland street; brightly lit and bleak it offers no shelter for two thieves and a drum kit. In Whitfield Street he pulls into shadows and we carefully put everything down. “Right” he says “you go and get a cab and come and pick me up here”. I start scowling and shaking my head “you are joking?” I whine “you are fucking joking, it’s 1 in the morning and we’ve got a fucking drum kit and anyway look at the state of me, I’m in rags!” He gives me one of those blank looks “Just do it.” Conversation over. I march away muttering, swearing, an on-going diatribe “why me? We’re going to get nicked, I mean talk about hot, anyway what the fuck are we going to with it even if I do get a cab, the bloke must be some kind of a cunt!” I don’t feel positive. I turn right into Tottenham Street and approach the cab office, there’s the usual bunch of tired, surly drivers sitting outside. Their eyes flick over me and draw the obvious conclusions; I lower the peak of my baseball cap ‘don’t look at my eyes’. I take a deep breath and go up to a heavyset Greek looking guy who looks the friendliest” how much to Angel?” He looks up, “bout seven quid love.”

I nod “that’s great!” We start to walk to the car, as I hand him the last of my cash I add “there is one thing though, I’ve just been kicked out my flat and the only thing the landlord let me take was my drum kit, would it be ok if we picked it up on the way? …I’ve got to get it to my bloke’s, it’s the most precious thing I own.” He sighs “ok where is it?” Who knows if he believes me, who cares? Pulling up in Whitfield street Steve scuttles out of the shadows and pops the boot, I jump out triumphant and help him load. On the way up to Angel we wax lyrical about ‘bastard landlords’ even the driver joins in “they’re all wankers, greedy that’s what they are!” We get home and Steve insists on setting up the kit in the basement, then we’re off again, on foot, heading for Smithfield’s meat market. The markets a real life saver. Long after all the shops and bike dealers have gone to bed there’s Smithfields; full of porters lugging carcasses and bone tired lorry drivers, all with an eye for a bargain. The only look out is the security, all puffed up with self-importance and tight with Snow Hill police. They’re meant to be there to guard the meat for god’s sake, not to make our lives hard. Steve starts striding and I grumble “slow down”. My feet ache, I’m tired, the gears wearing off... my feet ache. We hurry, getting there in about twenty minutes. We enter the meat market walking under red and green wrought iron arches through the bustle, and put our heads in the Chinese café. One of the porters in his blood smeared white bib and hat tells us Pete might be worth a try. We track him down offloading chicken in East Poultry. Pete’s from somewhere up North with a scraggly moustache, turkey neck and big sad eyes. Steve has a quick chat with him; he’s interested in the drums. It’s nearly 4. We wait until Pete’s finished then jump in his truck; we’re going back to Angel in a ten tonner as the sky slowly turns pink and silver with the dawn. It’s almost romantic. Time to relax a little, nearly over. Pete tells us that he wants to give his kids everything he never had, that’s why he’s buying the drum kit. We nod and make him right, glad

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to be part of his generosity. We pull into the tiny cul-de-sac where we live, Pete manoeuvres the lorry in with five inches to spare either side. Steve, ever the salesman, enthuses about all the benefits of owning a drum kit and why it makes the perfect gift for any child. A price is agreed upon and, feeling magnanimous, Steve throws in a Russian rubber dinghy we’ve had lying around for an extra tenner. The lorry pulls out with kit on board and we wave it off, cash in pocket, commenting on what a nice bloke that Pete is.

Our legs have started aching; we trudge down to King’s Cross and wait for the frontline to wake up. Job done.

Belle is a mature student at Sussex university. She has written short stories both fictional and not so fictional throughout her life. This one is set in London some time in the mid nineties.

Light at the End of the tunnel -Michelle D’costa Just when I feared My footprints Would be dissolved in darkness forever Just when I thought I should give up, I remembered the inventor of the light bulb And how many attempts it took him to succeed Then I looked at the map I had created for myself On my wrist My path to freedom It might look like a maze to you But it’s a smooth road for me Even though dark I tried to ignore My constant companion Mr. Merciless Mockery Who guffawed at my failure Through my veins Maybe I was closer this time


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How many more tries? I was right It was right there! But I hadn’t noticed it! My last addition to the path Completed the pattern And Made me see the light At the end of the tunnel Mr. Merciless Mockery took his last breath And I smiled at Edison’s ghost For being my beacon

you -Enya Sanders It was a word A word. A light. A smile. They enticed me to you. You. The perfection that is you. The perfection that still blinds my eyes With your beauty and your charm Charmed. I've been under your spell. The spell which is a cloud of happiness. Happiness. Yet it was filled with rain. Acid rain. Which still burns my heart. The same heart which still yearns for your love. Love, love, love. Was it ever really love? Was it? Was it really that beautiful emotion? Or was it all your spell? Your charm? Your beauty? Your perfection? You.

Michelle D’costa loves literature. She is an Indian raised in Bahrain.Her prose/poetry has appeared in 20 online/print literary magazines like Big River Poetry Review, eFiction India etc.You’ll find her latest work on Boloji.com and Hackwriters.com.She edits at Decades Review. She is also the runner-up of poetandgeek.com poetry competition 2012 and much more.

Enya Sanders, this being her pen name, is an aspiring author aged fourteen, who resides in the UK. She has been writing since the age of eight, her first story being a Club Penguin fan fiction. From then on, she has gone on to write various genres of stories, from her fantasy novel 'Purgatory' , to the step-by-step guide to improving stories in various ways 'Writing Techniques and Tips'. She is currently working on several stories , which can be found on her profile page on Movellas.com.


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jk Over the past decade technology has continued to develop more and more, with mobile phones, video game consoles and other gadgets experiencing reincarnation after reincarnation, many would say that it is only fitting that the world of literature should follow this evolution, thus the chance of further improving our reading experiences.

With the rise of the E-book, writing websites that resemble Youtube and the convenience of our favourite bookstores in front of our computer screens, good and bad points about digital publishing has been debated, and hopefully I will give you, dear reader, a good perspective of both.

Ye Online Bookshop:

Thanks to the ever-growing computer and the Internet, people are offered chances to browse and buy books from websites right in the comfort of their living room, bed or even mobile phone. Reputable shopping websites such as Amazon.com, Lulu.com and websites for familiar bookstores such as Waterstone’s, Foyle’s and other famous names all over the world offer customers both new and old the same quality of the same book that you would pick up in local branches.

Another good advantage online shopping brings is the ability to pre-order books and other merchandise which are not available yet to be bought physically. This gives you the chance to buy the actual book even early and have it delivered to your doorstep on the day of its release.

A Writer’s Refugee THE

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The World Of Digital Publishing

-Troy Cabadia


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Although you might have to pay a small fee for the delivery, many customers prefer this service because it’s more efficient, eliminating the need for having to wait for opening times and cueing in long lines.

E-Books, literature of the future:

E-Books are forms of literature which are published digitally and can be read on your laptop, desktop or other devices such as the Kindle or e-Reader. The Oxford Dictionary of English defines them as “an electronic version of a printed book”. Sounds pretty high-tech, right?

Like traditionally published books, E-Books can be bought (or can only be bought) in online shopping websites. Most PDF-formatted E-Books use Adobe as this program can be read in most computers and mobile devices.

Likened to mp3 songs, they can be downloaded and be imported into readers’ Kindle or iPhone with ease. With only this device in their hand, readers can carry a multitude of books ready anywhere and anytime. This eliminates any physical hassle a typical reader may get like having to handle clunky bags or increased weight in your suitcases when traveling abroad.

Books on Battery:

With such devices like the e-Reader within reader’s reach, it is now possible to read your book wherever you are, and in whatever situation you’re in. Imagine being in a dark bedroom with someone sleeping and you’re dying to read this new book of yours. You can bet opening the lights would wake that person up. With e-Readers and other devices which support digital published books, readers will have no problem like this as the lighting in their device (which can be adjusted) will be enough.

However, like constant usage of computers, always using these gadgets will cause your eyes to be strained and can cause sight problems in the future. Also, e-Readers are virtually useless when their batteries run out and there are no spares or electricity around.

Environmentally Friendly E-Books:

E-Books, obviously, are printed online and don’t need paper. This then makes publication considerably cheaper than their traditional counterparts, and for this reason, opting for the electronic version of the new book would be more practical and easier for your wallet. This could also create a positive effect on the environment, as with less paper used means deforestation will be a process less used. The low cost would also mean the author will be getting less money with each copy sold, which could strain their income to support themselves for writing more in the future.

The First Step:

The evolution of digital publishing allows beginners to the business a chance to get started on getting their work seen and start a fan base. Online publishing websites such as Lulu.com gives writers the opportunity to publish their work out by following basic steps into how to create a cover, how to lay out the content and how to format their work, either by E-Book or in physical book form.


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At the same time, the evolution of digital publishing also makes it harder for writers to get noticed in the middle of all these new writers emerging from nowhere. Getting noticed for their hard work will be more of a challenge than before.

Some people opt for digital publishing because they’ve created something for a very specific group of people and for those people only. One of my old teachers digitally published a personalised yearbook for him and his fellow alumni from his university, which, as it was set in a reasonable price, did its purpose: to be bought by those former students.

As with any new invention created every day, people will always find good and bad things to point out which can manipulate mainstream ideas into thinking a certain way about that invention, and the E-Book vs. The Traditional Book argument is the same.

he Nods -Steeve Moore He nods at the simplest question he frowns when it's not his turn A mediocre politician in the making an opinion for everyone He says that he will help you he insists it's not for fun This vastly experienced gobshite unfortunately, not the only one He waffles for a living he lies just to exist A subhuman interpretation of an exceedingly superior twit.

Steve Moore is a freelance writer and Poet. He writes for many online poetry sites such as Elbow Lane and he is an avid member of The Dublin Writers Forum. Steve has previously written for magazines such as The Big Issues and Irish Music Press. Steve uses his unique position as the youngest member of a family of fourteen and as a police officer to portray his life experiences in a truly distinctive way.


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reading

Shelley, again

-Chew Yi Wei

Today, I run my fingers along a row of books placed alphabetically, according to author, on the third tier of my bookshelf, the poetry tier, where I have through the years collected a few precious copies of the poets and poems that matter, to me. Most of the books on this row are wrapped in plastic, an indication of an obsessive phase I once harboured with keeping my books pristine, ensuring that they stand resilient against the ravages of time and mildew. I pick out a thick volume Shelley’s Poetry and Prose, a Norton Critical Edition, selected and edited by Donald H. Reiman and Sharon B. Powers, a copy I acquired from Kinokuniya Bookstore on the 2nd of June 2001.

I have a habit of dating my books on the day I purchase or receive them. Dating affords me a latterly knowledge of just how it was when I decided to claim ownership of the book, a reliving of the moment when literary desire, dream and ambition culminated into its purchasing; more significantly, it allows me to remember the years between, how I came to know about the book, how I and the book have grown and changed, the different and accumulating experiences adding another layer of perspectival richness. It is a precious, evolving relationship one has between her book and herself, her unfolding life, most keenly felt in the act of rereading, of revisiting a world one thought she lost, or a world she met so long or short a time ago. Sometimes the book becomes an old lover, sometimes a new enemy. In the most ideal of circumstances, the reader speaks to her book as it speaks to her, continuing from where they left off; a deepening conversation they started at a certain time and place. An unspoken understanding and a curious, profound sort of

chemistry is this conversation trellised with despite the length of days when both did not communicate. Otherwise, but no less desirably, the book and the reader cease to culminate in the meeting of minds. An estrangement ensues and perhaps a tenseness of feeling irrupts, germinates and grows till another day when and where they may or may not collude again.

C.S. Lewis says of rereading: “No book is really worth reading at the age of ten which is not equally – and often far more – worth reading at the age of fifty and beyond”. Rereading can change the way we remember, love or even detest the book, and such an act alone invariably transforms the trajectory of this very intricate relationship. Anne Fadiman, in the preface to her edited volume Rereadings, asks most succinctly, “Do we stop loving them (i.e. our books)?” even as the relationship between the reader and the read evolves beyond recognition? In her very question lies her very answer. I cannot possibly speak for every reader, but I can say without an iota of doubt that my own answer lies in the happy negative. Lover or enemy they may become, I have never stopped and will never stop loving these selected, especial books – the books that I have chosen, the books that have chosen me.

*

Back in early 1998, my O Level results were released. The agonizing wait for the results proved worthwhile; much to my thrilled, though passing sense of delight, I managed to ace all my subjects, the Sciences, Mathematics and Humanities alike. Under such auspices, I was in a fix as to what I should read in Junior College. The choice of college and subjects became both an enterprise of excitement and predicament. Two years in a heavy curricular blitz and scramble, just to prepare for a national exam called the A Levels: was it worth making the Humanities my choice? (It is hard to score in subjects that do not equate 1 and 1 with 2! What are you going to do after that anyway? Teach?) Or was I better off taking the more orthodox route of the Sciences? (At least the answers are fixed; subjectivity is suicidal! – well for your A Levels at least! Getting into the University should be your first priority. You wouldn’t want to screw around with your grades!). These were the less-than-visionary

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questions I asked myself as I stared at the form, in a quandary of what or what not to do. In the background, voices of authority and apparent commonsense blared, further interfering in my decision-making. Amidst the swirl of supposedly wise exhortations, it did not occur to me to make the choice between real education and practical learning (did I even know the difference?); what could potentially chisel a smoother path to the University was undoubtedly of greater concern. Choosing the Commerce Faculty was never a remote consideration because Accounting and its conterminous proclivity for long lists of numbers never appealed to me, so that, at the very least, made me a little less spoilt for choice. History was a bad experience due to the rigorous memorization I had to endure in Secondary School (no, I had not yet begun to realize that History was NOT about memorization; the ludicrous exam-oriented experience of the O Levels had scarred me momentarily and myopically), Literature was fun but frivolous, and dangerous; Chemistry was fascinating and I didn’t mind Mathematics in its non-applied form. With these subjects spread out before me like a buffet, I considered and re-considered my options alongside the familiar and unassailable dictum of why opting for the Science stream was more sensible, more realistic, and hence more desirable. “You will have more options,” I was repeatedly told. “You can later choose Science or Arts in the University. If you choose the Arts now, you close the door to doing Science later,” I was constantly reminded. Of course I knew such advice to be well intentioned, and to a certain degree, true. After all, the Singaporean curriculum was and still is largely inclined towards the Mathematics and the Sciences – and for good reason; the economy needs its economists, engineers, doctors and researchers. Perhaps the only useful thing about the Arts was that it could arguably prepare one for Law. But I did not want to be a lawyer; I never did. Under the rain and reign of such pragmatic societal counsel, I almost came to believe that reading the Arts was nothing more than an exercise in futility, an automatic trajectory to a “dumping ground” as was the parlance of the 1990s, for those who “could not make it” – another proverbial

Singaporean truism that is still in active currency today.

So, after much dawdling and dithering, my mind was finally made up; I knew what was the right thing to do. But just when I was about to write the words “St Andrew’s Junior College (Science),” something moved within me and for some strange, inexplicable reason, I penned instead the words “St Andrew’s Junior College (Arts)”. Not that I had any particular preference for the Arts at that point in time, it was Science I was more confident in to boot. Not that I even possessed any great desire in choosing Literature as a subject. Yes, I had read it for my O Levels, but I never truly appreciated or understood its essence; I merely saw it as a subject that my secondary school made compulsory. However, I was now given a choice – to read or not to read Literature – and I thought with a combination of fear and flippancy: “I’ll just give it a go.” One could say then that that was one of the most unplanned, hasty last-minute decisions I ever made: I thus threw myself into a gamble, a universe of unpredictability – a bigger, better, brighter universe where I would later meet so many kindred spirits that danced around in the fervid hunt for metaphors, in the dalliance and suturing of words – in the sphere of Literature.

And this was a choice, a journey that I never ever looked back on. Truth be told, it wasn’t all that seamless or effortless, especially at the incipient stages; the journey began fraught with regret, with anger, but it soon proved the only journey, transforming my confused and lonely destiny of wandering into one that was fulfilling and sure. Since that pivotal moment, I arrived at an epiphanic certainty that I wanted to write, to read, to make Literature an integral part of my life, my every breath. Shortly after I embarked on this stony, knobby trail, I knew that I had, without an iota of dissatisfaction, been on the perpetual but happy search for what Boey Kim Cheng in his aptly titled poem “Another Place” calls the “vanished song,” awaiting reclamation, revelation and profession in a distracted globe.

Of course it would be naïve to assume that Literature alone can feed a famished stomach, and I have in many moments through the years doubted, disdained even the thought that it

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could in any remote way save the world, or improve the human condition, as many people are wont to proclaim. But when the smog clears, when there is less time and place for cynicism, my memory of knowing Shelley – of those halcyon days when my Literature lessons were the only means of grace in a seemingly damp and dull curriculum - I am reminded of why I was drawn to the world of poesy and its larger universe of Literature in the first place, and there begins again a much needed sense of awakening, a fire that rekindles and reinvigorates a world so beset with both boredom, and violence. Wallace Stevens, in his poem “Not Ideas About The Thing But The Thing In Itself” captures the small but powerful cry of poetry, and Literature:

That scrawny cry – it was

A chorister whose c preceded the choir.

It was part of the colossal sun,

Surrounded by its choral rings,

Still far away. It was like

A new knowledge of reality.

I cannot begin to justifiably articulate Wallace’s majestic disjuncture between the “scrawny cry” and the “new knowledge of reality” attained by and through the poet and his art. “Life’s unquiet dream,” its proclivity for pecuniary measures, political might, environmental degradation and technological aspiration notwithstanding, Literature is perhaps the only recourse capable of that cosmic leap into the space of human connection, of our renewed conversation with the world as we strive to make sense of it each day.

*

I came to know about Percy Bysshe Shelley in 1998, after those curricular choices were administered, keyed into the system, cast in stone. Albeit choosing Literature as an A Level subject, I was totally unprepared for Shelley. Like a persona non grata, he stormed his way into my very immature mind – I was only 16 going on 17 – without warning, without

prompting. Prior to that year, Shelley was nothing less than a stranger; his name a complete question mark, a blank; a human being I never knew existed. Our introduction to each other was therefore defined more by a grudging handshake than a familiar “I have seen and heard of you before” one.

Nevertheless, despite his almost presumptuous and unexpected emergence into my world, Shelley soon became an indispensible and permanent resident, his poetry irreversibly embellishing, enriching and enlivening my otherwise parched and barren mental terrain. As soon as I got him, as soon as his poems started to fuel a small but spirited stirring in me, I knew that he was the one who would lead the way, who would open up rivulets, streams that debouched into the wide ocean of poetry, into the citizenry of poets. There are poets whose works I have subsequently fell in love with and who have become impeccable sources of literary influence – Robert Frost, Walt Whitman, TS Eliot, Tomas Tranströmer, Boey Kim Cheng, Lee Tzu Pheng, Arthur Yap – but no one else can ever replicate Shelley’s role in this sublime initiating experience, in my literary bar mitzvah.

We were told to purchase our Literature texts early in the new semester. Shelley came in the form of a thin volume titled Percy Bysshe Shelley Selected Poems, a Dover Thrift Edition: a volume with a floridly pastoral cover supposed to represent 36 of his signature works. I took a cursory glance at it, aimlessly leafed through the pages without actually bothering to read any of the poems in detail. When I made a random and feeble attempt to read just few lines from “Hymn To Intellectual Beauty,” all I could utter was a crude profanity, expressing perplexity rather than profundity. Like every typical Singaporean student, I thought I’d simply let the teacher do the explaining and then proceed to memorize what he or she says for the sake of answering the examination questions.

But oh! How wrong I was! For starters, my teacher, a veritable presence of a woman – the unmistakable Ms K - commanding, domineering and highly prepossessing, inducted us into Shelley’s oeuvre not through any poem from the collection but by throwing us, in a manner most unsympathetic and

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unaffected, Wordsworth’s “Preface to Lyrical Ballads” and Shelley’s “A Defence of Poetry”. “Read it before class on Monday,” she boomed, and then swiftly proceeded to walk out of the classroom. That was my first lesson on Shelley. We looked at her, and then at Wordsworth’s and Shelley’s manifestos, and stared helplessly at each other, wondering in the oppressive heat of the late afternoon what sort of trouble we were in for.

During the weekend, I tried sincerely to get past the first few lines of what was abruptly flung at us, but to my dismay, I remained in a trance-like loss. For the very first time since I made my choice to read Literature, I lamented in desperation that I wanted to make the switch back to Science. In that world, there would at the very least be no place for the foreignness of language and register, no fanciful, inaccessible English to plough through; everything in that more ordered world was either yea yea or nay nay. Over and over again, I tried to sieve through, to decode what was written, but over and over again, I continued to hit an unenlightened dead end. Nothing got through to me in spite of my fastidious efforts in paraphrasing their convoluted syntax; Wordsworth and Shelley remained in a cryptic double bind and I imagined the poets mocking me, in all their Romantic loftiness, for being an unsophisticated philistine; I cursed them in return for making my life miserable. I was livid in large part because I could not understand the readings; they were as alien to me as those few lines I briefly read in “Hymn To Intellectual Beauty”; at the same time, I wanted – in a bid to make myself feel better – to blame my teacher for leaving me to sink in a mire of words that I had difficulty digesting.

What did Wordsworth mean by good poetry being the “spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings”? Why was he so caught up with the way language was used? Did it matter? Why was poetry, to Shelley, “the expression of the Imagination”? What did Shelley mean by the “true and beautiful”? Why should the poet be deemed “prophet”?

Marianne Moore says most factually that “we / do not admire what / we cannot understand” and I suppose this proved only too true in my

initial laborious trawling of Wordsworth and Shelley. “Surely these people were too free,” I thought as I sloppily underlined those hallowed phrases of the two treatises. Soon, my copy of Wordsworth’s and Shelley’s writings were filled with highlighter marks and crooked pen lines; I merely marked out randomly what I thought looked like sound bites. Before anything could be given proper cognition, I found myself head on desk, sleeping the afternoon away.

The following Monday, Shelley was further introduced to me via a question. “Did you all bother reading any of the articles I gave out?” Ms K asked in her signature sardonicism. Silence was the reply. I was mesmerized by her eloquence and impeccable ability to be so authoritative, witty and intimidating all at the same time. She waited for some brave soul to answer her question before she proceeded to talk about the readings. Eventually, someone raised her hand, gingerly, much to the relief of the rest of the class, and that was how the lesson started proper.

Within that short span of an hour, I found, to my amazement and comfort, a growing interest in Shelley and Wordsworth. By some stroke of serendipity, I realized too that my unthinking highlighting of those quotes were in fact largely accurate for they were the very points we were asked to discuss in relation to Shelley’s poems. Like an acquired taste, these two poets began to grow on me, my frustration for them slowly transforming into admiration, elusiveness into understanding. No longer were they inaccessible or esoteric; a conversation between us ensued and Shelley’s love for the Imagination began to possess me just as Wordsworth’s spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings began to grip me.

As the days passed, Shelley became kismet, his friend Wordsworth trailing shortly behind. The former’s poems I gave to willing memorization that I could quote him as and when I wanted, ventriloquizing almost his observations on disappointment, change and most of all, the Imagination. One of my first favorites was the short little poem titled “Mutability,” of which I can till today chime the last line like a maxim cast in stone. My best friend Kelvin and I would spend hours talking about how Shelley was right in understanding life to be one of constant

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change, our adolescent fascination for the paradoxical “Naught may endure but Mutability” resonating with the vicissitudes of being 17 and dealing with the issues of growing up in an education system we felt increasingly alienated from but simultaneously bound to. It was almost as though Shelley understood us, our urge to run away into another universe where we could run the Elysium fields without the burden of teenage obligations; soon enough he became our little private nation, a kindred spirit we could invoke when we felt the rigors of exams, parents and personal angst catch up with us.

We loved his acknowledgement of life’s fragility, and mutability; I remember scribbling lines and lines of Shelley in my organizer, trying my best to appreciate the inevitability of death in my still very young life. “The flower that smiles today tomorrow dies”. What was the point of all this work, the building of an establishment when all these were but temporal, when we merely “wake to weep” when the day breaks? The delicate but poignant imagery of the flower, its sudden and short-lived beauty so given to passing, stirred me, fed my increasingly Romantic sensibilities and rooted me to its tragic end.

At those moments, I wondered if I finally came to an understanding of what Shelley meant by “the true and the beautiful,” that Art in its poetic form, terse and compact, was all about capturing the fleeting and the fleeing, that the poem alone was structurally capable of emblematizing and immortalizing the ephemeral. That was true. That was beautiful: the catching of vast ironies, of fraught incongruities in measured meter, in linguistic cadence. In Shelley, I saw the profusion and proliferation of the human imagination; the poet-prophet was therefore the bastion of humanism, able to push the limits of the mind and the heart, uplifting humanity to an aesthetic level and potential it never knew it had. Though Shelley’s constant allusions to Nature were nothing I could reasonably appreciate – for what could a 17-year-old living in a tropical, urbanized city possibly know of the fields, the skylark, the mountains? – they still managed to strike a deep chord within me,

creating for me a world in which I could escape, a world vibrating with geographies of my imagination. It didn’t matter that I had never traveled to Shelley’s England and Europe. The mind and its limitless imagination, just as he had prophesized, were sufficient for me, a skylark singing and flying on its own terms, in its own time.

Solitude, a virtue to Shelley became an indispensible part of my life. After the end of each day, I chose to avoid the crowded bus stop where hoards of school mates would gather, that I could retreat into Shelley’s words. Instead, I made a detour towards another bus stop, further away, and quieter. There used to be a pink steel bridge that arched across the canal at the old Gillman Barracks, linking Malan Road to Alexander Road. I would cross that bridge, just to gain the cheap thrill of suspension and height, and make my way to the bus stop at Depot Road. The bus ride home from that particular bus stop was ostensibly longer, but at least I could immerse myself in Shelley’s Alastor, his Spirit of Solitude – where the deep reservoir of the mind was faraway from the maddening crowd, where the spirit was able to delve deep into its own “inmost sanctuary,” and be in irreplaceable company with the Poet, the “nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds” – as I watched the passing monotonous landscape of HDB flats, tiny green spaces, angsana trees, rain trees and cars from the window of Bus 195 as it sped along its daily route in the afternoon heat. Accompanying us was the music of Ani De Franco emanating from my Discman, her vexed lyrics couched in acoustically folksy tunes; us three, Shelley, De Franco and I, railing against institutions and establishments in a three-way solitudinous interaction.

*

While most of his poems became increasingly accessible to me as time went by, there was however one which I had immense difficulty understanding. “Hymn To Intellectual Beauty,” the poem whose lines I read so much earlier on, came back to me like haunting. Some time in the first year of junior college, Ms K decided that we should all stay back after school one afternoon that she could deliver a special

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lecture on it. We marched reluctantly to the lecture theatre that late afternoon, knowing that we would most probably stare blankly at her as she went on her expectedly abstruse spiel about the poem. And true enough, after about an hour and a half, all of us walked out of the lecture theatre in a daze, not understanding an iota. I remember trying to take down some notes, but gave up fifteen minutes into the lecture.

Later that night, I decided that I had to get it right. Shelley had after all been able to speak to me in all the poems that I had studied so far. The moment I finished my dinner, I rushed into my room, forsaking my Mathematics C tutorial and the Economics lecture notes I promised myself to read, and flipped immediately to the poem. I pondered on just who this “unseen Power” was and why indeed it was manifested in an “awful shadow”. The more I read, the more the poem began to make sense to me, the more its meaning and form started to assume contours of greater lucidity. After about an hour or so of harvesting those questions, I hit upon a fusillade of discovery, a subliminal moment of revelation, that the Spirit Shelley spent the entire poem panegyrizing was his Muse, his inspiration. I suppose Ms K did mention it during the lesson, but the weight of the day and the dim lighting in the lecture theatre somehow overwhelmed me more than her – in retrospect – very commendable lecture. Soon, I too desired a muse that would guide me away from the “dim vast vale of tears” and into a place where I could “fear” myself and at the same time “love all human kind”. That Shelley was fixated with meter and language as defining elements of poetry, this poem was for me one of his culminating poetic achievements. I was enraptured by the poem’s metrical scheme, the ending of each stanza committed to a tight iambic pentameter; the lilting and rhythmic cadence of each syllable rolling off my tongue, sweetly, smoothly as I read the lines aloud in the privacy of my own company. Indeed, it was akin to a religious exaltation, an invocation and ode to a Muse that could so easily elude the poet and his art, the “ecstasy” of its “shadow” falling on the poet an intense yearning only he could comprehend.

I went to bed that night satisfied, in spite of the unfinished Maths tutorial being a persistent source of buggering.

*

When my mother was diagnosed with advanced breast cancer in 1999, my second year in junior college, Shelley grew a little distant for a while as I tried my best to cope with the news. Yet, he never quite left; he was always hanging around the further corners of my life, waiting to resurface. In time, I came to accept that my mother was indeed faced with an illness that was, in very simple terms, terminal. But the more I thought about it, the more scared and angry I got. My thoughts were suffused with frightened prayers and unanswered questions, my heart experiencing a daily sunkenness of feeling. The Bible’s profound ruminations on mortality segued into Shelley’s poems about mutability, except that physical death was permanent. Nevertheless, I sought refuge in both, though I was, more often than not, plagued by an acute sense of fear more than I was with calm comfort.

Mutability and mortality became a part of my reality, the expanded boundaries of my knowledge. Suddenly, Shelley’s philosophy emerged from the abstract to the concrete. When I read about how he died at the tender age of 21, that he was in the midst of writing “The Triumph Of Life,” I was all the more seized and shaken by the jarring and cruel irony that presented itself to me at such a time. He was atheist and I, Christian. Despite our differences, we were both united by our frailty, our finitude – our glorious but broken humanity. No, Shelley’s poetry could neither save nor heal my mother, but it was to my adolescent self so vital, if not to feed my angst, then at least to placate it; it offered me a moment of indulgence that I craved, and perhaps needed.

My mother has since passed on, the illness claiming her one fine day, when I was 26 years of age. I did not think about Shelley the day she died. But my memory of her is still infused with the intertwining truths of mutability and mortality.

*

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I left junior college at the end of 1999 after taking my A Levels. I must admit that I worked hard for all my subjects, but it was only Literature that I excelled in, not because I studied for it as an examination subject but because I loved it for reasons beyond the extrinsic. If Literature were for me merely an examination requirement, my relationship with Shelley would not have existed, much less grown, in the first place. What I was to read in the University was obvious; there was no other way about it. I became a student of Literature, Theatre Studies and History, majoring eventually in the first two, maintaining Literature as my unwavering first love.

Reading Shelley again today at the age of 31, a good thirteen to fourteen years after my first meeting with him, I am thankful that I did not miss the woods for the trees. In a country that makes no apology for privileging Economics, Mathematics and the Sciences above the Humanities, Shelley is but a stranger, a misfit. But in the cacophony of noisy number crunching, land reclamation and building demolition, there is a scrawny voice reverberating in all its loneliness, and solitude, that there is at least somebody who has hearkened to the call to look to another place, a place away from the physical, a place in the woods, amongst trees, where Art is allowed to sit and commiserate with its companions. Real education for me began when I decided to move beyond the confines of the curriculum, into the frontiers of the Imagination. It was then that I truly saw the value of learning; a long, enduring path that I have walked to this day, through the years.

In the years between then and now, I have intermittently pulled out my Norton edition of Shelley, for no other reason than to read some of his poetry again, to converse with an old friend again; to experience new realizations upon old poems, again. My A Level copy, the one by Dover Thrift Editions is now lost; I lent it to an acquaintance who wanted to retake her A Levels. The book, with all my notes copiously scribbled in it, never came back. But that’s no matter. True education is not about remembering one’s classroom notes, though there is undeniably an unshakable sense of sentimentality attached to it. Shelley’s poems, in whatever edition they are published in, remain for me the essence of his work, and my life. In any case, my current copy of Shelley is more than just 36 poems but his entire oeuvre. Without our unanticipated meeting more than a decade ago, I would have in all likelihood forsworn this path and taken another safer, more pragmatic one. As I linger on a little longer at my bookshelf with the page turned to “Mutabiity,” I am glad that I can, once again, meet with Shelley in a knowing conversational joust: my love for his poetry, his longstanding impact on me, has so far, throughout the years, unlike the title of his poem, been consistent, and unchanging. I close the book, in hopes of seeing him again, in a time I know not, when our friendship will be older, and riper.

Chew Yi Wei is a PhD student at the National University of Singapore. She has been published in Quarterly Literary Review Singapore, Transnational Literature and Journal of Post-Colonial Cultures and Societies. While focusing on her dissertation on Asian film, she also enjoys writing creative non-fiction and memoir essays.

Writing Prompt:

Create a story or poem inspired by a line in a David Lehman : “ Death was last seen in the auction room, looking worried.”


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Beat -Patrick Jamieson Feed me I’m starving— God rests In beads of sweat This frenzied Silhouette cannot survive By drinking God and His regret/ Rejected from The wanton mad Who spill The wine from barrels— Hymn seekers In the New York night Staining Broadway With their carols/ Reflected in The goodbye waves Black bile They savour pouring— Craving one Another’s salt and Sugar, Darling What’s left anymore/ Love them They’re starving— Adrift on Flotsam in the flood Their decadent

Silhouettes cannot survive On God And last year’s blood/ The Night and Her Bodies, Too - Cobblestone dreams, I beg of you to listen The skies ablaze in childish cries They say that blood was drawn; A knee scraped down The next forty years of overgrown relief And swing sets float forgotten Bear your labial intent Before the crescent moon And pray to be pried open

For the slaughter, Father, cannot Come too soon. Everything sleeps, even the night But we wait, watching The silence we conjure.

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P O E T R Y

Patrick Jamieson lives in Edinburgh, Scotland, idly spending his days stroking his cat's fur and his mother's hair. While supposedly at work, he sits at his computer desk daydreaming about stroking his cat's fur and his mother's hair. He happened upon a passion for writing when composing a belligerent e-mail to the shampoo company - who will go unnamed - responsible for the product that left his mother suffering from hair loss, only to find such activities resulted in his cat nestling on his lap. Ever since he has made his only friends with literature; he has rejected the day.


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J

How did you get interested in writing? I've always been a big reader since the age of eleven. Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone was the book that got me into reading, it also happens to be the book that got me into writing. JK Rowling's stories made inspired me to write and I did just that. After one short story and a couple of articles, I jumped straight into my first novel. It's called “You're an experiment. Yes, you!” Currently, I'm looking for a publisher and it’s tough to get Fantasy published in India. As you're starting out what do you wish to gain from writing? I'd like to take writing up as a full time profession. I want to do nothing but play Ultimate and write novels for the rest of my life. And yes, I'd like to make enough and more money from it so that I can keep writing. Where do you get your inspiration to write from? I've always had a strange thinking pattern. For instance, I can look at one simple, silly object and kick into a thought stream that happens to be so intricate and full of detail, that I sometimes surprise myself. So I turn these episodes of bizarre thought into material for my books.

An Author’s Profile

THE Inspiration

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up-Incoming author: getting started

Akash KJ is an up-incoming India author who has written one Urban Fantasy novel and is currently working on two other fantasy books as well. So I got the chance to interview him and find out what motivates someone new to the scene of writing.


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What's your schedule like as an up-incoming writer? I have a full time job and a full time post-graduation course in Television Production and Broadcast Journalism. So I try to juggle those two things and write for one or two hours a day or at least put in 2000 words. How do you get past "writer's block"? I don't believe in writer's block. Anytime I'm stuck with something, I go ahead and take a nice long walk or go meet my friends. If everything fails, I then go ahead and pick a fight with the first person I can find. This somehow makes me forget about the 'block' since I'm in so much pain after getting beat up. So there's really no room for writers block after that, an idea must turn up to keep you going. In most cases, I just power through and I eventually clear the blocks. Also, since I always write novels that have more than 4 parallel story lines, I can switch over to another character if I'm stuck with the current one. Do you have any favorite authors or favorite books and have they influenced you in any way? The Harry Potter series and Lord of The Rings trilogy have been very inspiring. Other notable authors who influenced me include Dan Brown, Ayn Rand, Doulas Addams and Mario Puzo. Also, a special mention to “The Hobbit”. What are you working on now? Two books, “Sinsinapatti” is a novel involving four chaotic people and it happens to be written for an Urban Indian audience. However, since it has such loud imagery, pretty much anyone will enjoy it. Apart from that I'm also working on a collaborative project with a friend, it’s called “Chicken and Paneer”. Do you do any research for the material you write? Nope. Until now, I've always created my own worlds since I'm too lazy to research. Also, I like the flexibility that one's own universe has to offer. I'm addicted to world building and so I'm going to keep going at it. For my first book, which was fantasy, I spent close to year on nothing but world building and the experience was amazing. Even Sinsinapatti is based in an imaginary city. At the moment, I'm considering writing a book on Gandhi; it's going to be historical fiction. And so I'll have to do a ton of research for that book. Do you have a certain place or time for when you work on your books? Honestly, I'm not fortunate enough to have a nice little nook. I don't even have a desk. I used two massive cardboard boxes as a make shift desk. And I write whenever I'm feeling good, mornings usually or late nights. And the final question, what would you say to any other aspiring authors coming up? Keep writing. When my first book got rejected by a few publishing houses, I went ahead and started writing two more. I believe in my work and I've got nothing but positive feedback from people who've read my stuff. So I know for sure that my work will get published one day and that I will be a big deal. Also, most writers hope to write an amazing novel someday. Well, that 'someday' happens to be today. Stop waiting, start writing right away. And when people ask me how I write so much so fast, I tell them that if you want something bad enough, then you'll end up doing


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it. I completed a 1400 page manuscript “You're an experiment. Yes, you!” in less than two years and I have six more books coming up in that series. So yes, start writing and don't stop. Relate every single element in your thought stream to your books and you'll find thousands of ideas coming at you from all around and you'll never have writers block every again.

Interviewed by : Christopher Stewart

full Life In The Day Of A Poet

-Dah

The Poet Writes:

Dawn. The sun’s big display creates its fortune.

The Poet rises in a beam. Small birds chirp

near the Poet’s smile. The day’s marvelous

reality. A phenomenon. Should the Poet

doubt reality when it lives in his senses?

The Poet Writes:

Noon. A sudden change in the hour’s hand;

light floats its bright balloon. The birds insist

more songs. The afternoon’s various glitters

are thrown into the air. The Poet’s mind;

a warm breeze flows.


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The Poet Writes:

Night. A crimson lavender sky ushers

the darkness. Nighttime’s stillness

spills from creation’s hands. The Poet

is silent. Memories burn his nerves.

Like an octopus, his hand clutches a pencil.

Like fine hairs, splintered graphite falls to the paper.

The Poet Writes …

Transparent women -Daniela Voicu

pink fog fluid february morning, no one blinks ... you could see as I pray to the sun on mats with traditional motifs ocean pearl ... to remain joyful to my rhymes where all women put in the hair lover's name waiting for Valentines Day others expect a new Pope- red dresses matching the colors of green from heaven. we are transparent women we can sneak up on Beethoven's piano without even the time noticing us

Dah is the author of two books of poetry, ‘In Forbidden Language’ and ‘The Second Coming’, both published by Stillpoint Books. His third book of poetry is due for publication in early 2014, also from Stillpoint Books. He is currently working on the manuscript for his fourth book of poetry. Dah lives in Berkeley, California, where he teaches yoga, meditation, and deep relaxation to

children and adults.


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playing, swept our ankle in water dressed in purple silk like nymphs with long legged crayfish when memory burn in hell we can go back in time breathing deep, rejuvenating our smile ...

Too few To Mention -Jeff Dupuis

Tanya hates her husband, and what's more, she expects me to hate my wife just as much. Disc one of Ella Fitzgerald Sings The Cole Porter Songbook spins behind a plastic panel, vertically, in the CD player/clock on her night table. Tanya calls this romantic music. Track eight, “I'm Always True To You In My Fashion” plays softly. Her head is on my chest. Long, wavy blonde hair spreads out in all directions. A sheen of sweat gives her bare back a gentle glow. Each breath flows through her painted lips and over the edge of my ribs like water over falls.

“I want to laugh and cry, it's been so long,” she says.

“Maybe we should open the window, let this place air out before your husband comes home.”

“I don't care about Derek.”

“Uh, okay, but he'll care.”

I've seen Tanya a handful of times since high school. In our final year we sat next to each other in a political science class. She wasn't really into that subject, or any subject really, but I was, and I helped her study for the exam. I didn't have a chance with her back then. Tanya was always sexy, and it wasn't because of the clothes or the cleavage. She wasn't a slut or anything, though she had some experience, and it wasn't just her body. It was how she carried herself. But she liked

Daniela Voicu ( 6 April 1977) is a Romanian poet, novelist and painter. In 2009, she founded the international journal of culture and literature, Cuib Nest Nido; and in 2011 she founded the international poetry festival of music and contemporary art, The Art to be Human in Switzerland. Since 2009, she has been a member of the Writers' League of Romania.

Are you a published author? Or have a book launch soon? Let us know about your book, Miracle loves promoting new authors and we would love to help you in any way we can. Just email us at [email protected] about your book with a short summary.

P.S Poetry Collections are also welcome.


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bigger guys, hockey and football players, not tall, skinny, hunched-over losers.

She's bigger now, twelve years out of high school and her metabolism has slowed. She still has her curves, she's still sexy, but she's puffier and sags more, thicker in the hips and around the waist. I'm bigger too, now, after a decade of hitting the gym. I've corrected my posture and ditched the Goodwill wardrobe for designer labels.

My interview finished early and I didn't have to file my story until the next day. My afternoon was free and I went walking along Bloor Street, from used bookstore to used bookstore, killing time so that I could surprise Maria, my wife, when she got off work. That was the plan anyway. It changed when I saw Tanya and a friend drinking sangria on a patio, Tanya's hair catching the sunlight in its waves. She looked fantastic in a striped dress that looked like a long, wool sweater. I put both hands on the fence separating the rest of the sidewalk from the patio and said “hello”.

Tanya had been working in a beauty salon since graduating high school, and then she decided she wanted more out of her life. I asked her more questions, mentioning little about myself, only that I was married. No mention of the old gang, I didn't want her running down the list of mutual acquaintances and asking how they all were. Maintaining eye contact, I asked her more and more questions like she was the subject of an interview. She stopped her recap abruptly, flagged down the waitress, ordered more sangria, and continued. She still worked at the salon part-time, but had decided to go to university. She was enrolled in an academic bridging program, a course designed to reacquaint older people with academia before they enrolled as students. Her companion, Margaret? Margarite?, was also from the program and they had both just finished a class discussing the merits of Moby Dick. I stood

up, approached our waitress at the till near the bar, which was dark compared to the patio, and settled the tab. Tanya objected after the fact, I said I only had credit and didn't want to split up the bill for my two gin and tonics. She offered me money, to which I replied she owed me and could take me out for coffee. It was like fencing, my fente, her riposte, finishing with corps a corps.

She rolls over and off me, taking the sheet with her. With it wrapped around her like a wedding gown, the train dragging over our clothes scattered on the floor, she goes and opens the window. The brown and red brick of the building across the alley is clearly visible through the opening, traffic noises filter up and into the apartment.

“How come we never got together?” She's looking down at something.

I want to say “because you were never interested, because I was never your type.” I say nothing for a while. She sits on the edge of the bed with her back to me. A car horn honks outside.

“Derek will be home soon,” Tanya says.

She turns toward me, still holding the sheet over her chest. A different woman than the one from the patio earlier is looking at me now, a sad, serious woman.

“We both married so young, too young.”

I nod at this without thought. Then I'm hit by guilt, a noose of betrayal tightens around my throat. I thought this was about sex, two people who never got to have it with each other getting a second chance. I can see now that it's something else.

“You should go,” she says.

Jeff Dupuis writes poetry and short fiction, and reviews non-fiction and how-to books. His work has been published in The Barnstormer, Foliate Oak Magazine , Valve, The River Journal, Turbulence, Rolling Thunder Quarterly, and blogTO. In his off-hours Jeff likes to train in the martial arts, or if nothing else, watch straight-to-DVD martial arts movies. Jeff Dupuis lives and works in Toronto, Canada.

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A Journal Review : eFiction India

Reviewed By: Michelle D’Costa

Most of us need a reason to do something, a muse. For writers/artists it has been eFiction

India. Upon interacting with eFiction India contributors I learnt that the reviews they receive for their writing through eFiction submission manager- Submishmash are very encouraging.Even rejections have constructive criticisms. eFiction India team members are diverse in intellect, talent, age, cultural background etc. from Pakistan, SriLanka, India and also Bahrain. It is a sister product of U.S magazine eFiction. Nikhil Sharda (India editor) has vouched that he won’t disappoint Doug Lance (Chief Editor) instead he will surprise him. The magazine accepts flash fiction, encourages submissions through writing prompts, seeks illustrations to accompany the published works and much more. Recently eFiction India posted a flash fiction ‘Like and Love’ as ‘Free story of the month’ on its website which has received very positive reviews so far. They are an encouraging family which always have room for more talents. Contributors get a free copy in which their work has been featured. If you have an even better fortune of getting your work turned into a song or film you will get that for free too!! Whatever the team does with your work, will be done only after seeking your permission. It recently released its first song ‘You and I’ based on the lyrics of a poem published in its February issue. You could expect some concrete poetry in its upcoming issues and stay tuned for more surprises your way. If hard work pays off they will be the best literary journal you have come across by the end of the year with not only poems turned into songs and stories turned into movies but writers/artists turned into icons.

Miracle Opportunities: As the magazine is going into print, we are gearing ourselves up for some great opportunities for everyone. So, if you are a writer or an artist join us on our mission while we still have some space. We are always open to new ideas and collaborative projects. On top of that, we are also looking for some volunteers for a new column that we are going to start. There is no qualification required, if you are a dedicated writer, just drop us an email.

We would love to have an every growing family for this magazine!

Remember, we like talking to new people, so send us an email at [email protected] 39


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A revolutionary Poem -Phillip Larrea Dear Sir- As to the violin left here in haste Upon your urgent departure from our harbor; I am sorry that our country’s situation Should render you no longer able to remain. Though she is presently ill-tuned, and lacks a case, I shall, with my utmost care, preserve her safety. Upon arrival to your seat of government, Please convey to your Ministry, this American Opposition is no small faction, as believed. They have taken into their heads, we are cowards, And will surrender to an armed force. They are wrong. This I affirm, and place my honour upon it. If it be within your power to undeceive On this point, at this critical time, you perform Such service to nations, as the world has not seen. They must hold out no false hope, no ignorance of Our real intentions. Rather than submit, I would Lend my hand to sink the whole island in the ocean. As to your collection of law books; you may be Willing to dispose of yours here, and replace them With better editions. I should be happy to Treat with you on this subject, in more peaceful times. My best wishes for your felicity attend Wherever you go. I remain your friend and servant…

Phillip Larrea is a syndicated columnist and wealth adviser in Sacramento, CA, U.S.A. In 2012, Phillip’s poems were published in 30 journals and anthologies including Outburst Magazine, The Poetry Bus Magazine and thefirstcut #7 (U.K.), as well as Nazar Look (Romania). In the U.S., Phillip has been published in The Decade Review, Rusty Nail, and the Brooklyn Voice, to name a few. He has two books scheduled for release in 2013; Our Patch (Writing Knights Press) published January 05, and We, the People (Cold River Press) in the spring.

THE Inspiration

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The Temple -Konrad Noronha

Upon yonder hill There stands a temple still No chanting, nor praying Break the sound around The trees around are silent There are no bird’s cries No music fills the hearts Of people while they till Not so long ago This temple’s bells had tolled The devout came and bore Offerings and much more A prayer, maybe, a desire From deep within the heart For everybody has one Whatever be his tenet But now it stands in silence A victim of mans hand The priests have long since gone, In ruins, the temple stands.

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Konrad Noronha has been writing poetry since his teens. He also writes short stories. His poetry is inspired by everyday events in his life - people he comes in touch with, places he has visited, events that strike him as significant. Poetry is his way of allowing him to daydream, create, and spread his ideas, thoughts and feelings. It connects him to a more spiritual dimension of his psyche.

Writing Prompt:

Use this personification to spark a poem or story: sorrow croons as love begs.


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Picture, Cap and Gown -Michael Lee Johnson Cap and gown history major, minor in math- graduation under the maple tree, bright red leaves, but the times don’t show it; a full face grins. There’s a shadow below your nose above your lips, it settles into a gray mixed day. You stand on farm land with no plow in hand or in the distance bare- no damn cows to be seen no red barn or damn homestead just open acres of space- and downed fences- and some idle brush blending with quill feathers flushed within a background of branches. Life is a simple picture. Life is a simple picture, repeating with tree shadows hovering around leaves. Dirt in the background dances freely- it’s here your memories are folded, into prairie winds. You are still framed in solid black and white- you can’t leave this space on your own, from now to your own eternity, to your salvation or your grave. Your whole life now has spots and spaces behind it. Did you grow older and have children? Did you marry a man of the plow or that chemist you had the brief affair with in agricultural school?

Did the graduation certificate rolled up in your hand like a squashed turnip, donut, or dead sea scroll fade by moisture and sun or wind up cursed with sand? I pull down your life and frame it here like a stage curtain handful of future, present, passed, and pasted in a space dimension of 3” x 5” tucked beneath a simple footnote in time.

Michael Lee Johnson lived 10 years in Canada during the Vietnam Era, now Itasca, IL, runs seven poetry sites, has many videos of YouTube, published 4 books/chapbooks, and has been published in 25 countries as of this date: http://poetryman.mysite.com/.


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The Very Hungry Ants

-Sara Koch

One morning, taking the five minute trip to Roath Park Primary School, I notice something fuzzy moving on the ground. I bend down and peer at it. It is a furry caterpillar, the colour of a leaf getting ready for autumn. It reminds me of the one that starred in The Very Hungry Caterpillar.

Excited – and thinking I’m doing a good deed – I pick it up, knowing some place it can live happily.

I didn’t eat mud like other toddlers. Instead, I was more concerned with what lived in the earth.

Creepy crawlies of all shapes and sizes – whether they looked plump and juicy, or were thin and flexible like arteries – bugs that flew or bugs that slid, all fascinated me.

Even after a few years the back garden was still the jungle I spent my time in as an explorer. The wall that separated our garden from next door’s was covered with so much ivy, that it looked like it was a straightjacket made out of barbed wire, holding the wall upright.

One by one I hunt out snails from the wall and hold them upside down. They look like pieces of gnocchi drenched in mildly bubbling sauce. I am intrigued by their eyestalks which stick out like pins that have been pushed into their cushions. I find it funny, and a lot of fun to brush my finger against their eye and watch the stalk quickly shrink, or disappear straight

into their bodies. After a while they slowly lengthen their eyestalk to see if it is safe – it reminds me of cartoons where you can see a telescope getting longer and shorter, with a huge eye taking place of the lens – but I just touch it again. I never get bored.

Everyone knows once they’ve stepped on a snail – the crunch is unlike any other. Every time I accidentally did, I freeze, then lift my foot quickly, as if it still has a chance to survive, knowing full well a crunch marks the end. In a panic I apologize to the snail and to God for killing one of his creatures, and ask them both to forgive me. Even so, I crouch down and observe the crushed snail, guiltily wowed rather than sad. It looks like someone has banged their fist on a Caramel Swirl from Quality Street – except more green and grey.

Slugs, ranging from long, charcoal ones or almost invisible, yellow, speckled ones bewitched me for a different reason. These homeless snails, which look like they have been squeezed out of a toothpaste tube at birth, are interesting because of the thin strand of film they left behind.

It’s different to snail slime. The viscous mucus slugs leave behind is a lot shinier and silvery. If ever stepmother slug and poor father slug feel like it is necessary to lose their children deep into some woods because of lack of food, it will be impossible.

My mum, aunts and friend’s mothers hated slugs. Every time they saw one in their homes, they ignored the pleas of us children, took it outside and powdered so much table salt over them, that the poor buggers probably thought they were enjoying a white Christmas at last. The salt dried out all their slime, dehydrating them to death.

I never really liked spiders, and now I’m terrified of them. But their webs are remarkable. The idea of building your own home: choosing the perfect location, making it as big or as small as you want, not needing to pay any mortgage (I didn’t know what that meant but it was bad

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because parents and people in adverts moaned about it). How lucky spiders are! And not only that, but their homes being traps for food? How extraordinary. Sometimes I want to free the fly that gets seized, but it is more exciting to finally see the owner of the web come out from hiding, and preserve their food.

And then there are the patterns they make. I try to see if I can find a spider in the process of building a web, but unfortunately I always see them ready-made. If it rains the night before, the drops that are sprinkled over the web gleam like they are a chain of tiny, Pacific pearls – especially when the sun hits them. It seems surprising that a raindrop doesn’t destroy a web, but now I know that the spun silk of a spider, which snapped and clung to my finger whenever my finger came into contact with it, would be stronger than steel of the same dimensions.

In school at break and lunch on a wet day, if anyone spotted a worm, especially a big, fat one, word spread and a crowd of between six to ten infants soon gather around it.

We were cruel, I guess, prodding it with a stick to see if it is live and wriggling, then trying to pick it up with the same stick. The worst is using it as a butcher’s knife and slicing off an end. We just want to know if it was true that it would still survive, or grow a new end. None of us ever mean to hurt them, and we aren’t trying to be unkind – we are just curious kids who learn by doing.

I only take a couple more semi-skips before I notice an identical caterpillar. I

pick this one up too, cover the hand they are both in with the other and run all the way to school with a wide grin on my face. Two in one morning, what luck!

In the middle of the playground, against the far wall is a raised flowerbed. I lower my hand and let the twins crawl onto the soil. There! So much more suitable

than boring cement, and scenic too. I beam and go to class.

When, at long last, the bell for playtime rings I stop fidgeting and sprint into the playground, eager to see how my caterpillars are getting along in their new home. Something strange is going on. Way too many people are crowded around the flowerbed, way too many. I push past them so I can see the bed clearly. Once I do, my eyes grow to the size of satellite dishes and are stabbed with horror by what they see. My heart is heavy with regret and my insides twist with anger and disappointment.

The cater-twins lie motionless as a battalion of ants, about as many ants as the grains in a handful of sand, march around and on top of them. Are the caterpillars…Dead? Are they possibly being eaten? Have I brought them to their final resting place? But I was trying to give them a happy life. It’s entirely my fault…But I didn’t know…Besides, there wasn’t a single ant there in the morning!

But how? Caterpillars are a gazillion times bigger than ants, which are as small as a bite a caterpillar takes of a leaf! How can they not defend themselves?

Sara was - and always will be - a daydreamer. Her permanent home is in her mind where her imagination runs fast like a Ferrari. Getting lost in her own world used to get her into trouble - but it has, no doubt, helped her with her passion for creative writing. Sara has graduated with a BA in Creative Writing, and is especially passionate about writing for children.

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Take This Poem -Silva Zanoyan Merjanian Take this poem I bit into its flesh it bled bitter aftertaste of you yet on cracked walls it flowed honey thinned and washed in words I carved with trembling hands take this poem dance my voice it sounds perfect flapping in morning’s silence when all you have is fake sunlight through windows smeared with praise of wolves and forged kisses take this poem grafted carbon footprint under the right light you will remember …… under the right light it’s the only song that matters tucked under wing of an angel__ yours

Silva Zanoyan Merjanian is a poet residing in California with her husband and two sons. Her first volume of poetry Uncoil a Night is about to be published. She has been recently featured in Galway Review, and she was on shortlist for Fermoy International Poetry competition last year.

Miracle e-zine is always looking for artworks. We accept all types of photography and art. So if you are an artist, drop us an email. We might have some great opportunity for you.


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irected by the Oscar winning Ang Lee, known for Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon and Broke back Mountain, comes Life of Pi. The movie is based on bestselling novel, of the same name, by Yann Martel. Life of Pi is an adventure/ drama

movie about a sixteen year old boy who survives a shipwreck and is stranded on a boat, in the Pacific Ocean, with Richard Parker – a Bengal tiger. The film casts some well known names in Indian cinema: Irrfan Khan (who also starred in Slumdog Millionaire) as adult Pi Patel, who narrates the story of his life to the curious novelist (Rafe Spall). Pi's mother, Gita Patel, is played by Tabu. She is regarded, from her generation, as one of the most influential female actors. The 16 year old Pi who befriends the tiger is played by Suraj Sharma. He made his debut in this film after auditioning amongst 3000 others for the lead role. Sharma, being only seventeen during filming, was unknown and gave an excellent and believable performance as Pi. He is the only human onscreen for most of the film, spending most of his time in front of a blue screen and emoting with an invisible tiger. Sharma lost twenty percent of his body weight for the role, and was the only male nominated for a BAFTA in the 'rising star' category this year. Life of Pi is visually breathtaking. As four real tigers were used in some scenes, the CGI had to be better than ever before so that you would not be able to tell between the real and fake tigers – I, for one, was fooled as I did not question the tiger being real at any point. The film flowed smoothly from scene to scene and it wasn't just the CGI tigers which were impressive. Each shot was stunning. Visually, it exceeds Avatar and Tree of life – and, unlike Tree of Life, the film's vivid, spectacular visuals go hand in hand with the story. I usually do not enjoy 3D (unless it is IMAX 3D) but viewing this in 3D really brought this film to life. Life of Pi is rated PG and it is rare film, in these times, where all ages can enjoy and love a movie in the same way; you can watch it with your friends or your family. It is a welcome breath of fresh air in the cinema, having an unpredictable plot, great narration and even comedic moments. If you haven't seen it yet, be sure to book your tickets now – or if it has stopped showing, pre-order the film, you will not be disappointed.

D

Film Review LIFE OF PI

Reviewed by: Sara Koch

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When We Dead Awaken -Scott Sherman

When we dead awaken,

we come as the shattered crow you found,

planted in the Earth in a hole-punched shoe box. When we dead awaken,

we come as the dog, who tried to pull himself out of the road

and back to you, a half-empty roll of toothpaste. When we dead awaken,

we come as the father, whose heart boiled your brain, whose hands

sent you into the backyard with a rusted shovel. When we dead awaken, we come for your solace. The blood-soaked bandage,

draped over the seeping wound of your youth. When we dead awaken

so too will you.

Regeneration -Allabhya Gosh

Ten feet by ten feet remain

prisoners living room .

We are spending the rules

of the downtown showroom.

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Scott has spent the majority of his adolescent (and adult) life writing, mostly to subdue the immature demons inside of him. At age 23 he spends most of his time in 9 to 5 work shifts. Most of his writing is based strongly around childhood, and in some relation the loss of the western frontier. Scott loves those ideas, because they both relate to the loss of innocence and magic (something he thinks nobody should ever lose). He's constantly looking for any place to expose his writing, and his subsequent love for it.


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There is no time ;

to see the sky .

At the heart of the website ;

there is interactions of my .

We are going

to be like a robot .

We are living

in a bookish cot.

I'm just

Mr. W. W dot com .

Away from me ;

the best art and poem .

Like roses on the balcony ;

tub garden of our lives are so funny.

Everything is boring to me ;

the lyrics is becoming prose .

I want to be a grasshopper ;

after death of artificial life of rose .

Railroad Bridge -G.D McFetridge Everything turned on a dime in his imagination and then he mentioned the girl on the bridge. They were standing together near the railroad tracks, waiting for the train to flatten a dozen shiny pennies. The older brother ran his fingers back through his shaggy, sun bleached hair, and reached for a cigarette pack in his T-shirt pocket.

“One of those hot college babes,” his brother said.

A cigarette angled from his mouth. The younger brother nodded and glanced in the direction of the train. A Marine helicopter flew high overhead making a heavy thumping sound that seemed to resonate from the concave doom of blue sky. He told his

Allabhya’s poetry , novel & story have published into national &international magazines . Her first book of poem is " The Mirror " that was published when she was 17.


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older brother how he and a friend had been surfing that morning—perfect glassy conditions—and watching college girls watch them from the cliffs by the university, a couple miles north of the old railroad bridge. Nodding, his older brother inhaled and blew smoke into the summer air. It seemed to hang there, shimmering, like a cloud of iridescent motes. Later he and the friend drove south to check the point break just north of the bridge. There were willows and sycamores in the canyon, running along the edges of the creek bed, and more willows underneath the high iron framework; and there in the sunlight, in the midst of it, in the midst of a cloudless sky, the girl was on the bridge, a silhouette backlit by rays, sea breezes blowing her blonde hair in a halo of yellow mist. When they cleared the shadow of the high bridge, where the stream widened into a delta overgrown with shrubs and wild grasses, and where the surfers’ footpath angled north toward the sandy beach by the point, he glanced over his shoulder to look for the blonde girl, but a tall sycamore blocked the view.

Pedestrians were not allowed on the railroad bridge. But the rule was never vigorously enforced. The older brother dropped his cigarette and stepped on it, mashing with a worn tennis shoe in the dirt. “And so what happened next?” he asked. The wind had come up and the ocean was choppier, and only a half-dozen surfers were still in the water off the rocky point. They paddled out through the breakers; the water was warm, the sunlight very bright and hot. He told his older brother that he watched the bridge between waves, wondering what had become of the blonde.

A rogue swell came unexpectedly, twice the size of the smaller sets that had been rolling in all day. A young surfer outside had a chance at the rising wall of water and took off as the wave peaked. Down the curling tongue of water he shot and leaned and then plummeted forward like an unstrung marionette, his body lingering for a second, behind and all around him seven feet of translucent blue-green water spilling forward, thundering,

taking him under in an explosion of white water. The younger brother stopped the story and glanced in the direction of the train. Everything was quiet. The tracks shone in the hot sun there. The older brother reached in his pocket for the pack and fingered out another cigarette. The breeze kicked up and blew out the lighter. He cursed and flicked the lighter a second time, then exhaled a thick cloud of smoke. “Keep going,” he said. “Are you even listening?” “Yeah, sure, I’m listening.” They waited for the young surfer’s head to reappear in the expanse of foamy white water. A more experienced surfer had caught the north shoulder of the immense swell and managed a long roller coaster ride, punctuated by yelps of delight. He was close to the shore now and wading toward the beach, toward a girl lying on a brightly colored beach towel.

The young surfer’s board popped up cork-like, and a moment later his head. His eyes were wide, flashing white, and he spluttered out of breath, arms flailing for the surfboard. They watched until he reached the board and climbed on belly first. After the big wave the ocean flattened, eerily, a lake almost. And then the breeze died, as if the world had stopped breathing, its breath held in anticipation of something bizarre yet indistinct.

He heard a high-pitched female voice, a wailing sound that drew his attention towards shore. He looked at the railroad bridge and in the middle of the bridge he saw the blonde girl waving her arms. She went up on her tiptoes, knees flexing, pointing and calling. Pointing as if her fingers were fifty yards long and she was trying to touch something in the water. He turned to his friend. They looked at each other and shrugged it off, thinking that the girl was shouting at someone on the beach. The young surfer, his eyes still wide, paddled past and said that something had tangled his tether line; something was down there and had snagged his tether and held him underwater. He was still out of breath.

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The girl on the bridge was screaming louder, but the wind blew harder and her words were indiscernible, a mishmash of blurred sounds. The older brother wanted to know why she was excited, but then he yawned as if only half listening to the story. Half listening was something that happened a lot, as if their conversations had a one-sidedness. The younger brother said he wasn’t sure, but it didn’t matter because the train’s air horns blew suddenly from the south, from the beach town where the tracks cut across several streets and where the engineer always sounded warnings.

The blonde turned toward the piercing blast and began running for the north end of the railway bridge. But her balance seemed awkward, as if running was unfamiliar to her. He had never walked on the bridge, although he knew many surfers who had, and they all said the catwalk was wide enough; there was plenty enough room to avoid the train. Everyone agreed it was scary, terrifying even, because the train went by at sixty miles an hour. The large wave had churned the blue-green water and the water was murkier than before, and something dark passed beneath them. The train’s air horns blew again, louder this time, and the first of three massive pullers rolled onto the south end of the bridge, its triple headlights made weak by the bright sunlight. The girl had a hundred yards to go before reaching the end of the bridge. They looked at each other, and he saw fear in his friend’s eyes.

The cloudlike form that passed beneath them had made the water’s surface ripple, as if from an upwelling current. They paddled for the shore, his heart pounding as he pulled his forearms and hands through the water. His friend had a longer board and moved quickly ahead. He could feel the darkness coming from somewhere underneath, menacing, rising like a cold shadow. The train’s horns blew again, a loud, extended blast followed by another, as if to push the girl forward. He glanced up. Three big puller engines rumbled toward her, trailed by a long line of boxcars and flatcars, clattering, the tonnage and sounds of

metal on metal. The air horns blew again and again. “Let’s get out of here,” the older brother said, “the train’s not coming.” He dropped his cigarette butt in the dirt but didn’t bother stepping on it, then headed toward the road where the pickup truck was parked. The younger brother picked the dozen shiny pennies off the track; they were like points of copper light dotting the gleaming steel. The younger brother remembered when he had nearly drowned in the swimming pool; how he’d fallen from his brother’s tree fort and almost broken his neck; how he’d crashed his first motorcycle in the back of a parked car at forty miles an hour, and that his life had often seemed unreal and disconnected. His brother never listened to him, he occupied space.

They didn’t enjoy each other’s company that much anyway. Never really had.

Or maybe it was more than that, some sort of unspoken thing only brothers understand, something wedged inexorably in the past. Mom had never loved them the same, and the old man was worse. Stuff buried down there in unconscious mind, the baggage, the unseen forces pulling strings. A gathering of symbols you can’t even dream.

A fat ground squirrel hurried to its hole in a pile of rocks. A line of doves perched on an old rusted chain-link fence, their pastel shades of gray and brown washed in sunlight. He put his hand in his pocket and jangled the pennies. A brooding look moved across his face. Then he got the truck key and opened the door.

“So then what happened? Did she make it?” his older brother asked, and reached for another cigarette. “Yeah, sure, she made it. No one’s ever died on the bridge.”

G. D. McFetridge, iconoclast and philosopher, writes from his home in Montana's majestic Sapphire Mountains. His fiction and essays are published across America, in Canada and the UK. His six novels however have been deemed unpublishable by the effete literati of NYC.

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Seventh summer -Brendan Sullivan

The boy remembered his seventh summer

how pelicans haunted the bay,

swooping down

to snatch tiny minnows

and ghost crabs

hidden in the waves.

His grandmother died in June

old lady smell and tube roses

filling the parlor

where guests offered prayers

crushed tight like robins.

It rained all day

God's judgement

his mother said,

her tearless face terrifying

beneath the long black veil

as her hands pushed away the coffin.

In July he went fishing,

the reek of blood worms

churning his stomach

while the boat rocked

and the sun ate up the sky;

the thick black of beetles

chewing through his jeans

as he pretended to fly

in a plane with no wings.

His father came home late August

shiny new medals

bursting holes in his chest,

the shrapnel in his head

lending him a stranger's voice,

and promised this time would be different

But his mother stopped dancing in the garden

and took to her bed again

claiming God was now the enemy

and his father talked

only to the whiskey bottles

hidden in the basement

where the maw of early autumn

settled in like men of straw.

Brendan Sullivan is a lifelong beach bum who has turned from acting to poetry, as he finds it a more remarkable and at times, reliable muse. He also enjoys surfing, sailing and diving. His work has been published at Wordsmiths, The Missing Slate, Every Writer's Resource, Gutter Eloquence, A Sharp Piece of Awesome, After Tournier, Bareback Magazine and Bare Hands.

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l;;

Enya Sanders

Enya Sanders, this being her pen name, is an aspiring author aged fourteen, who resides in the UK. She has been writing since the age of eight, her first story being a Club Penguin fan fiction. From then on, she has gone on to write various genres of stories, her most noted being 'C.U.P.I.D' , and the step-by-step guide to improving stories in various ways 'Writing Techniques and Tips'. She is currently working on several stories , which can be found on her page on Movellas.com. What is the best advice you have ever received about your writing?

Meet The YOUNG Movellian

An Interview by Ollie Lambert

Poetry online has become immensely popular, especially in the younger generation, mainly because of its accessibility. Young writers like to be able to publish a poem and receive feedback on their writing, without having to face rejection. Movellas.com is the most popular writing site on the internet, and poetry is one of the most well-liked genres, with over three-hundred poems being entered in the first competition. I have interviewed some of the young members, to show just how passionate the younger generation are when it comes to writing, and to put across how enthusiastic teenage aspiring authors are to make it in the world of writing, and poetry in particular.


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This is going to sound crazily stupid, I know, but it's paragraphing. I used to just let my imagination flow, not bothering with paragraphs, however the moment I got advice about that, my work has become much more structured. What is it about writing that you find attractive? The fact you can let your imagination flow in any direction you like. If inspiration strikes, you can just let it all out onto your notepad. If something moves you, whether that be a book or a real life event, you can let your emotions turn it into something great. Is there an author that you find inspirational? Well, the obvious choice is J.K. Rowling. She has inspired millions of people around the world to read and write. She also proved if your work is good, it does have a chance, which has inspired many fellow authors. What sort of a relationship exists between writers and the people they create on the page? There has to be some sort of emotional bond. It's hard to write about something that does not strike a chord with you. You have to be able to understand their emotions, and how you'd feel if you were in their shoes, regardless of whether you are writing in first person. In C.U.P.I.D , I very much relate to the main protagonist Jessica. This is because I've been through similar situations she has been in, and in fact will be in. That emotion is what draws the reader in. How often do you write? I don't have a set timetable. I write whenever something inspires me, or if I simply have a brainwave. In my notepad, I've got so many paragraphs of stories which never actually are completed after about two chapters. They are the result of me writing down something my imagination has thought up. So, it depends, really.

Erin Sheehan


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Erin is currently a junior at Kennedy High School in Pennsylvania. She loves to write fiction, genres like mystery, romance, and adventure. Some of her other hobbies include reading, singing, dancing and anything that has to do with theater. She is a Girl Scout, and a volunteer at a local pet shelter. What is your favourite thing about writing? I love to express my feelings through my words. I also love how when you write, you're transported into another world where no one is there to tell you who to be and what to do. What genre do you prefer to write in and why? I prefer romance, because I love cutesy things. I also tend to throw in a bunch of drama in my romances, because I LOVE suspense. What do you use to inspire your writing? I use real life experiences, my friends are huge influences on my characters and I think other books help to give me an idea of what I would like to write about next. How do you deal with writers block? Two words. Writing prompts. I get writer's block WAY too often. I always tend to lean toward the story starters and writing prompts online to give me a boost into a brilliant idea. When do you write? All the time. Mostly at home, on my laptop, but my other favorite place is school... which frequently gets me in trouble... haha. How has your writing developed over time? I used to hate writing about the setting. I thought it was boring and that it told the readers what to think about the place the story was set in. But now I've realized if you don't tell the reader where the story is, they will get lost. I've also improved my character development, now by doing outlines of my characters, so when I'm writing their feelings or dialogue, I fully understand how that character would react. What advice would you give a young and maybe inexperienced writer? Learn vocabulary. Writing is so much better when you have a better vocabulary. Also, make outlines. MANY OUTLINES. Otherwise, you're writing on the fly, and then your story might have holes, and people will get lost. And finally, never ever give up. If maybe a story doesn't work as you may have planned the first time, don't scrap the whole idea. Look at it again, maybe change a few plot lines, add a few characters, and if it still isn't working for you, consult a friend. They may be able to help you add new twists and help you to open your mind.


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さくら

さくら, also known as Sakura, is a seventeen-year-old writer from the United States who writes on Movellas.com. She is fluent in Spanish, English, and Japanese. She is also third-generation Puerto Rican American. She was recently accepted into Cornell University's prestigious Architecture program. Sakura enjoys singing, writing, drawing, and swimming. What would you say is the hardest thing about writing? The hardest thing about writing, for me, is finding time for it. I'm super busy, and it's sometimes very difficult just to sit down at my laptop, take a deep breath, and let the words flow. I also find it extremely challenging to write in Spanish. Even though when I was little it came easy to me, now-a-days it seems as though the words just don't come to me. What do you use as inspiration? I use my memories of traveling most often. It's those tiny moments that stick with me, staring outside of my window in various locations. I try to soak up every detail and retain it so that I can write later. I also use a lot of personal memories to really make my characters relatable. I try to create my characters in such a way so that even if people haven't been in the same shoes as my character, they can still relate to their emotions and feelings. What got you into writing? Honestly, when I was little I wrote a story about Bob the Islander eating bananas. I was six. And then life happened and I was busy with school and swimming and never really gave another thought about writing until this past September. That's when I started writing essays for my application to Cornell. I think it was those essays that got me accepted. I also started taking an English class, AP Language and Composition. I found that I loved playing around with words and sounds a lot, and started writing again. Why do you write?


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I write because I love language, and expressing myself through it. It's a creative outlet that I can throw myself into 100% and watch something beautiful form. Is there an author that inspires you the most? Definitely Ken Follett. Pillars of the Earth not only inspired my love of architecture, but also showed me how one can weave fact with fiction seamlessly.

Rhiannon Davies Rhiannon, also known as IceCreamGirl, is a 14 year old aspiring writer from London. She has always loved to write throughout her childhood, but only saw it as a serious career prospect after joining Movellas in June, and has been unable to drag herself away since. Rhiannon loves to write realism about a range of topics and characters, liking to explore all aspects of life and points of view. What is it about creative writing that you like? I like that you can do anything with it. Everything is your choice, you're utterly in control and it's amazing. If there's anything you think you improve about your life, or the entire world, you can do. You're really shy? Just make your character really bold and outgoing. Think global warming will end in disaster? Write the future, as you imagine it. The writing is only limited by your imagination. What sort of connection is there between a character and his/her characters? Basically, if you're a sentimental person, then writing is not for you. Reading is bad enough, crying when your favourite characters die, but writing is a hundred times worse. I get so attached to my characters, it's almost impossible to make anything bad happen to them. If I could, I'd just write something where the main character wins the lottery, grabs the perfect guy and cures cancer. But no-one wants to read that. I'd say it's a mother (or father) and child relationship. You made them, you're responsible for everything they do, and if something goes wrong for them, then you feel their pain. What is it that inspires you to write a story? Anything, really. I read somewhere that teenagers are far better at absorbing information than adults, which can lead to knife-wielding maniacs or writers and artists. Things tend to come to me when I'm just watching, but not taking in. Or as other people call it, daydreaming. Then something will just jump out at me, either from my imagination or the surroundings. I guess if I was going to narrow it down, then something that inspires me a lot is sitting on benches. There will be scratchings on it, people passing by, surroundings constantly changing. You can look at any of them and try to work out their story, which just develops into a piece of writing. Then it's just a physical need to write. It sounds stupid and it is, but I cannot concentrate on anything until I get the idea down. What's the hardest thing you find about writing?


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Keeping a story going, without a doubt. Yes, I've had the idea and all the wild plans for the future, but once I've written a chapter or two, it's hard to find the motivation to continue. I don't even know why I struggle so much with this. The only thing I can do to try and keep things going is organise a writing timetable, but even that I end up giving up on. What makes the perfect story? To me, I don't think there ever will be a perfect story. If you'd asked me 3 years ago, I'd had said the perfect story was Twilight. Now I'd probably say The Dark Materials. In 10 years (God forbid) it could be 50 shades of grey. It just depends on what you like in a book, on how perfect it is. Right now, the perfect thing for me is: an imaginative idea, written well with plenty of description, I quite like a romance somewhere and it has to be intoxicating. If the book doesn't take me to another planet, it just doesn't make the cut. But any perfect book is the one that keeps you up until four in the morning, just to finish it, the one that you read with tears running down your face as a character dies, the one you scream at when you don't like the ending, the one you spend the next week in a blur because of, still in shock after reading something so amazing. That defines the perfect book.

Scottie 12 year old Scottie from the United States. Not only writes on the writing site Movellas, but also posts music videos on her youtube account. She is MrsTomlinson1224 on Movellas and she loves to talk with fellow writers, poets, and hopeful young authors in search for writing advice. She loves to write songs, stories, and poems, and is a very creative person. Scottie has been encouraged to write for some time now, but has not really gotten into it until late 2010. What sort of a relationship exists between writers and the people they create on the page? In a lot of books, published or not, there is always a relationship between the characters on the paper and someone in the author's lives. Sometimes it isn't even someone who has impacted them largely, it might just be someone who they've met a few times and they think would be an interesting addition to their book. I know that in a book I'm working on right now, Fight For The Winning Spot, is about my dream journey throughout X-Factor. The other competitors are going to be a lot like people I've met in the past few years and might be some interesting friends and competitors. What is it that makes a writer? To be a writer, I believe there are 2 very important qualities you have to have. You always have to be creative and imaginative. You have to easily be able to come up with places, scenarios, names, and personalities for your characters. You have to be able to not make each character much too alike to another character or someone in your life. You can make them the same, but not the exact same. That's just weird. The second thing is that you have to be confident, willing, and still take in advice and constructive comments from fellow writers. You have to be confident in the writing world when you are around, looking for agents. You must be able to stand up for yourself and your own writing and work.


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After the writing's finished, how do you judge the quality of your work? Sometimes, I look around at other work by authors who have a little more experience than I do. I might come across a piece of work that seems really fancy. In reality, the author thinks it is fancy because of the loopy, hard-to-read font used, but it really is difficult to read and help the author. So when I write, I have to be sure that the fanciest writing will be italicized or bolded Calibri or Arial font. All authors proofread their work, and if their is an error, that makes the quality of my story in my head go down a little bit. A good author has to have a developed skill of good grammar and spelling. That's a pretty big part of writing. What has writing done for you as a person? It has made me think even more outside of the box. It helps me in all classes. In science, we have to answer these questions after an experiment. In math, we have to find a creative way to solve a problem. In english, we had to write a newspaper. In spanish, we write sentences for tests. In history, we answer questions with long paragraphs. Writing has helped me in all of these classes to enhance my writing skill. Not only can I write better than I could before, but I'm a better thinker and more imaginative and creative. Writing can truly help in a lot of things in life.

Bond of Souls -Karima Puzon Lost souls searching the unknown. Wandering around the lonely shore. Blown together by the cyclone. Everlasting bond has been formed. Stumbled together by pure circumstance. Lost souls involuntarily intertwined. Slowly fading into trance. Different worlds are clearly aligned. Destiny played the cards. Fate rolled the dice. Souls were caught off guard. The deal was worth a price. Souls found themselves smiling,

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They gave each other peacefulness. Hearts found themselves laughing, They have seen happiness. Drawn together by fate, Though they journey separate paths. They've unlocked the gate To a place with no wrath. A place where no tears are shed. A place where promises are made. Inside their hearts they live, There they will be alive. Souls have found each other by accident. They have found life's content And lived in each others hearts. Souls that are simply called friends.

The Escaping Dream -Chrysovalanto Papanikolaou

Friends and foes have acquired a blurring definition

for they intersect,

making the escape dream

that kept me once banished from the arms of Morpheus

to cavort around me anew.

And the long forgotten one way ticket

still waits to be seized by the bold ones

who should be wise enough to have learned a lesson

from the disobedience of Lot's wife.

But against all the odds,

at the end of the day I keep on hanging around

with the two M's and I.

Karima Puzon is an architecture student . She started writing at the age of 8 when she was forced to create a poem for a school project. After a year she won a short story writing contest in her school. Ever since that day, she considered writing as her passion. She writes poems that are based on experiences and observations. It is her outlet of her emotion. She also writes short stories of any kind, from fantasy to inspirational.

Chrysovalanto Papanikolaou was born in Greece in 1986 and she studied English and American Language and Literature in the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki in Greece.. After she had attended a creative writing class at the AUTH she started to write more consciously, mostly poems. In 2008, due to her university work in poetry, she was selected to take part in a poetic conversation, held by the AUTH, among Greek litterateurs.


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The Piano -Nina Knowles

Alone in a solitary room, sat an elderly man on his treasured piano. The room may have been bright and colourful with collected antiques, an amber warm fire and a loving family. However in his world, the room was vast and deserted; all the happiness had faded... Frail, old fingers continued to walk up and down the old ivory keys. The piano was ancient, passed down for generations, from his great- grandfather, to his grandfather to his dad and now to him. But now there was nobody it could be given to. He had no children. He had remembered hearing the forefinger had a vein that led straight to the heart. On that same finger he wore the ring, matching the one belonging to the love of his life. The lavender smell tickled his nostrils which he recognised at once. She was joining in for the duet. Her cold, pale hands and his own moved along the keys exactly how they had done sixty years ago on their wedding day. In a worn out hospital lies an ageing women, he's seconds away from losing her. But what can he say, when she doesn't even know him anymore? "Who are you?" she whispers, watching with her grey eyes that are shining with tears. "Your husband," he answers. His voice cracks. "Who?" She asks.

He's about to answer again, like he had done for the past two years. Each time it kills him inside, how she had just forgotten. But her eyes are slowly shutting; she's only seconds away from leaving him. So he leans down softly kisses her on the cheek, and then parts from the love of his life. As she finished her part, she watched him wistfully with her shining grey eyes, kissed him softly then faded into nothing. The lump continued to build in the old man's throat, he was used to that. But he wanted to carry on so that he wouldn't end the song unfinished. He knew that the words of his old friend were the only reason that he kept on going. The only purpose he kept living. His ears explode from the sound, rattling in his ears. The roaring of the bombs are driving him insane, he can't keep going on much longer. He's surrounded by death beds, the lives of men he had known and the men he was forced to kill...taken. Lost forever. Then he thinks, what is the point in it all? What is the point of life? Why bother experience the anger, despair and sadness of life when you could finish it all in seconds? He thinks of the quick darkness that will approach him if he could end it. Then it would be over. Finished. He pauses pointing the gun towards his head, one click and everything would be gone. But the words of his partner, his companion, his best friend stops him. "Keep going, don't give up...there's always sunshine after the storm." The dying man coughs for the last time as he lies in the dirty, disgusting mud.

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He watches his best friend gasp his last breath then become lifeless. His partner, his companion, his best friend...dead. The man's eyes brimmed with tears. He couldn't play much longer, but he couldn't leave the song unfinished. Not when it was the last time. Keep going; don't give up...sunshine after a storm he muttered to distract himself. Only a little left to play. His eyesight began to fade into a dark blur, but it didn't matter, the song was so familiar he didn't need to see, just allowing his hands to play the song. If he had a family then he would have shared this time with them, but they were not there. They didn't want the depressed man to be part of their life. He continued as the sound of the piano becoming quieter, his worries and sadness gradually began to fade. The room darkened into black as he played the last soundless key. Peace once again. The Toy Shop: Aromas of moulded plastic and synthetic fur fill the enticing room. Toys from brightly-coloured cars to porcelain china dolls clothed in delicate silk dresses, line the rose wood shelves. An ocean of children, adults and the occasional teenager fill every space. Some try to squeeze past whilst others stand like statues, transfixed. Mixed expressions are displayed on faces, from bored teenagers to ecstatic toddlers. Chatter, laughter and cries of children make the room full of life and atmosphere. A model train painted a deep ruby-red travels around the room, mimicking the noise of a steam engine. In the front sits a driver, a permanent wide smile carved on its ghostly-white face. It grins and stares straight ahead as the train glides across the tracks. A wisp of steam blasts from the miniature loco-motive. Nearby, an exhausted mother exclaims, “Don’t put that in your mouth!” She confiscates a wooden soldier, trapped in the mouth of her child. At first he sticks out his tongue in disgust from the strong, bitter

taste of the paint. Then he waves his arms wildly and wails, “I want toy!” Screams erupt around the room as it is tossed carelessly back amongst the others. The child scratches her with his little claws, turning crimson from effort and frustration. Impatiently, she grabs his pudgy hand and pulls him away. He abruptly stops shrieking, his attention is brought to the teddies nearby. He cries, “I want bear!” Teddy-bears ranging from midnight blue to honey yellow sit proudly in the front of the rows of soft toys. With outstretched arms they block all toys cowering behind them from the customers’ view. They show off their glossy fur, soft as a newborn puppy and irresistible to tiny hands. Shiny black eyes, stare in earnest, begging to be chosen. Somewhere amongst the chaos stands a small group of teenagers. One boy seizes a baby doll dressed in nothing but a pink t-shirt and a nappy. He twists the head around cruelly making the rest of the group snigger. A girl, caked in an inch of makeup squeals hysterically at him exclaiming, “You are so funny!” Smirking at his friends’ reactions, he twists the arms around until they pop out of place. They watch in surprise and laugh amongst themselves. The boy sniggers, “whoops...” then chucks it so that it soars across the room. The broken doll smacks against the shop window then falls into a crumpled mess on the display. A child stood outside jumps back from the window, eyes widening at the doll that has made a bombshell of the display. The streets are silence apart from his chattering teeth and the occasional car as it drives past. He shuffles forward again, pressing frozen hands against the cool glass. He stares mournfully at the toys that line the shelves and at the horde of people bustling around in the warm, cosy room. In his thin rags, he shakes constantly in the unbearable cold. As he rests his head against the window, his breath condenses into cloudy fog. The door swings open and for a moment he is almost part of the hustle of people,

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hunting for their last minute Christmas presents. A classy, pretentious woman dressed in luxurious clothes crinkles her nose at his repulsive smell and filthy appearance. He glances at her warm

coat miserably, then pulls his tattered hat down as far as possible to cover his frozen ears and walks away.

The Showdown -Phoebe Duffet As the argument starts to heat up, I release the tiger from his cage. He sits down beside me, His stripes like lines on a page. He bares his teeth, And releases a mighty roar. Rattling the windows, Sending them crashing to the floor. My father quivers in his boots, His face as white as a cloud. My tiger looks back at me, And sees that I am proud. He stalks off back to his cage, A grin upon his face. Leaving my dear father, Unable to move from his place.

Nina has been an enthusiastic writer since she wrote her first ever story at the age of six, about a candy land full of evil chocolate bars! Since then she has written a number of short stories and poems, including the piece that she is most proud of, “The Piano”. She has won everal poetry awards and has become a runner up at a writing competition on a writing community called Movellas. Her dream is to one day become a published author.

Phoebe has always had a passion for writing stories. But it wasn't until she attended an Arvon course during half term that she discovered her true passion for poetry. It was during that course that she wrote this poem.


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h. Good morning. Am I awake? It’s so hard to tell where to draw the lines. I wonder if there is a quantitative way to measure consciousness. No, I am most definitely

awake. I can see the patterns on my popcorn ceiling. The way the light hits it, the spot right above me looks like a long-nosed old man. Oh, no, it’s gone. I guess I didn’t see it.

Why are my feet so much colder than the rest of my body? Have they been running around without me in the night? My hair is messy. I bet comatose people don’t wake up with messy hair. Then again, comatose people don’t often wakeup, which is really too bad. I’ll comb it in a minute, I need to check Facebook and the news. I’m so dependent on the internet for information, it’s scary. It’s like we’re all interconnected. We’re twenty-first century honeybees gathering, sharing, and pollinating information.

My computer turns on slowly. It must be waking up too. I wonder if it was dreaming, if electronics even could dream when turned off. I wonder what I was dreaming, or if I even was last night. I just spent eight hours of my life, and I only have a vague memory of walking through a cornfield. And it wasn’t even a real cornfield.

I should get breakfast. The heater is buzzing, and that makes me happy even though I’m not warm yet. It’s like Pavlovian conditioning, I know that noise means it will be warm. I don’t want to go to the trouble of making pancakes. They’re so flat. I wonder what pancakes would look like if you forced them into the third dimension. Cubecakes. That sounds dense. I just want a little cereal.

I should go for a jog before I start writing today. Some fresh air would clear my head. But I hate jogging. If I could read minds I’m sure the neighbors’ would be thinking about how slow and chubby I am and how foolish I look. Then again, if I could read minds, I wouldn’t read my neighbors’ minds. I’d go to the park and listen to little kids and see if they thought anything aside from what they said aloud.

Maybe I should stay home and reorganize my t-shirts by how witty they are. Or sew a patchwork wizard’s cape out of all those clothes I’ll never fit into. I can turn on some jazz and balance my checkbook, pretending that I’m a crooked accountant working for the mafia.

No. No. No. I am just looking for things to do because I don’t want to write. I haven’t written in a week. I am all out practice, rusty like Oz’s tinman. If I go any longer without writing my internal organs will fill up with all of my unused ink, all of my unpenned words, and then I

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The Last Place You Look

-R.G. Summers

THE Inspiration

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will die. I just need to think of some sort of speculative concept, something to work with, something imaginative…

I go for my jog. I walk out onto the porch and wonder who’s idea it was to put porches on houses. I step down, counting the steps: one for luck, two for love, three for charm, and four joy. The grass is dewy and wet, like crickets have been crying on it all night. Do insects cry? I feel like that’s something they should have taught me in high school biology. Maybe they did. I wasn’t paying attention. I was usually doodling spaceships and alien-hybrid people on my notepaper.

Focus. I have to focus. If I don’t focus, I’m never going to find inspiration. The sunrise is mostly melted away, like oil flooding down a sewer grate, the color is seeping away. The sky is mostly blue, and the last traces of pink are vanishing quickly. I try to imagine what life must be like for the pink light of the sunrise. It is always moving, always morning, wherever that pink is. It must be fun to be a sunrise, more fun than being a writer. Sunrises don’t have to worry about being original or running out of colors, people love them no matter what.

Oh, there’s Mrs. Doubtfire. I don’t know what her real name is, but she’s a nice old lady and she looks like she might be a man. Wouldn’t it be nice if there was a surefire way to know, just by looking at someone, what their gender was? It must have been easy when everyone either looked like Ward or June Cleaver. I suppose that would be one advantage to clones…then you’d at least know what model people were.

Keep jogging. Stop thinking about the man-looking neighbor lady. I have to be thinking of story ideas! I follow my thoughts aimlessly, wandering through my brain to find dead-end after dead-end. Vampires? Overdone. Time-travel? Too convoluted. Our machines turn against us? Too unoriginal!

As my feet slam against the sidewalk, I begin to doubt there are any good or original ideas left out there at all, let alone any that I will be able to think of. I’ve got nothing but blank paper, and a limited understanding of origami. Look, I made a crane. How many variations of that can you do?

The worst part is that inspiration is dangling in front of me like a carrot in front of mule. I know it is there, just an inch beyond reach. It’s on the tip of my…elbow, right under my…ears…I don’t know anymore. As my lungs start to catch fire, I realize I haven’t been jogging recently. I am out of shape. My mind is the very same way. I haven’t written, and now I can’t imagine or write without my mind un-athletically falling over in a chubby, unexercised heap.

Excuses had been gnawing me for days. Gnawing like rats and reproducing like rabbits. It was always something, and now I don’t have the faintest idea how I could even managed to pen a simple “once-upon-a-time.”

What I need, I think, is someone to break my heart. I should find someone beautiful and witty, fall madly in love, befriend her, write her tomes of poetry and lyrics, then unveil myself. Voilà! I am, in fact, the creepy-secret-admirer type. She’ll desert me, painfully, crushingly, devastatingly. It will be great. I’ll be all full of feelings and things. Not like now, now when I can’t feel anything but guilt over my lack of inspiration.

That would take too long though. Falling in love may only take 0.2 seconds—according to some experiment at Syracuse University—but to really cultivate it into something beautiful enough to be heartbreaking…that would take time. At least a week, and I need to write now. I try to root up old emotional memories. Surely there is some sort of tragedy in my past that has not yet been fully mined for its golden inspiration. All I accomplish in this effort is reminding myself of how distraught I was when I was seventeen and my best friend stopped talking to me. That heartless teenage harpy shrew…

As I pound down the sidewalk, heading for home, I start to come to terms with my utter lack of imagination. I’m doomed. I was at my artistic and intellectual peak when I was twenty-one. It’s a sad, sad, state of affairs, but clearly I’m past my prime. My genius is worn-out. I haven’t had a single interesting or imaginative thought all morning, or all week.

As soon as I set foot on my driveway, I stop jogging. I bend over and pant, awkwardly. All I want is to catch my breath, but while I let myself recuperate from that grueling, torturous jog, something catches my eye.

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It’s amazing how dandelions always find a way to push up in asphalt cracks. It’s almost like they prefer the challenge of growing in impossible, inhospitable places. Do plants have any comprehension of challenge? People do, of course, and that’s why we seek it out. The only thing better than victory is the victory of an underdog. The victory of a dandelion, an underlion.

All at once, my head rushes into a flurry of thought. I may not be filled up with ideas, but it only takes one. I squat down to look at the little flower, the little weed. It has such personality, and in an instant I can see the blossom’s entire life story. Always growin’, ever tryin’…How brave you are to be…A bold little dandelion…Blooming brash here before me…

The words are coming to me too quickly; I worry that I will forget them before I can jot

them down. They are such flighty, temperamental things, I do not trust them to stay put for a minute. I’ve barely caught my breath, but now I’m racing back inside, desperate to find paper. Oh, it’s only one little poem…but it’s a start.

Now if only I’d noticed that blasted flower before I left, I could have avoided that jog altogether.

s-h-e (Surely Hidden Existence) -Sasha Milivojevich It's dark, shivering, cold, that walk on the one way road, no one's starting their own path but following of what they've been told. I am aching for a crossroad. Followed by the sorrow, i've turned devoted myself to nocturne. While the mist is swallowing me, i'm quenching my eyes to see, one brick, one glimmer of light or even just a tree, so i could know i've made the right turn. Then, all of a sudden, a silhouette. It started haunting me. I've almost felt it's smell and breath, pick myself up and turned around and oh!


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Suprise! It was SHE. The sorrow was gone, blown away, once again i could freely breathe, knowing that i'm not a loner anymore. Now, there's someone following me. So i ran, ran through the mist, through the landscapes of nocturne, but all the sudden i heard her laughing, with grimy laugh that cuts deep and burn. The sorrow is back in the second, but then, it all started to happen, All of it vaporized. Left. Gone. The road.The mist.The quenching. It was only me with my thoughts. My feelings are gone.Dead. There wasn't ever any mist, any road, just misery playing with my head. So, here i am, lonely as ever, wondering how it could be, allthough, all this time i was and i'll always be sure, that it's madly hard to find my SHE.

The Dog, Cock, ape and Serpent -Luke Surl Were I to be tied with much ceremony In darkness with four restless sins, Ogled by the mumbling moral crowd, Then I would know Death ends what Life begins. *** I O! My heart’s salted slug, Bound by slavish pact to the mutt Libido Which bounds away on dew-laden pastures, Its face of Janus, backwards feigning woe.

Sasha Milivojevich is a nineteen yrs old student from Serbia. A student of journalism, future column writer and freelance journalist, started writing because of the need to express himself through something, put his emotions in words, poems or short stories. His work is mainly based on his life, his thinking and on how he sees the world around him. Allthough he's pretty pesimistic, he writes fantasy/surrealistic stories as well and he started working on a short surrealistic/fantastic novel.


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Revulsion slackens as tether tightens: Never has Lust teemed with more bloated flies! Sleazy skeletal shadows tout promise as fanciful As verse on the walls of Belsen, eking out thin life. II Does the moon, the Gods’ clipped toenail, Yellow and exiled, seek to cow me? I shall heartily crow in poet’s Pride! I shall herald the dawn’s sweet livery! For is it not in my intent To skim the dawn and its royal pool? So I must take arms against the ambuscade Which is sleepless Pride’s swift downfall. III Some savages have mastered a hard-wrought art More ominous than contriving sparks of flame. They thrust the spear in jest, in sport, In boredom. They smear Nature’s diplomatic name. The daydreaming chimps of my pedigree Know Violence only as a last cry, afraid. If such rage grovels before wry Lucifer, Is savage or ape more damned, pray? IV The serpent offered wily Eve respite From God’s straitjacket fidelity: In truth, Disobedience and Deceit Are more moral paths than Honesty! For he who is honest and reaps as such Is martyred by his golden sheaves. Picture an upright tree shedding, blind To the dirty courtships of its dissident leaves.

Born in London and raised in Suffolk, Luke currently resides in Brighton.

M I R A C L E PO E T R Y

Writing Prompt:

Include this line anywhere in a poem: “the rouged coal languish long after midnight”

We would love to read what you have written in response to the prompts in the magazine. So if you want us to read your work or just simply need some feedback, email us.


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Never Give Inn

-John Howell

realize I am making made enough noise to wake up my wife so it is not surprising when she rolls over.

“Frank what’s the problem you sound like you’re having a heart attack.” “I just had a nightmare but I think everything is okay now.” “Are you sure you aren’t sick? You’ve been acting very strange lately. What time is it?” “I don’t know.” “You have your precious Patek Phillippe watch on; can’t you just look at it and tell me the time?” “My watch is broken, but I think it is about five or six o’clock.” “What do you mean broken? You mean it stopped?” I don’t think it is the time to let my wife know the elements of my dream nor the fact that some elements seem to be true. My watch, when I looked at it earlier, looks like it has been bitten by an animal. The crystal is missing and there is a hole that looks like a tooth mark in the face. In my dream; I was being bitten by a wolf while I was lying in some god forsaken woods. I am hoping there is a logical explanation, like the dream was fueled by too much to drink and I broke the watch falling down some stairway. I don’t feel like I have any bruises or broken bones but need to buy some time. I have no idea what is going on, and I don’t think she will be very comforting if I try to explain that I am very confused and have no answers. I decide to simply tell a lie. “Yes that’s right it stopped.” She sighs once. “Can you roll over and look at the clock then?” I roll over and see to my surprise that it is ten after seven in the morning. “Ten after seven,” I say. “I wish it was more like five. I did not sleep

well and really don’t want to get up.” “Why don’t you just stay here and I’ll get you some coffee.” “Mmm. That sounds good.” I throw back the covers and swing my legs out and sit upright. I have a very woozy feeling and decide to get up quickly and start moving before I barf. I really don’t want any questions right now, so I move to the bathroom without any delay. The commode is on the right as I enter the door, and I decide to sit rather than stand to take care of the pressure inside. Whew, that’s better, I think as the stream seems to leave me like a fire hose. My mouth is very dry so when I’m finished I go over to my sink and run the water. My cupped hand serves as an immediate vessel as I suck in the cold water. I finish and stand to look in the mirror. I see me as I remember I look. Long straight nose, brown eyes set apart nicely, brown hair a little mussed but nicely styled. The image looking back at me is not the image I saw in my dream. My dream image looked like a throwback to a more primitive time. The eyes were set together and there were muscles where my flab is normally placed. I remember the character in my dream had a tattoo. I can’t recall what it was, but for grins I pull up the sleeve on my tee shirt to check. I am shocked that there is one there. Never Give Inn looks like a stencil on my left arm above the bicep. I have a momentary loss of blood to my head that makes me want to lie down, but I grip the pedestal sink and steady myself. I look again and realize the tattoo is backwards so that it is visible the right way in the mirror. I look closely and don’t understand how it got there. It is not fresh and when I run my fingers over it I can’t feel any difference in the skin texture. It

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must have been there for quite a while. My problem is I can’t remember ever getting a tattoo, especially one where the artist obviously made a mistake in the spelling. I imagine that the statement Never Give In is some sort of morale booster and the design is so the person needing a boost can read it easily by looking in a mirror. I am still puzzled as to why it is on me. I remember one part of my dream where I was in an accident and in danger of being eaten by wolves, but can’t remember how that dream ended and the one with the Cro-Magnon began. I do recall being kicked awake by a police officer who thought I was homeless. I am really concerned about my watch since I do recall a wolf grabbing my wrist. It is all so real yet not, I think. I let go of the sink and decide I had better get some coffee for Joyce. I leave the bathroom and cross the bedroom to a short hallway that leads to an anteroom that we named ‘the coffee room.’ Here we have an espresso machine, refrigerator and sink. We normally come in here in the morning to sit in comfortable chairs and enjoy some coffee and quiet conversation. I am trying to remember if I took any drugs last night, and what exactly I did yesterday, but I am coming up blank. I stare at the coffee maker and then snap out of the trance. I touch the button on the machine and it starts its warm-up routine. Once ready I brew two cups of coffee and drink half of mine before leaving the room. I go back to the bedroom and approach Joyce’s side of the bed. She is still wrapped up in the bedding. “Coffee is delivered.” I say. Joyce groans and rolls over while pulling the sheet and duvet cover down away from her face. She smiles at me and I freeze. I do not recognize this woman that I thought was Joyce. She reaches for the coffee and I don’t make any attempt to release the cup from my clutch. “What the hell is the matter with you?” she says. “I uh…don’t really know.” I realize I need to let go of the cup and do so too fast. Some splashes down the front of her nightgown. “Damn, that’s hot,” she says. She immediately takes her top off and wipes

the coffee away from her breasts. I apologize and reach for the cup. “I’ll keep it. I need the coffee more than you can imagine.” “I’m really sorry,” I say. I can’t help staring at her naked breasts. This is like seeing a complete stranger naked for the first time. “What are you looking at? Do I have a new mole or something?” I turn and walk to the other side of the bed without answering and take a seat in one of the bergere chairs which are on either side of the bay window. I take a sip of coffee and look down the cup at her. She is a brunette, my Joyce is blond. She has large, full breasts. My Joyce has small, perky ones. This woman’s face and skin look as if she might be from the Middle East. Her eyes have a dark shine and almost almond shape with fairly large eyelids and slightly dark circles under. Her skin is almost olive color and no trace of tan lines on her upper torso. Her arms are full figured and I can see a slight roll just before her body disappears under the duvet cover. My Joyce is pure European from the blue of her eyes to the slightly freckled fair skin. She has rather thin arms and looks as if she never worries about gaining weight since she has no extra fat anywhere on her body. I am sure this is my house. I look around and everything is as I remember it. I am now beginning to worry that this woman is someone I met last night and brought home. Shit,I think. What the hell did I get into that I would have completely blacked out? I try to remember yesterday but can’t seem to get beyond the nightmare. I am thinking, it seemed like I was in a car crash but no car in sight. Wake up in the forest and grabbed by wolves but really in another part of the dream I wake up in the park. Taken to a shelter since a cop thinks I am homeless. Wait, I remember. I saw the tattoo in a mirror at the shelter, then after that I woke up here. I wish I could say I should lay off the booze, but I think it is much more complex than that. I think, Look at the woman over there. Where in the hell did she come from? Her voice is like my Joyce but her body and face are totally strange to me. I need to ask her some questions. Maybe I can figure something out. I’ll want to be

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careful since I do not want to tip her off that I have no idea who she is. Um…Joyce? I say. “Yes Frank.” The first hurdle has been overcome. Her name is Joyce and maybe I am having some kind of nervous breakdown and think I see someone else other than my Joyce. “We have been married for ten years. Right?” “Actually last week made it eleven.” “Oh yes eleven.” I chuckle a little to try and cover the mistake “Why are you acting so strange?” “I have been having a rough time at work lately and I think I am having some kind of breakdown.” After I said that I think, I guess I could have been more subtle. “Oh my God Frank. Tell me what is going on.” I now have her full attention. “It is really hard to explain but I had this bad dream where I was in an accident and was being attacked by wolves but I actually woke up in a park and everyone thought I was homeless.” I pause. “Frank you are just worried about your work and this may be the way your subconscious tries to cope.” “But there is more.” “Okay there is more. Tell me.” “You are not blond.” “What?” “I remember my wife being fair skinned and blond. I don’t remember ever seeing you before.” Joyce immediately pulls the covers up over her exposed breasts. She is now looking at me like I have just broken out of the insane asylum and she is also showing some subtle fear in her eyes. “Frank, I think you are right. You are having some kind of breakdown. You and I are happily married and have loved each other for years. We met in college and have never been apart.” “I’m sorry Joyce. I don’t mean to concern you but I have lost those memories. I remember this house but not you and me. Also look at this tattoo. I have no idea where it came from.” I get up and walk to the bed. I see Joyce pull back a little and I can’t blame her. She is wide eyed when she sees the tattoo. “What does it say?”

“Never Give Inn, but it is written backwards so you can see it in the mirror.” “You’re telling me you don’t remember getting that? It must have hurt.” “I know. That is the confusing part about the tattoo.” “I need to call Doctor Windsor. He should take a look at you to see if there is something wrong metabolically. Your blood sugar might be out of whack or something.” I can see a small tear in the corner of her eye and I can tell this Joyce is getting upset. I go back to my chair so that she won’t feel threatened. “One other thing.” “Oh God. What?” I undue the strap on my watch and throw it to her. “Take a look at that.” The watch lands on the bed and she picks it up. She turns it over to see the face. Her eyes get wide again. “Frank. You are starting to scare me. Who did this to your watch?” “I am telling you that I was bitten by a wolf in my dream and as you can see it looks like it really happened.” “Okay that’s all I can take. As soon as his office opens we are going to Doctor Windsor’s and sit there until he can see us. In the meantime, come lay down and I’ll get a cloth for your forehead.” I don’t ever remember my Joyce as giving a damn about me. This Joyce seems to really care. I get up and walk to the bed. Joyce pulls back the cover and I slide in. I have to admit it feels good to lie down. Joyce sits up and pulls the covers up higher under my chin. I feel like a boy being tucked in. She gets up and goes into the bathroom. I hear the water running and after a little bit she comes back with a cloth and a glass of water. “I have one of my sedatives that I want you to take and then try to take a nap until it is time to go.” I don’t have the will to fight so I take the pill from her and swallow the entire glass of water with it. She puts the cloth on my head and it feels soothing. I guess she really knows about taking care of crazy people. “Can I ask a couple of questions before I go to sleep?”

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“Sure. Don’t know if I will have answers.” “Do we have any children?” “No. We have tried but so far no luck.” “Am I the head of a multinational company? I was in my dream.” “You are an investment banker on Wall Street. A very successful banker.” “So we have enough money?” “Yes dear. You provide very handsomely.” “Please hold my hand I am starting to feel like I am slipping away.” “That’s just the drug Frank. You will be fine. Close your eyes and relax.” I decide to give into the pleasant warm feeling that spreads over my body and that is the last thing I remember. “Wake up Frank.” I hear a voice from somewhere else. “This is Sergeant Dwyer and I am demanding that you get up.” I am really confused since the last thing I remember is asking Joyce to hold my hand. I open my eyes and see a police officer trying to pull me up by the hand. I weakly try to respond to him while having some difficulty getting up. “What’s going on?” I ask. “You’ve passed out in the park again Frank, and I need to take you to the county lockup. I’m going to book you on public intoxication. I have no idea how long you have been lying here, but for the last time get up.” “Wait I haven’t been drinking.” It is the same cop from my last dream and I need to get through to him this time. Wait a minute, I think. This is a frigging dream. How in the hell can I change anything. “Yeah sure Frank you say that all the time. I told you the last time that I was going to take you in if it happened again. I need to do this for your own protection. It is obvious by your behavior that the shelter cannot be responsible any longer.” I let go of Dwyer’s hand and fall back down. “Please god help me.” “God has better things to do Frank than to

help someone who won’t help himself.” Dwyer grabs my hand again and yanks me to my feet. I am very weak and try to get a sure footing but seem to be having trouble working my legs. Dwyer puts his arm around my waist and provides the support necessary to walk to his patrol car. He places me against the car and while holding me with one hand he opens the back door. He then takes both my hands and sort of eases me into a sitting position is the back of the car. He places his hand on the top of my head to prevent me from hitting the door opening and lets me go. He grabs my legs and swings me inside. He then pulls the seat belt around me and snaps it in place. Seeing that I am safely in the car he tells me to watch my hands and slams the door. I blink a few times to clear the tears out of my eyes. Dwyer gets in the driver’s side. “We are off to the Never Give Inn,” he says. He starts the car. I blink again and then his statement hits me. “What did you say?” I did not mean to, but yell at Dwyer. “Relax Frank,” he says. He frowns back at me in the mirror. “What’s the problem?” He looks in the rear view mirror and I can tell by his eyes that he can see that I am upset. “You said Never Give Inn.” “Yeah so what?” “What does it mean?” I am now sounding really shaky. Dwyer can sense I am on the edge so he goes overboard in his explanation. “That is the name we have for the county lock up. We call it that since most of the people in there are multiple offenders and never give in to law abiding behavior.” I barely hear the whole explanation as the world goes dark yet again as Dwyer puts the car in drive.

John Howell's main interests are reading, writing and sometimes arithmetic. He began writing full time in April 2012 and writes fictional short stories and novels. His short story, Cold Night Out won honorable mention In the Writer’s Digest 2012 Popular Fiction Award contest. John lives on a barrier island in the Gulf of Mexico off the coast of south Texas with his wife, two cats, one Boxer, and a Silky Terrier.


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an ode Has fallen ill -Steven Fortune I've been married to this left margin ever since my handwriting overthrew my fingers and vaulted the burlesque autonomy of scribble over jagged nail Rockies of prescription slips into the indifferent trampoline of typed receipts A lazy palm walked me up the crimson aisle flanked to the right by an ink blue congregation No exotic shaped honeymoons in wordy poems indecipherable to undressing eyes Then I met a girl an acrylic shepherdess amid a pony-maned pasture of graphite prospering beneath a canopy of wax rainbow When I tried to speak my throat catapulted every word I ever wrote up and through my epileptic mouth in congealed dollops of belated blue Rubber trees uppercut

the revolted earth like crew-cutted zombies summoned by a jealous bride to remiss the infidelity brewing in my brain in the shape of regret over never learning how to speak in circles Forgive me shepherdess of spectrum Words never sleep

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Steven Fortune was honored to appear in Issue 3 of Miracle E-zine and is excited by the prospect of being a part of future issues. He began experimenting with creative writing in high school and would go on to study and acquire a Bachelor Of Arts in English Literature and History. He also served as Editor of several campus publications. His literary influences span centuries and range from Homer and Shakespeare to Coleridge and Tolkien.


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Can you tell us a little about yourself? I am a 36 year old man born in Plainfield and bred throughout the neighboring towns and cities of NJ. By trade, I am a senior technical project manager and owner of a web technology firm located online at www.elwci.com. I believe in hard work, sacrifice, dedication, individuality, and equality. Writing these books made me realize that it truly takes time to come to completion.

What does being creative mean to you? Creativity is a natural form of expression. Creativity allows our minds to expand and evolve. Creation takes time and perfection to the artist is an infinite form of expression. What inspires you the most? Everyday life inspires me the most. The fact that each day is different than the prior and tomorrow is never promised. Everyone has a different view on life and my ability to create a literary canvas that people can relate to and discuss is wonderful to me. I enjoy that my book is being well received and my writing is not done in vain. How did you initially started writing poetry? I needed a way to express myself. I never knew that I was going to write as much as I have. I started writing so that one day I could reflect on my thoughts of the past. Someone read my material and said I had a very unique style. As I started to journal more I realized that this

Author Interview

Lawren Greene

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style is mine and that I had so much to express. I have had the opportunity to see and contemplate so much in my short period of time on this Earth. Can you tell us something about your new poetry collection? I created “Diary of a Waterman” to be the final master volume of the poetry. There are over 255 individual literary pieces of work residing within 5 books (7 – 11); all which I combined into one the 2nd master volume. I feel I engineered this book like that of a building. Each work is it’s own room within the building and presents its own feeling and theme. How was your journey towards getting your first book published ? It was very time consuming; roughly 12 years are included in the body of work. The first Master Volume: “Mortally Immortal” (books 1 –6) was where it all started. Is there a message you want your readers to grasp? Every page in the book is open to interpretation. I created this piece of work for an individual to consciously absorb the material. I wanted to open my life experiences and thoughts to the reader. Upon completion of the book my soul felt much lighter as a major weight was lifted. There were so many things that I wanted to poetically release. I needed to write the book to get to a new stage in life. Without it’s creation and all the tribulation that went into it I would not be where I am today. The creation of the book was certainly a personal journey. It takes a lot to write honestly about your thoughts and experiences as you go through life. Through my book I wish people to realize that we all need one another; no one person stands alone. The world is such a small place and we all have so many big agendas but we are all very special in our right and can make some type of positive change.

The Great Mansion -Amit Herlekar Its a majestic thing to all who see The Mansion across the horizon With rose gardens and tall trees Stood tall on its stead - Unshaken Passing by the moor, an old man often Smiled gladly when his eyes caught This magnificent structure - Abandoned By time, which was once admired a lot


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It was a palace all sang and danced, it Prayed For everyone to Live and Enjoy Life with charm Where grandmas baked and children played It welcomed every living soul - With open arms It was a home for Lovers of Romance In the rose garden, under the starry night Embracing each other in a complete trance For all other eyes it was a delightful sight Now he stood very close to it - Very upset Admiring every detail crafted up by pouring sweat Then his proud smile gradually began to fade When the liveliness was lost - What fate! He couldn't accept its failure in the struggle With time, of being the dear thing - Forever Where he saw little kids play and giggle Is now filled with haunting silence allover It was once a Castle of a Great King And there were celebrations all the time Everything is blown away by howling wind For Emptiness to prevail like Eternal Sunshine Its neither pleasing those New Eyes Nor it is a structure of glory anymore He wonders why it can't be otherwise Why can't it stand a chance anymore? It steals attention of anyone passing on the way But it remains just as good as anything to watch "It was a great mansion" - is what they say And share its stories holding a glass of Scotch He longs to live in the mansion - As Before Thinking he could rediscover his inner self But it looked old fashioned and he couldn't adore As it is gravely beaten by time - Like himself Left in ruins, will it die alone in oblivion? Or survive as a legend in pages of History? Why does anyone care where he is buried in When all his noble deeds are deemed ordinary Thus goes the song of roaring Rise and silent Fall All the hard worked footprints slowly get erased Time always wins to cause imminent Downfall Paving way for the new breed of things to race

Amit is a software professional. He started blogging in 2011. He wrote mostly about personal musings. During the end of 2011, he started poetry. Posts in 2012 is full of book reviews and poems. Writing has become his passion now and would like to continue writing for the rest of his life.

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mildew Adornments -Paul Tristam

She rose up out of her depression shook her mildew adornments away. Took a deep breath while smiling then again started on her way. Her road of life seemed clearer for the first happy-go-lucky mile. But when she met her first person a frown quickly conquered her smile. She stopped beneath a tree of fear until the stranger passed from view. She just sat there crying for hours simply not knowing what else to do. Safe in the shelter of her misery her paranoia once again became bold. As she sat staring at nothing her adornments began to mould. As night descended with its fury she placed her head between her knees. The wolves howled within her mind as she rotted with the autumn leaves.

Fungus Lining Walls of flesh -Jeremiah Walton Watch flesh stretch over arches of skeleton Tan putty malleable melting plastic, ragged meat doll wrap encasing bones Massages of eternity & farts of poetry mark tongues shaving erect hairs of swirl stained white.

Paul Tristram is a Welsh writer who has poems, short stories and sketches published in many publications around the world, he yearns to tattoo porcelain bridesmaids instead of digging empty graves for innocence at midnight, this too may pass, yet.


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Shaded dawns pencil sketch new days, new night Over turning vehicles for pocket cigarettes and cancer change Lucky 7s, backyard hick creationism. God is connection between consciousness. We all experience God 5 hours a day. Fires laugh small embers kissing ash, loving souls of shoes Feet soldered to woodlands, floors, and misshapen fire pits. Skeleton shifting, casting shadows long past the fungus having rotted, long ears and snouts sniffing long living historical dead snuffed into cavern closed mind Dancing skeleton dancing skeleton dancing skeleton skeleton dancing round backyards Investigating horror circles with acute angles Silly squares push peddles of Men Skeletons push folds of flesh Moon stitched fungus grows uncontrollably The Mirror laughs louder

SIX ANGELS -Gerardo Delgadillo

ala learned about the angels on a starry night, sitting outside with Mommy.

“There are six angels looking after you,Pumpkin,” Mommy said, her smile as big as a chocolate cookie. “They are three baby boys, and three precious baby girls.”She pointed at the sky. “And they love you very much.” She placed her hand on Gala’s cheek. “Remember that.”

Gala tilted her head, pressing her mom’s warm hand against her cheek. Looking up, she smiled. Are the angels watching me? Right now? What do they look like? Do they have wings? What color are they? Mommy sighed and caressed Gala’s black hair. “I love you.” Gala hugged her. “Love you too, Mommy.” Every night, Gala would open her window, search the sky, and wonder if the angels

G

Jeremiah Walton was born February 12th, 1995, in New England. He manages Nostrovia! Poetry, a small publishing press dedicated to the youth and promoting poetry. He is author of LSD Giggles, Modus Operandi, and To Your Health: Humanity's Diagnosis.


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were shiny stars, but only found tiny, brilliant dots. One night, when Gala wore her favorite candy-n-cookie jammies, Mommy tucked her into her bed, kissing Gala’s forehead. “Why do the angels never visit me?” Gala asked. “Because they live far, far away,” Mommy replied. “They also live here, Pumpkin,” She patted Gala’s chest, right where she’d said her heart was. But Gala wanted to see the angels. That same night, she woke up, but it was still dark. For sure Mommy and Daddy were sleeping. She slid off her bed, took Leggie, her stuffed ant, and climbed up the stairs to Daddy’s work room. Moonlight filtered through the windows. Gala tightened Leggie against her chest. “It’s okay—the Boogieman is afraid of the light,” she whispered and looked around, making extra sure he wasn’t there. She shuddered. “He’s not here,” she added, “He’s not here.” She rushed inside Daddy’s room, closing the door behind her.Daddy’s old desk sat on one corner, darker than ever, while his tools dangled on the wall like upside down bats. A whiteboard hung on the opposite wall, but the bricks’ usual red color seemed brown. A familiar cold chill ran down her neck. “The Boogieman is here!” Gala brought Leggie to her nose and took a deep breath, inhaling her comforting fragrance—she knew Mr. Boogie hated that perfume. After a few moments, she dared to look up, but an unfamiliar light forced her to gasp and look at the floor. Now, her cold legs told her something was wrong.“Let’s try again,” Gala whispered to Leggie, raised her head, and sighed. She’d been so silly.She smiled at the glow-in-the-dark stars shining on the ceiling—there were so many. Are the angels there? She searched but found none. She ambled to the window and stopped right in front of the big, white tube Daddy used to watch the sky, his planet gazer.She dragged a chair, climbed in it, and peeked through the lens, but found no angels. Gala placed her hand over her chest. Mommy said the angels could be there. But how could she see inside herself? She sighed and went back to her room.

In her bed, she closed her eyes but couldn’t sleep. She turned to one side, then to the other but stayed awake. Mommy’s room, she thought. Not a bad idea. But Mommy had told her that when she could show her age with more than one hand, it was time to be brave and stay in her own room and,since her last birthday, Gala needed a finger of her free hand. Gala shook her head at this thought. She shut her eyes and imagined a herd of sheep jumping over a fence. One, two, three, five, ten, seven… “What ya’ doin’ hea?” a voice said.She opened her eyes and found a stuffed pink sheep.“What ya’ doin’ hea?” the voice repeated. She squinted. “Who are you?” “Who are ya’? She’saskin’. Can you believe it?”Gala shook her head and blinked.“What!” the sheep added. “You’ve never seen a pink sheep?” Not a talking one, Gala thought, but she was afraid to speak. A stuffed monkey appeared behind the sheep. “She’s new. What is your name,Sweetheart?” he said in a low tone and smiled, showing huge teeth. Gala held Leggie tight. “Ga-gala.” Mr. Sheep scratched his head. “Gala? What kinda’ name’s that?” She sat on her bed. “Mommy says my name means special occasion.” “Special occasion?” the sheep echoed, still scratching. “Sheep,” the monkey intervened, “be nice. She just, you know, met us.” At this, Sheep smiled, and a drop of his saliva fell onto Gala’s face. Gala wiped her cheek. “Yuck.” “Sorry,” replied Sheep. “Can’t control my body liquids—know wada’ mean?” “She doesn’t,” replied the smiling monkey. “I’m Monkey.” Sheep and Monkey stared at her. Gala covered her face with her hands. When she peeked they stood there, still staring. “Mommy?” she asked. “She ain’t here,” replied the sheep. “Besides, wer’ only the mess—messon—messers.” “Messengers,” corrected Monkey. “We have a message for you, Miss Odson.” Gala recognized her last name. She looked at Sheep, then at Monkey.

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“Message?” “Course,” replied Sheep. “You’ve won a prize! You’re richer than a slice of triple chocolate cake.”Mr. Monkey glared at Mr. Sheep.“He’s got the message,” added Sheep, dropping more saliva, pointing his hoof at Monkey. “I ain’tgot nothin’ to do with it.” Monkey took a parchment from his furry back and held it in front of him. He cleared his throat. “The Alliance welcomes you and extends you a cordial invitation to their castle. If you decide to ignore us, we’ll be forced to turn all off all the lights.” Monkey looked at Gala intently. “That’s worse than the Boogieman.” Gala held Leggie tighter. “That it?”Sheep asked. “Yes.” Monkey smiled and faced Gala. “Are you coming, Sweetheart?” Gala shivered. Under-the-bed monsters loved darkness, and there was the Boogieman too. “Okay,” she said. “Okay!” said Monkey and turned around. “Follow us.” The stuffed animals rushed to Osote, her giant stuffed panda, and opened his belly.A rainbow came out of him—so pretty. Sheep turned around. “You fly?” Gala remembered the girl who flew using fairy dust. “Can I?” Monkey faced her. “Can you?” “Can I?” asked Gala, once again. “You fly?” asked Sheep. “Can you?” repeated Monkey. Gala sighed, looking down. “No, I can’t.” She looked up. “But I can run.” Sheep stepped closer. “Run?” He gave her a loud laugh. “She can run!” This time his saliva bathed Gala. “Yuck!” Gala said. “Sorry.” As she wiped the liquid, she felt lighter, so she looked up. The ceiling came closer, and closer, until Gala could touch it. How? She glanced down. Sheep and Monkey now stood by the beautiful rainbow. Monkey chuckled. “You can fly now.” Sheep’s saliva worked like fairy dust. Galastretched her arms toward the Panda. “I’m coming.” She flew inside the opening on Osote’s belly but as soon as she entered, warm rain hit her face so hard, she barely saw

her new friends flying toward a tall, gray mountain. A village sat at the mountain’s feet. Where is the castle? She wondered. They descended toward the town and landed on a small street surrounded by black and white doll houses. Actually, the whole town was black, gray, and white. As they sauntered on the black velvet ground, a rag doll appeared through a window. She had her face buried in her hands. Monkeylookedat the gray sky. “It’s the rain.” He shook his head. “She’s been like this since it started pouring.” He frowned. “And she hasn’t stopped since.” Sheep pointed his head to the sky and opened his mouth. “Endless water.” Gala pointed at the black clouds. “It never stops?”Her friends shook their heads. They continued strolling in silence. Once in a while, distant lightning lit up the gray mountain, making Gala jump a bit. They stopped in front of a two-story house, which had more windows than the fingers on Gala’s hands. On the roof, two chimneys expelled smoke that smelled like hot cocoa with marshmallows. Sheep pointed to a path in front of them. “Alliance Castle’s way.” “This?” Gala asked.“A castle?” “Where you expecting a castle?”Monkey asked. Gala scratched her elbow.“Yes.” “It is a castle,” Sheep said, crossing his front legs. Gala stopped scratching and glared at Monkey. “Sheep’s right, Sweetheart,” said the monkey. “It’s not a castle but it’s a castle.” She frowned. Sheep placed his hooves on Gala’s rain-drenched shoulders. “It’s the Alliance Castle not a King’s castle—know wada’ mean?” This time Monkey pointed to the white path. “The Alliance is waiting for you.” Gala took a few steps, pressed one foot on the cushy lane, and strolled. It felt like walking on fluffy cake. A door resembling a rectangular cinnamon cookie sat at the end. She looked over her shoulder. Her friends hadn’t moved. “Are you coming?” she asked. “You’re on your own, Sweetheart,” Monkey said. “The Alliance didn’t invite

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us.” She gasped. In her rush, she forgot Leggie, and Gala wanted to hug her and smell her, but this time she was alone. She stopped, looked at the tall, gray door, and turned around. “No,” said Sheep. “You don’ wan’the Alliance to turn off all the lights in your house, do you?” The image of the Boogieman appeared in Gala’s head. She sighed and turned back, heading for the door. She had guessed right, the entrance smelled like cinnamon, and it had sugar too. She pressed a dark chocolate doorbell and waited. The door opened, showing a white and gray candy cane as tall as Daddy. The candy cane looked down at Gala. “To whom may I direct your request?” She waved. “Hi.” The piece of candy rolled what appeared to be his eyes. “To whom may I direct your request?” “I’m Gala, and I’m here to see the… Alliance?” The cane produced a sheet of paper and inspected it. “Gala…” He shook his head.“You are not on the invitee list.” He slammed the door shut. She looked over her shoulder, but her friends weren’t there, and the constant rain poured over her head. She knocked. Once again, Mr. Candy Cane opened the door. “To whom may I direct your request?” By now, he sounded like her annoying cousin’s toy robot. She remembered the invitation. “Miss Odson.” He slid his finger over the list, stopping midway through. He turned around, heading inside. “Follow me.” As soon as she entered, her clothes, hair, all of her, dried. The castle had tall walls covered with books, carpet with cotton candy drawings, and a chocolate fountain as big as the backyard’s pool. But everything was white, gray, or black.Mr. Candy Cane climbed up the Lego stairs, and Gala followed. On the second floor, a lady as old as Mommy sat behind a desk, reading a book. The cane cleared his throat. “Miss Odson has arrived.”He rushed down the stairs. The lady looked up, showing a nose longer

than a carrot and tiny, oval eyes, her black hair tied in a bun. “Come closer,” she said. What if I turn and just run all the way back home? Gala thought, but knew the Boogieman would be waiting for her. She shivered. She approached the desk. Up close, a giant wart sat on top of the lady’s nose, making her look like a hatless witch, but she wasn’t a witch, was she? “You’re such a precious little girl,” said the lady. Her eyes narrowed and an evil smile grew on her face, as if precious meant yummy.She pinched her huge wart, inspected her hand, and then smeared her fingers on her white blouse. The lady pressed a button on her desk. “Miss Odson is here.” She directed a long, bony finger to an entrance as tall as Gala. “The Alliance is waiting for you.” The witch-looking lady checked her wristwatch. “It’s late! I have to fly.”She rushed to a window, put on a pointy, black hat, and grabbed a long and skinny, salt sprinkled breadstick. She rode the cracker and flew outside. Gala decided to end this journey, so she marched to the door and entered a small room. This time her two hands had enough fingers to count the nine chairs. A puppet theater sat on the back of the room. “Take a seat,” said a voice in a lower tone than Daddy’s. She did as the voice instructed, choosing a seat on the middle row.“Closer,” demanded the voice. This time she sat in the front. The sound of curtains opening broke the silence, showing an empty stage. A snowman cookie marched to the center of the platform. “Hi, Gala,” he said. “My name is One.” Gala loved cookies. She waved and smiled. “And I’m Roberto, Cutie,” said a gingerbread man, joining One. “Two,” added a fireman cookie that had also joined them. They put their arms around each other and grinned. “We like you,” said Roberto. “Do you like us?” “Yes.” Gala stood and clapped. The cookies bowed and blew kisses toward her. Then they walked backstage, and Gala didn’t know what to make of this, so she sat.

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A Spanish doll, as pretty as Aunt Julia’s fifth birthday gift, appeared on the stage. “Hola,soy Juanita,” she said and curtsied. Gala’s favorite aunt’s smiling face and snow white, curly hair appeared inside Gala’s head. Gala grinned. A white pony with a smooth tail and long eyelashes followed. “Hello. My name is Polly.” Once again, Gala waved and wondered how this place would look in color. To her surprise, the crying rag doll entered the stage, her chin glued to her chest. “Three,” she said and hid behind Juanita and Polly. “Why are you crying?” Gala asked the doll. “She’s sad, you know. The rain,” replied the snowman cookie. The rag doll walked to the front. “It’s not that,” she said, still looking at the floor. “It’s just…” “O-kay,” said Roberto, stretching out his arms. “We are the Alliance.” Gala pointed at the six of them. “You?” “Si, señorita.” Juanita nodded once. “Do you have a message for me?” Gala said. “Yes,” said Roberto and beckoned the rag doll to come closer. He whispered in her ear and she smiled. He faced Gala. “We have something very important to tell you.” “What is it?” Gala asked, motioning him to continue. “We are your angels.” He grinned. “My angels?” she asked, raising an eyebrow. “Si, si, si.”Juanita jumped and clapped. Three, the rag doll, extended her arms toward Gala. “Come here.” In a blink, Gala shrunk and stood by them at the stage. They hugged her tight, and it felt just right, so she hugged them back. Gala faced One, the snowman. “Why do you, Two, and Three have number names?” He sighed. “Because She didn’t have time to name us.” He pointed at the others. “Roberto, Juanita, and Polly have pretty names, don’t you think?” Gala nodded. “Let’s go!” urged Polly, the pony. They jumped out of the stage and rushed

outside, Gala following behind. When they got out of the castle and to her surprise, the rain had stopped, and the sky showed a huge rainbow. The colors are back!Gala thought and admired the village with wide eyes. “This is pretty. Who fixed it?” Roberto, the gingerbread cookie, smiled. “You.When Three is sad, the sky is sad, but now she’s happy. She had missed you so much.” “Missed me?” Gala asked. “Say hi to Mommy,” Roberto said. “Tell her we love her very much.” “What?” But nobody answered. A rainbow picked Gala up, lifting her into the air, and she flew until she crashed on her bedroom’s floor. When she looked back, Sheep and Monkey waved goodbye as the opening on Osote’s belly closed. Gala climbed back into her bed and grabbed Leggie. “Was it a dream?” she asked the stuffed ant. But Gala knew it had happened. She closed her eyes and this time she didn’t have to count sheep. Mommy shook Gala’s shoulder.“Wake up, sleepy.” She squinted. The morning’s sunlight poured through the window. “I saw the angels, Mommy.” Mommy arched her eyebrows. “What did you say?” “The six angels, Mommy.” “Where?” Mommy sat on the edge of the bed. Gala pointed at Osote. “In the candy and cookie world.”Mommy gave her a blank stare.“Their names are One, Two, Three, Roberto, Juanita, and Polly,” added Gala. Mommy looked at the ceiling. “Roberto... Juanita... Polly.” Tears welled on her eyes. “Why are you crying, Mommy?” She wiped the tears from her face. “Happy—I’m happy.”If Mommy was happy, why was she crying? Mommy hugged Gala extra-tight. “They are your angels, Pumpkin, your baby brothers and sisters living in heaven.” Originally from San Francisco, Gerardo Delgadillo

lives in Frisco, Texas with his family and a howling beagle that doesn’t let him sleep. Because of this, Gerardo writes dreamy-weird stories when he’s half-awake.


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I Paint My Mind -A.J Huffman in dyslexic colors of absence across panoramic pages, bleached white. My thoughts streak, feathers fed through a blow-dryer, bloody carcass stains. I am re-born in this portrait of abysmal. Color of alarm, a fitting cloak, imbues my palette, a seeping base, howling at every attempt to find the light.

A.J. Huffman is a poet and freelance writer in Daytona Beach, Florida. She has previously published six collections of poetry all available on Amazon.com.She has also published her work in numerous national and international literary journals. She has is the editor for six online poetry journals for Kind of a Hurricane Press ( www.kindofahurricanepress.com ). Find more about A.J. Huffman, including additional information and links to her work at http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100000191382454 and https://twitter.com/#!/poetess222.

Submissions for Issue 6 are currently open!

Theme: Music

Your artworks and literary pieces can be any topic while we would love to read theme based works.

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ne of the first movies that introduced 3D effects to a wider audience was in the prequel Alice in Wonderland by Tim Burton. Now the people involved in that one are back again with another take on an old fairy tale, only without Tim Burton. This time

Sam Raimi (known for the Spiderman trilogy) gets the chance to show us a beautiful world of wonders and magic and American flags. (Just kidding, there aren’t any flags…) Oz: The Great and Powerful shows us the journey of Oscar, a cheap trickster and how he became the most powerful wizard in Oz. The movie begins in black and white, with a 4:3 aspect ratio, just like in the old times. It feels like the time stood still as an introduction of the carnival setting. Oscar the main character is the wizard of the road show, between the strongest man and other typical actors. He lives a low life with cheap and torn clothes, but strives for so much more. He wants to be a great man that brings the wonders of magic to the world in which he is quite talented. He is so good at them that people actually believe him to make everything impossible possible. This includes a little girl who wants nothing more than to be able to walk again, something impossible for him to grant. The people lose their believe and want their money back. He runs away from not only this but many other problems that occur to him, just to find himself in a hot air balloon within an hurricane. Like in the original Oz is that the way to get into the fairy tale world and his journey begins. The color blazes through the picture and it widens to the normal wide screen, introducing us into the world of Oz. The world of Oz is filled with original flowers, landscapes and animals, mostly known of the original story. We get to see the munchkins, the winged monkeys and the scared lion, just to name a few. The scenery is lovely and feels like a picture, is enriched with so many details to gaze upon. A world that will amaze you, especially in 3D as you can see in the pictures here. Don’t they look lovely? Yes, but only if there is no motion. Whenever the camera spins around there is only left a blurry mess of pixels, which ruins the picture. The beginning had several scenes like that and camera rides that make you dizzy. Bare with them, because this fault lasts mostly a few seconds and is only at the beginning. There are some later scenes but they weren’t as intense as the ones in the beginning. That is also the only stigma in the visual presentation, which is otherwise great. We see many different places like big cities, dark forests or flower beets. The design of the characters is just as good and lively. If it is the little china girl or the winged monkey companion, who is voiced by one of my favorite actors Zac

O

Film Review Oz: The Great and Powerful Reviewed by: Patrick Satters

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Braff. He gets all the laughs, which somehow annoyed some critics. I can say that I liked them and was surprised by the amount of good laughs. The other actors were quite splendid as well, like Mina Kunis or James Franco, who played a lot of parts in Raimis movies. Only one of them fell flat and that was the good witch played by Michelle Williams. Somehow she didn’t manage to show emotion, kinda like Kristen Stewart. The story was a bit dragged on and seemed to lose focus around the middle. In the beginning the world of Oz looks like a parallel world to the real one, with people who have the same problems. A girl who can’t walk anymore and so on. I thought it was a great way that Oz couldn’t run away anymore and finishes what he left off, but as I stated that take part only till the middle. Then everything is about the bad witches, which revelation didn’t surprise as the makers hoped for. We get a bit of drama and misunderstanding, that are typically between man and women. It results in a big fight, which doesn’t feel big or difficult to win. The solution was a bit disappointing, because a single wrong step and it wouldn’t work. Most of it has to do with the effect of believing, which Oz mastered. It’s not a plot hole, but beyond normal behavior. The story goes well with its original source and gives logical explanation, why the world of Oz become this way after Dorothea gets there, which was well executed. To sum things up: Oz the Great and Powerful is a hilarious movie with beautiful pictures, that explains well how the world of Oz becomes the way it is. It shows the journey of a normal man behind Oz mask and why the witches want him dead. The only bad things are the few blurred camera rides in the beginning, which could strain some peoples eyes and the drama of the story, which never feels epic, like the Lord of the Rings did with its big battles. The movie is for everyone who wants to see a nice fantasy film, without shedding blood. It’s the definition of a family movie, which will be enjoyed by parents and kids at the same time.

a journey into Yesterday -Bola Opaleke Your artist hands had reached for my mind Creating fireworks out of snake oil Stroking the back of my tall past Your magical fingers light as wind Brought back memories of where I used to be. I chased after your slender smiles One winter bugged morning of Christmas

Pattrick Satters is a writer and film enthusiast and can be found at: http://patricksatters.blogspot.de/ THE

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Craving only the April warmth To clap and clad in rustling nakedness, shortly Before your glittering deception exploded to my face And left me in Hiroshima mushroom Wondering what it was like to be young. But the white words of wisdom floated in echoes Laughing at the lust I seek, angered By the curves and contours And bubbles of illusions around my loin For the sake of vanity Brash, elusive and beyond my youthful reach If ever I came back alive. These depressions coined after shoreline footprints Oozed scents wrapped around svelte imagination Secrets (of mermaids) hidden beneath ghostly mythology Tottering past the needled darkness In difficult heavy wiggle Scuttling through the shadows of my own innocence. Like an expired poison. I perched atop the green leaf drooping downwards Waiting for a new sunrise My mouth opened to the heavens in risible beggary Savouring this odd state of metastasis Thirsty for more giving Where dehydration become a sign of victory As the green leaf turned mysteriously yellow. But the ropes and chains across my bruised neck Sneaked past your betrayal They laughed at your pride, your loss To never return again as angel I planted your flower as sign of liberation.

Abimbola Opaleke(Pen name - Bola Opaleke) was born in Nigeria in 1973. He was educated through secondary school and later attended Obafemi Awolowo University in Western Nigeria where he graduated with honors.He relocated to Canada in 2011. In 2012 Bola got his first book, a collection of poems published by a US based publisher. A few of his poems and essays have appeared in some online and print magazines.

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Sanya's Last Lantern -Jake Reynolds Over the chiminea, heat rose into a bulbous paper boat with its own flame, cradled in a tiny wooden axis orange wrinkles, as if we’d unfolded the sun Swelling, it elevates like a luminous mollusc, roaming the darkest ocean depths We united in watching the ascent over neighbourhood rooftops it hovered (still hovers?) hot air vessel mocking the engine roar of aeroplanes. The urge to follow it forever was strong but the beckoning warmth of home was stronger.

Installments of Love -David J Delaney A gentle breeze blows down this quiet street as rustling papers echo through the night, while on a corner stands a dim street light where faceless, nameless people sometimes meet. A lone car now approaches then it stops, the driver silhouetted from the glow. He ponders should he stay or should he go, as nervously he glances ‘round for cops. Then, stepping from the darkness feeling cold she’ll spend another long night by his side. It’s been three years since his beloved died, with no-one, how he needs someone to hold, and wonders can he share love once again; just like the love they shared together then.

Jake Reynolds, 18, is looking to study English Literature with Creative Writing as university approaches. He has had two poems featured on the Young Poets Network, a poem featured in a previous issue of Miracle e-zine and in January 2013 completed his first collection of poetry, gaining interest from his local newspaper and the Young Journalist Academy.

As a poet, Delaney has had wonderful support, in Cairns, Queensland, Australia and worldwide. His love for writing and the impact it has on everyday people, has, definitely been an inspiration for him to continue with something he honestly enjoys.


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ost is the art of letter-writing. With helectronic communication (emails, Facebook, txts and Twitter) letter-writing is now something confined to great aunts and the occasional thank you letter. However the format of

a letter gives us great constraints to work with as a writing prompt. Firstly who is sending it and secondly who is it too? Both characters have a particular relationship: what is it? There is also a purpose for the letters being written. Why have they taken the effort to write a letter? This can take you in many directions. For this prompt however I am going to narrow the relationship down. Imagine you receive a letter from the person across the street, who you have never met. It could be quite offensive or a love letter. Write this letter. When you have written this letter. Write another as a response. And a response to the response. So that a story develops. Another prompt (using txts) is to write a poem or story using the constraint of using 140 characters (including spaces) about your morning. The same could be done looking at your status updates over the last year. Could they be used for a poem or story film idea? Writers do not live in a vacuum: communication is our source of survival.

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WRITING WORKSHOP

Prompts & Ideas

By Marie Lightman

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Smoke -Lim Sioh Huang They uncurl in charred wisps, empty Remnants of golden locks. "Come, I promise you eternal warmth!" Cries the sun. They drift to it, still frozen In a lingering memory of spitting fire, Not knowing they have died.

Winter Sheen -Máire Morrissey-Cummins Winds swoop sleet across a bleached sky, bare branches drip with Winter. I seek colour in rosy sunsets, and juice, squeezed from blood oranges. I shine fireside mirrors, buff wooden floors sparkle glass tabletops polish chestnut sofas and settle in the sheen of my sitting room. I burn a rose scented candle,

Lim Sioh Huang, 15, is a Science student currently studying at Nanyang Girls' High School. She writes contemporary poems for supper, as a hobby, and looks up to Hilda Doolittle.


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kindle flames in the wood stove, place a patchwork blanket around my knees, lush green fields of budding Spring. I see sand and blue seas in a collection of shells piled high in a crystal bowl. Cobalt skies flash from a pot of grape hyacinths and the glow of Spring nods from tête à tête on the windowsill. On stormy days, I seek the light within.

In a Wood - Keith Charles Dovoric theres something majestic and ancient about being in a snowy wood during the day the blue complexion of the sky not quite perfect above storms of steaming breath and riddled with tentative clouds one feels like an assassin waiting on the sign of dogs when the other hunters arrive much prey and blood have littered these foot printed realms a small mammal here or there butchered and spread open by a callous hawk i will bide time sit in this sparse cottage house nothing but the small windows domed and clustery like locusts eyes and full of frost to spy the omen a hundred-thousand ancients have already met and been mutilated by

Màire is Irish. She is early retired and has found joy in writing and art. She loves to get lost in words or paint. She has been published with Every Day Poets, Wordlegs, The First Cut, New Ulster, Open Road Review, The Galway Review, Bray Arts, Notes from the Gean, A Hundred Gourds, Lynx and many online and print magazines worldwide.

Keith Charles Dovoric is a writer, musician, teacher, and all-round amicable misanthrope from Essex County, New Jersey. He has published in several esteemed periodicals, including Gloom Cupboard. Noted for his acerbic tone, ironic lyrical twists, and quasi-existential themes, Mr. Dovoric is also an accomplished musician and songwriter.


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Craters -Joanna Ngai i still have a soft spot from a crash arrival of what became embedded onto the surface of my beating heart, the patch stings tender pulsing unstable waves under a watchful sun that in time surely will collapse my core, your impact is my weakest link the chains that bind my feet to move inexplicably, irresponsibly, fear is an old bruise but what i whisper in secret in guilt and awe is of a force capable of offsetting my orbit in such gentleness, fusing indifference into shattering thoughts, i ponder these spots and wonder feeling the voids and collisions within me, feeling their depressions when i am lost.

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Joanna Ngai is studying at the University of Washington.She has been previously published in a Few Lines Magazine,Straight Forward Poetry Journal.


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ird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life by Anne Lamott (Anchor; 1 edition, September 1, 1995)is one of the most inspirational books on writing that I have read to date. Using her vast knowledge and wit, she urges writers to continue writing for the sake of writing as opposed to writing for publication. She focuses on the reality of

writing and the struggles that a writer faces on a day-to-day basis. The inspirational aspect of this book is derived from the reality of a writer’s struggles that she highlights as opposed to glorifying and fictionalizing it. She brings wit, reality, instruction, as well as empathy to prospective writers. Her focus on character development as opposed to the plot of the story. The title of this book pertains to her little brother who at ten years oldwas struggling with a book report on birds and became flustered by the project as a whole. “Just take it bird by bird.” is the advice she had given.This is the underlying message of her book. Most writers feel the pressure of handing in a perfectly written manuscript, flawless and ready for publication. In reality, however, every writer struggles and is asked to either rewrite or reevaluate the work as a whole. This inevitablycauses grief and frustration. She encourages writers to write within this book regardless as to whether or not the work gets published because the joy is within the writing, not of the glorification one gets in publication. Full of wisdom and insight, I recommend this book to anyone who wants a very witty, understanding, insightful, and humorously empathetic look into the world of writers and the reality that they face.

n an alternate level of inspiration, The Last Ringbearer by Kirill Yeskov (Random House, 1999) reads at times like a cross between Clancy and Tolkien, and is the attempt of a Russian scientist to explain a few more of the inner workings of the Lord

of the Rings universe. It begins with a standard setting. The main character is a worn and wounded engineer, wandering the desert with the only other survivor to live through the destruction of his unit, braving enemy held territory to make it to safety. It deviates from this

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standard setting when the reader discovers that our protagonist is an Orc, and is aligned with the "evil" side. He is a likable and well written character, and you can feel for him when he is thrust into a situation beyond what any normal man (or orc, for that matter) would be capable of. The best part of the book is integrating the knowledge you gain with the lore you already know from reading the rest of Tolkiens trilogy. Our hero faces all the problems we know of, and a few we don't, on his quest to save his homeland from invaders. It’s a refreshing take on a classic tale, and a perfect example of military inspiration.

nce you have read Lone Survivor by Marcus Luttrel (Little, Brown & Company, 2008) you’ll begin to question your own capabilities. It says it is an autobiography, but it at times reads like a horror story. This factual account of a failed mission on the border

of Pakistan can easily freeze the hearts of anyone who reads it, but it still manages to put the world in perspective. The writing is straightforward and easy to read, and makes it simple to relate to the author. The book touches on military training that Mr. Luttrell went through, the mission he went on, and the nightmare he endured over the course of the next four days. When I finished it, I couldn't help but think that if the man I had read about and come to know so well could survive trials like that, I could handle anything life could throw at me.

ing’s critically acclaimed book ‘On Writing’ (Scribner; 10 Anniversary edition, July 6, 2010) is part memoir, part instruction manual on how he has developed as a writer as well as his struggles as a writer. Part of what makes this book inspiring is his telling of his

experience of being hit by a drunk driver in 1999 and how writing had assisted in his recuperation. Like Lamott, Stephen King focuses his attention on the development of character as opposed to the plot of the story. Most of the advice he gives is common sense such as organizing the day and making time for writing. He writes of the struggles as he began his writing career including how and where he wrote his famed novel Carrie. Most individuals would find more gratification out of reading this book as it allows readers to see into the life of one of the most influential and popular horror novelists of our time and realize that even he has faced his own struggles throughout his career. The core focus that King stresses upon within this book is that in order to be a successful writer, one must read. I found this book to be quite enjoyable and more inspiring than a biography on the author.

eldom do writers of modern times quite capture the audience the way Heinlein does. Tunnel in the Sky by Robert A. Heinlein (Scribner, 1955, Del Rey 1987) Keeping with the scenario of men surviving and thriving in situations that no one should have to go

through, this classic juvenile tells us of Rod Walker, and a voluntary college level survival class he elects to take. Instead of the backwoods of his home state, Rod is teleported to a different planet, and tasked with his own safety for the next week. When recall fails to happen a week later, he knows that his own survival is no longer at stake, and he takes steps to not only endure, but prosper in this new wilderness. It is hard to not be inspired by both Rod, his friends and family, and the settlement that they help build. I finished the story with a smile on my face. It reads like classic Heinlein, with strong female characters, interesting events, and unique inhabitants. After finishing, you will be able to understand why this story has stood the test of time, still being published after more than half a century. Truly, science fiction at its finest.

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Reviews by Julie Stanley: Bird by Bird and On Writing by Stephen King Reviews by Adam Skidmore: The Last Ringbearer, Lone Survivor, and Tunnel in the Sky


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1. Write a lyrical poem.

2. Write a short story based on the play of William Shakespeare “ Midsummer

Night’s Dream.

Writing Contests

Send in all your entries of the above mentioned writing tasks to [email protected] . the best ones will be featured in the Feburary-March issue. Best of luck!

Also, you can now send in your submissions for the fourth issue of the magazine.


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Dramatic Poem

The Sword -Hanna Sophian I smell the blood on, The piece of metal, That will soon take my life. To them, I does not matter, Whether I am two or seventy-three years of age. All that matters is that, They can take the blood. I try to keep still, For the smallest twitch, Could take my life, Somehow, Hate and Anger have parted from my heart, Only Peace stays with me. I think I can feel it now, But I do not think I can look down, Maybe when I am in Heaven I will, But not now. Yes, the blade is cutting into my shoulder, I am certain, I think. Now I feel dizzy, I hear a laugh, and a cry and I feel a smile, As I see my life pass before my eyes, I am happy I died young. I didn't see much.

Winner Of Last Issue’s Contest


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